Agenda item

The Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017 requires all employers with more than 250 employees to report annually on their Gender Pay Gap. This report provides to the Committee sight of the Council’s results for this reporting year ahead of publication on the Council’s public website by 31 March 2024 and on the Government dedicated Gender pay gap reporting website.

Discussion:

Members considered a report in line with the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017 which required all employers with more than 250 employees to report annually on their Gender Pay Gap. This report provided details of the Council’s results for this reporting year ahead of publication on the Council’s website by 31 March 2024 and on the Government dedicated Gender pay gap reporting website.

The Head of Council Planning and Programmes highlighted the key issues from the report, stating that Council’s workforce consisted of 74.4% female employees and 25.6% male employees. Whilst the national pay gap for 2022/2023 was 14.3%, the mean pay gap for Medway for 2023/2024 was 6.91%, the lowest level for five years and the median pay gap for the same period was 2.88%.

She also advised the Committee that the detailed gender pay gap results were set out in Appendix 1 to report, comparative data for the Council’s neighbouring authorities at Appendix 2 to the report and whilst there was no legal requirement to provide this information, ethnicity and disability pay gap results were set out in Appendices 3 and 4 to the report.

Members then raised a number of questions and comments, which included:

Ethnicity pay gap – in response to a question regarding the upper middle and upper quartile pay gaps, the Head of Council Planning and Programmes advised the Committee that she had not had time to interrogate the data, however, further analysis would be undertaken as part of the Equality, Inclusion and Diversity Action Plan which would look at a number of issues including the reasons for the variances in the pay gaps.

Disability pay gap – in response to a question regarding lack of bonus pay for staff with disabilities, the Head of Council Planning and Programmes advised the Committee that the only bonus pay for staff was through the 1A MedPay award each year, which was awarded to low numbers (around 30 people in total), hence the low likelihood of disabled staff receiving bonus pay.

Staffing numbers – in response to a question regarding the Council’s staffing numbers set out in the report compared with the information provided at the induction session for this Committee held in June 2023, the Chief Organisational Culture Officer advised the Committee that the figures broadly aligned. However, it was likely that there was a difference in the numbers used for casual staff, given, for example, some staff may have been used in one-off events such as the Medway Test. She undertook to provide the Committee with a briefing note clarifying the numbers regarding the staff establishment.

Gender pay gap results – it was commented that the gender pay gap of 6.91% compared to the national average of 14.3% should be celebrated, together with the ongoing downward trajectory of the gap. In response to a question as to how the Council could further improve, the Head of Council Planning and Programmes advised the Committee that she had not had time to interrogate the data, however, further analysis would be undertaken as part of the Equality, Inclusion and Diversity Action Plan to look at how the Council could make further improvements.

Decision:

The Committee noted the contents of this report in relation to the Gender Pay Gap prior to publication and to also note the ethnicity pay gap results, as set out in Appendices 3 and 4.