Gender Equality: Pay

Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts

Wednesday 21st March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

The noble Baroness asks an interesting question about what comes next. What will come next is that this will shine a light on which companies take their gender pay obligations seriously and which simply do not. If I were a graduate going to a company with a huge gender pay gap, I would start to think about what that company would mean for me as a woman. I think it will draw into sharp focus those companies that take their obligations seriously and shame those companies and public sector organisations that do not.

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

Will my noble friend undertake to look into the position at the BBC, where sick pay and maternity leave are being eradicated by the move to freelance contracts? Is that right? Surely employers should not be able to sidestep their employer obligations in such a radical fashion.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I think what my noble friend refers to with sick pay—I am going slightly beyond my brief here—is the practice whereby people are not employees but freelance, more often than not, for companies. Given the press reporting that there has been on this, I am sure that this issue will be drawn into sharp focus.