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BBC Gender Pay Gap - Are There Lessons for SMEs?

on Tuesday, 12 September 2017.

The gender pay gap - are there any lessons for SMEs from the BBC's recent experience?

Following the extensive press coverage of the BBC talent pay data published during the summer, employers will be considering how best to present their own gender pay data.

The BBC is in the unusual position of being required to publish the names and pay bands of high earning staff under the terms of its Royal Charter. With only 34 women on a list of 96 names, difficult questions around the BBC's gender pay gap were inevitable.

Private sector employers caught under the Gender Pay Gap Regulations (principally those with more than 250 employees) are not required to publish this same level of detail. Individual identities and pay bands will be protected, and annual salaries will be distilled down into hourly rates of pay.

However, there are some useful takeaways from the BBC disclosure exercise. In particular, it may be sensible to pre-empt potential criticism (both externally, and from your workforce) by using the opportunity, through the inclusion of detailed narrative, to place pay data into context.  This may include reflecting not only on your organisation's current data, but also on what measures can be put in place over the coming years to reduce any gender pay gap over time.

You might also consider if there are broader issues - perhaps outside of the control of your business - which help to lend context to what might otherwise be quite 'stark' data.

Those not caught under the Regulations should maintain a watching brief over how practice in this area develops, as there is talk that over time the threshold could well be lowered.  The Government consultations on Mandatory Gender Pay Gap Reporting saw some respondents call for a lowered threshold and different regulation to support SMEs which are currently exempt.


If you would like to discuss your gender pay data, your reporting obligations under the Gender Pay Gap Regulations or how best to explain your data when reporting, please contact Gareth Edwards in our Employment Law team on 0117 314 5220.

Questions? Please leave a comment below and we'll get back to you.

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