The gender pay gap is worse in Britain than anywhere else in Europe, with women in full-time work earning 17 percent less than men, a government-appointed commission said yesterday.

The Women and Work Commission called for a change of culture in schools and workplaces, saying the gap was costing Britain up to 23 billion pounds ($40 billion) a year in lost productivity and wasted talent.

?Many women are working day in, day out far below their abilities,? said Commission chairwoman Baroness Prosser.

?This waste of talent is an outrage at a time when the UK is facing increasing competition in the global marketplace, and an outrage for those women personally,?

The Transport and General Workers Union (T&G) welcomed the report but said the commission should have gone further and recommended a mandatory pay audit.

?Being a woman still means being paid less ? a quarter less than men, which is the highest gap in Europe,? said Diana Holland, T&G's national organiser for women, race and qualities.

?Audits simply ensure an employer is complying with the law. Without an audit, employers will be vulnerable to thousands of individual, costly equal pay cases.?

The report outlined 40 recommendations, including a scheme to give schoolgirls a better understanding of pay and their prospects. It also suggested improved training for women returning to work after having a baby.

It also said girls should be encouraged to think about non-traditional jobs, especially in sectors with skill shortages.

The report, ?Shaping a Fairer Future,? said women with childcare responsibilities often had to take part-time employment below their skill level.

Britain passed the Equal Pay Act in 1970 which gave women the legal right to be paid the same as men.

?We are at a crossroads?, the report said. ?If we do not act now, new management and caring jobs will be created in the next decade but be filled in the same way as in the past, and women will continue to lose out?.

?We found no single, easy solution or magic bullet. Rather, we identified a set of solutions which, taken together, will lead us towards a fairer society and a more efficient economy.?

The report called on the government to fund a 20 million pound package to raise skill levels among women and help them change careers.

The report was commissioned by Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2004. The Post said its survey found The American Red Cross had given out 84 percent of the $2 billion in donations it collected for victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

Fifty cents out of each donated dollars was disbursed in cash to victims, the newspaper said.

The survey found that 6 percent of contributions came in the form of supplies, contributed mostly by corporations.

Fifty-six percent of the remaining donations are controlled by faith-based organizations, according to the newspaper.

<B>Kate Holton </B>