It is clear that the public sector pay gap reported to government remains stubbornly high, at 15.5% versus 9% in the private sector. So where within public services is this happening, and why?
In 2018, the first year of compulsory gender pay gap reporting, women working in the public sector earned 86p for every £1 their male counterparts did. In 2021, that dropped to 84p.
The vast majority – 88.7% – of 1,545 public sector organisations reported a median pay gap in favour of men, with 693 paying men at least 20% more than women.
Of the 50 organisations with the widest gaps –private or public sector – 18 were multi-academy trusts, which run academy schools. The Learning for Life Partnership, which operates five primary schools in Cheshire East, reported a median pay gap of 77.2%, with women earning on average 23p for every £1 their male colleagues did, while the Pele Trust in Northumberland had a median gap of 72.5%. In all, 80 academies had gaps of 50% or more.
The Learning for Life Partnership said the pay gap reflected its predominantly female workforce, not pay inequalities, and that staff were paid according to teaching and local authority pay scales.
The health service had some of the biggest pay disparities in the public sector – and again the problem is getting worse. Queen Victoria hospital NHS foundation trust had a 32.1% gap while the clinical commissioning group (CCG) in Coventry and Rugby had the highest gap among CCGs, with a median gap of 35.8%.
As a small specialist surgical hospital, Queen Victoria hospital said highly paid medical consultants formed a much higher proportion of its workforce than elsewhere in the NHS. When the figures were submitted, it had more than twice the number of male consultants than female. “This will change as more female consultants are appointed and our current female doctors progress their careers with us into more senior roles,” a spokesperson added.
Despite making up three-quarters of NHS staff in England, 34 trusts and CCGs reported median pay gaps of 20% or more and 128 had gaps of 10% or more in favour of men. Only 40 NHS trusts had gaps of 5% or less in either direction.
Christina McAnea, the general secretary of the public sector trade union Unison, said: “Bigger pay divides in parts of the NHS are often down to the large number of male highly paid consultants and senior medics on the staff. And senior women are more likely than their male colleagues to downsize their responsibilities and take on lower-paid roles as they approach retirement.”
Among police forces, Leicestershire had the biggest gap of 31.6%; among local authorities, Tonbridge & Malling’s gap of 29.5% was the widest. A spokesperson for Tonbridge & Malling borough council said most of its management, including the chief executive, were women, but that “the contracting out of some services … saw many lower-paid men coming off the council payroll, which has made it harder to achieve balance at these levels”.
Although 15 councils reported gaps of 20% or more, the overall picture in local government is improving, with the median gap now 3.6%, down from 5.8% in 2017-18.
In the civil service, pay gaps have also narrowed, with the average median gap now 8.1%. But some departments have much higher rates, including the Treasury (16.8%), the Department for International Trade (15.9%) and the Ministry of Justice (15.6%).
A government spokesperson said the national gender pay gap had fallen significantly, with 1.9 million more women in work than in 2010, and that ministers were due to publish proposals to “advance equality for women at work, increasing opportunity and tackling the issues that are holding women back”.
But trade unions want the government to go further. McAnea said: “Reporting the figures shines a spotlight on what still needs to change. But only when employers are required to publish action plans for getting to gap zero will true pay equality be achieved.”
