Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017

Baroness Gale Excerpts

Tuesday 28th February 2017 Grand Committee

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

My Lords, these regulations which are being introduced under powers in Section 153 of the Equality Act 2010 replace and amend the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties) Regulations 2011. Under this power, Ministers can impose specific duties on public authorities to secure the better performance of the public sector equality duty. These regulations replicate the measures from the previous specific duties regulations, namely that public bodies must publish information every year to demonstrate their compliance with the equality duty and set equality objectives every four years.

Tackling the gender pay gap is an absolute priority for this Government. That is why we have used these powers to include new duties for the relevant public authorities, if they have 250 or more employees, to report on their gender pay differences. We have already delivered on our manifesto commitment to introduce mandatory gender pay gap reporting for large employers in the private and voluntary sectors. The Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017 were approved by both Houses last month and signed by the Secretary of State on 6 February.

Of course, it is only right that public bodies, including government departments, are subject to the same reporting requirements. That is why we announced in October 2015 that we would be extending the manifesto commitment to the public sector. We want government to be a trail-blazer and lead by example. These regulations apply to specified public authorities in England, non-devolved organisations and certain cross-border authorities. Scottish and Welsh public bodies are subject to separate specific duties regulations. The devolved Administrations in Scotland and Wales have been consulted on the proposed changes. Both sets of regulations will require the same gender pay gap calculations and use the same methodology for calculating the data.

Public authorities that are subject to these regulations will need to publish the mean and median differences between the average hourly rate of pay for male and female employees. They will need to publish the mean and median differences between the average bonuses paid to male and female employees. They will also need to report on the proportions of men and women who receive bonuses, and the proportions in each quartile of their pay distribution.

All specified public bodies will need to publish their gender pay gap data on a website that is accessible to members of the public. Organisations will also need to upload data to a government-sponsored website, which will allow us to establish a database of compliant employers and closely monitor compliance. We have aligned the reporting timetables and obligations as closely as possible for employers in different sectors to achieve consistency and comparable sets of data. The two sets of regulations will provide unprecedented transparency on gender pay differences in all sectors and create the environment needed to drive change. I beg to move.

[Baroness Gale (Lab)]

My Lords, first, I thank the Minister for bringing these regulations before us tonight. We waited seven years for the Government to come forward, but I am very pleased that they have finally introduced mandatory pay audits for large companies in the private and voluntary sectors. It is a shame that it has taken this Government so long to bring into force the measures created by the last Labour Government, but at least now we are taking some steps forward, which is very good. I commend the Government for extending the mandatory pay gap reporting duties to public sector employers, as they promised to do in October 2015. This again is another step forward towards progress.

The regulations discussed today, under Section 153 of the Equality Act, mirror almost exactly the regulations under Section 78, although I have concerns that some of the new duties could have gone further. As with the duties on private and voluntary sector organisations, they apply only to public authorities with 250 employees or more. The maintenance of such a high employee threshold for application of these duties in the public sector was raised as a concern by a significant number of organisations and individuals responding to the Government’s consultation, but the Government have chosen not to set a lower threshold for public bodies.

It is understandable that the Government would want to create comparable data between the public sector and private and voluntary sectors but, clearly, limiting the application to public sector bodies with more than 250 employees will severely limit the number of public authorities caught under this regulation. The Government claim that of course a public authority of any size could choose to adopt mandatory reporting, but to what extent will a voluntary expectation create practice in reality? What communication does the Minister intend to have with all public bodies, regardless of their number of employees, to encourage them to publish their gender pay gap information? Have any indicated to her that they will take this voluntary action? In the consultation response, the Government promised to keep under review setting a lower employee threshold, but failed to give an assurance on a timescale. When will this be reviewed? What evidence will she require to persuade her that the figure of 250 employees is too high a threshold?