Cul de sac

Progressing the equal pay agenda through legal sanctions has had little effect, but it is in employers' best interests to get to grips with the business case for reasons not just to comply with the law.

The journey to achieve fair pay for women appears to have reached a stubborn road block. The gender pay gap reduced quite quickly in the early years following the introduction of the Equal Pay Act but since then has shrunk very slowly and now seems almost stubbornly stuck. It is still changing insignificantly as in the recently reported Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings figures by the Office of National Statistics.

The ONS figures show the equal pay gap between men and women has improved from 12.6 per cent to 12.2 per cent for full-time work, while the equal pay gap between men and women has also narrowed from minus 3.7 per cent to minus 2.0 per cent for part-time work.

But commentators in the field point to the impact of the recession on men's high earnings in the finance sector as a possible contributor to this change which, if this is the case, means even this small change is not likely to be part of a permanent trend.

Clearly the government continues to face an uphill struggle to promote effective employer action through legal provisions. In the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development's view the proposal to enforce the reporting of gender pay gap information in 2013 under the Equality Bill, if there is not enough voluntary employer action, is not likely to work as a single intervention to trigger vital change.

The onerous equal pay legislation has failed to remove the problem of unfair reward for women in comparison with men even though high profile court cases expose employers to a poor public reputation and a damaged corporate brand.

Damaged reputation can incur serious costs to the balance sheet which is not good news at any time. It certainly does nothing to help organisations survive the turbulence of intense competition in the current tough economic climate.

So why is the challenge of equal pay so difficult to deal with?

Put in a nutshell employers are not on the ball regarding the business case as shown by the new survey evidence about employer practices and attitudes to measuring the gender pay gap in the workplace. This survey gives important clues about a better way to effect progress and re-enforces the importance of education and awareness raising about the business reasons for acting.

An autumn survey conducted by market research company IPSOS Mori, found that fewer than 1 in 5 (18 per cent) private sector employers measure their gender pay gap, the vast majority, and especially smaller employers, considering this unnecessary for their business. In the public sector, where equal pay monitoring is a statutory requirement, 2 in 5 (43 per cent) employers only complete audits to tick the necessary bureaucratic box rather than as part of an underlying effort to advance gender equality.