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Ministers are urged to shame employers into closing gender pay gap
Nicholas Cecil, Chief Political Correspondent06.01.09
COMPANIES face being shamed into closing the pay gap between men and women.
Ministers are being urged to introduce legislation to force firms to publish details of the number of their employees - by sex - in different pay bands.
The measure is being pushed by the Equality and Human Rights Commission and the Solicitor General, Vera Baird, is said to be sympathetic to it.
Business chiefs have, however, voiced their opposition.
Full-time male workers are paid 17.1 per cent more than similarly qualified women, according to government figures, with the pay gap doubling for part-time employees.
Lady Prosser, deputy chairwoman of the commission, believes publishing pay band league tables would speed up the drive for equality.
She said: "It's enough to give a good picture of which firms are lagging behind when it comes to equality. That's not a good image to have and those firms will just have to do something about it if they don't want to be embarrassed."
Business leaders questioned the benefit of such a scheme and warned against adding to bureaucracy.
Neil Carberry, head of employment at the CBI, said: "Forcing companies to reveal meaningless statistics will not tackle the real causes of gender inequality. The key cause of the pay gap is occupational segregation.
"Better careers advice for girls, better advice on parental rights and more high quality childcare will all help address this issue."
John Wright, head of the Federation of Small Businesses, added: "We are hopeful there will be some thought given to the impact on small employers of any mandatory audit of pay scales."
The Government's equalities office is reportedly drawing up an amendment which could be included in the Equality Bill to bring in compulsory publication of pay bands.
Companies found to be paying women less would come under pressure from unions and other groups to address any differential.
Sarah Veale, head of equality and employment rights at the TUC, said she backed such a move, adding: "It makes good business sense and those companies that do so already have found them beneficial."
She said companies had failed to do enough voluntarily to tackle the pay gap.
The Equality Bill will allow firms to discriminate in favour of female and ethnic-minority job candidates if they are equally qualified as men or white people.
