PAY DISCRIMINATION
HR professionals back mandatory pay audits
Two-thirds of HR professionals believe employers should be forced to carry out equal pay audits, according to a large-scale survey published today by e-reward.co.uk, the pay and benefits web site.
The poll shows that among a sample of 377 pay and HR specialists, only 32% of respondents were against the proposal by an equal pay taskforce to change the law to require employers to review their pay systems for sex bias.
Pay consultants in particular are less keen on the idea. The figure for consultants was 49% against mandatory pay systems reviews, with 51% in favour.
Do you think it should be compulsory for employers to conduct pay audits to ensure that pay systems are free from sex bias?
| Job responsibility | Yes | No | Sample size |
| HR, personnel, reward | 68% | 32% | 271 |
| Consultant | 51% | 49% | 53 |
| Academic, researcher, student | 86% | 14% | 7 |
| Senior executive, director, managing director | 75% | 25% | 20 |
| Line manager | 86% | 14% | 14 |
| Other | 92% | 8% | 12 |
| All | 67% | 33% | 377 |
Source: e-reward.co.uk.
Background
EOC urges government to introduce to combat gender wage gap
The Equal Opportunities Commission has told the government that it should be compulsory for employers to conduct equal pay reviews. Without such a move there will be little or no speedy progress in closing the 18% pay gap between men and women, says a recent report drawn up by the EOC's equal pay taskforce.
Government ministers reject proposal for mandatory pay reviews
Speaking at the launch of the EOC report Just pay on 27 February 2001, Tessa Jowell, employment minister, accepted the task force proposal that employers should carry out pay reviews, but rejected the recommendation that they should be mandatory. In her view: Employers should be encouraged to carry out voluntary reviews.
Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development
Commenting on the EOC report, Dianah Worman, adviser on equal opportunities, CIPD, said: The Commission’ s call for a change in the law to require employers to review their pay systems will not achieve the changes, that are unquestionably required, in the quickest timeframe. The CIPD research to be published shortly will show that legal action is in fact the least likely method to bring about change. In contrast, employee pressure and unions are the biggest drivers for taking action to redress equal pay imbalances.
Want to know more about the e-reward.co.uk survey?
Methodology: A questionnaire was emailed to 2,000 readers of e-reward.co.uk on 5 March 2001.
Sample size: A total of 377 useable return were received by the closing date of 12 March — a response rate of about 19%. As many as 72% of our survey respondents work in HR, personnel and compensation departments. The remainder are consultants, line managers, researchers and so on.