PAY DISCRIMINATION
Government confirms October timetable for Equality Act
The coalition government has confirmed that the Equality Act will be introduced from October 2010.
The Equality Act brings together nine separate pieces of legislation into one single Act “simplifying the law and reducing the burden on business by making it easier for firms to comply with discrimination law”. The first wave of implementation of the Equality Act will go ahead to the planned October timetable following the publication of the first commencement order in Parliament this week. This will pave the way for the implementation of “landmark provisions” to tackle the gender pay gap.
%ADVERT%
Pay secrecy
Section 77 of the Act makes it unlawful for you to prevent or restrict your employees from having a discussion to establish if differences in pay exist that are related to protected characteristics. It also makes terms of the contract of employment that require pay secrecy unenforceable because of these discussions.
An employer can require their employees to keep pay rates confidential from some people outside the workplace, for example a competitor organisation.
Gender pay reporting
Section 78 enables the government to require private and voluntary sector employers with at least 250 employees in Great Britain to publish information about the differences in pay between their male and female employees. The regulations may specify, among other things, the form and timing of the publication, which will be no more frequently than annually. The regulations may also specify penalties for non-compliance. Employers who do not comply with the publication requirements could face civil enforcement procedures or be liable for a criminal offence, punishable by a fine of up to £5,000.
This is a new provision. The government wants larger private and voluntary sector employers in Great Britain to publish information on what they pay their male and female employees, so that their gender pay gap (the size of the difference between men and women’s pay expressed as a percentage) is in the public domain. The government’s aim is for employers regularly to publish such information on a voluntary basis. To give voluntary arrangements time to work, the government does not intend to make regulations under this power before April 2013. The power would then be used only if sufficient progress on reporting had not been made by that time.
Reactions
Katja Hall, CBI Director of HR policy, said: “The government has missed an opportunity to say it will remove mandatory gender pay reporting from the legislation. Forcing companies to publish average salary figures for men and women could mislead people into thinking that women are paid less than men in the same role, which is rightly illegal, when differences will actually reflect the proportions of men and women in higher-paid jobs.”
She added: “The policy is also likely to backfire. Companies that have too few women in higher paid roles, and are trying to attract more, would be forced to publish a statistic that could deter female applicants and compound the problem.”
Want to know more?
For more information about the Equality Act 2010:
The Government Equalities Office: www.equalities.gov.uk/equality_bill.aspx
Office for Pubic Sector Information: www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2010/ukpga_20100015_en_1
Equality and Human Rights Commission: www.equalityhumanrights.com/equalityact