Average gender pay gap in education sector is 25%, figures suggest, but FE sector could be the ‘good guy’

The Gender Pay Gap in the education sector is, on average, a whopping 25%, new figures suggest, but the Further Education sector is likely to be the ‘good guy’, says employment law specialist.

ONS statistics show that the education sector overall in the UK has an average gender pay gap of 25%, which makes education one of the worst sectors for pay inequality in the UK.

However, employment law specialist Luke Menzies, director, barrister and solicitor at Menzies Law, said he believes that the Russell Group and Oxbridge universities are likely to contribute heftily to that 25%, whilst the FE sector is likely to be the good guy, probably coming in at around 10%.

“In a speech I gave recently to the Association of College’s annual Employment Law Conference, I emphasised that having a gender pay gap of perhaps 10% or thereabouts is certainly a lot better than the education sector as a whole, and most definitely in a different league to the financial services sector (35%), but it will not let you off the hook or prevent a potential run of equal pay claims,” said Mr Menzies.

“The unions, led by the UCU, are making equal pay a major plank of their campaigning at the moment, and it will be difficult to find a place to hide.  We can expect more and more scrutiny and transparency on who gets paid what, and so every college leadership team and governing body need to ensure their college is getting to grips firmly with understanding what their gender pay gap is and working out where the equal pay legal risk areas may be, in order to close them.”

To add to this, the government recently changed its plans for gender pay gap reporting for the public sector.

They released the changes in August this year, when many college directors and HR professionals were on holiday – and for some, the news may even have slipped through the net.

Mr Menzies said: “Although for the last year we’ve known that private and voluntary sector employers with 250+ employees would need to calculate and publish their gender pay gap figures from April 2017, we had been told that the public sector in England would be spared for now.

“However, in mid-August, when most people were deservedly on a beach somewhere, the Government Equalities Office issued of a second consultation paper on mandatory gender pay gap reporting.  There had been a change of plan. 

“Now all English public bodies are included in the mandatory publication requirement after all.  Moreover, they will not be allowed any additional time to prepare – they will have to publish according to the same rules and timescale as the private and voluntary sector, starting in April 2017.”

The gender pay gap is the difference between female and male average earnings, either within a particular employer or nationally.  It is much more broad than the issue of equal pay, and describes the fact that average women’s pay has stubbornly remained significantly lower than average men’s pay for decades.

Having a gender pay gap is not, itself, unlawful.  However, the reporting of the figures will likely result in a barrage of equal pay claims by women, and therefore this will be a big issue for all public sector bodies in 2017 and beyond.

Ends

Stats and facts:

• All businesses and public sector bodies with 250 or more staff will need to report their gender pay gap as it stands by 5 April 2017
• Non-compliance with this will result in a fine of up to £5,000.
• The national average Gender Pay Gap is 19.2%

What have we learned about the Gender Pay Gap?

• The majority of organisations who will be required to report their gender pay gap from next year will have at least a 10% gender pay gap to report and explain.  Some will be looking at a 20-40% gap. 
• Having a well-designed pay structure or job evaluation scheme does not necessarily mean you will have no gender pay gap or only a minimal one. 
• Decisions on pay are too often inconsistent or are not sense-checked or calibrated around a business.
• A lot of Gender Pay Gaps are not directly caused by sex discrimination by bosses.  Gender Pay Gaps are caused by a range of things, including the choices that women make around work and family commitments and the value that employers and society place on lower paid work – which is often seen as ‘women’s work’. 
• Where any sex discrimination is at play in pay decisions, it is most often unintentional (unconscious bias) and then gets exacerbated and then made worse by being perpetuated over time. 
• Individual salary negotiation is thought to generally favour men over women, as they tend to negotiate differently.  Most organisations still fail to recognise and recalibrate for this.  
• The latest research on requests for pay rises shows that women do, in fact, appear to ask for pay rises as often as men, but they are more often refused.  
• Despite having company guidance or policies in place on pay, many are still not applied or followed correctly.
• Gender pay gap reporting will not only highlight disparities in pay between genders, it will also highlight disparities between genders as regards career progression.