Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jo Swinson and Sarah Champion

Thursday 18th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

The Government’s report, “Think, Act, Report: one year on”, states that 54 organisations have signed up to the Government’s voluntary equality pay scheme. Given that there are 6,000 businesses in the UK that employ more than 250 people, does the Minister think that a 0.9% sign-up rate demonstrates sufficient voluntary progress on equal pay?

[Jo Swinson]

Clearly, we want to increase the number of organisations signed up to “Think, Act, Report”, but we have also been focusing on those that employ the largest number of workers. The current figures show that more than 80 organisations and large-scale employers have signed up, which represents 1.3 million employees. I think that is a key figure, because 1.3 million employees are now protected by companies that are ensuring that they not only consider what they need to do to tackle the pay gap, but act on it and, importantly, through transparency, report on what they have been doing.