Ethnicity Pay Gap

Debate between Paul Scully and Abena Oppong-Asare

Monday 20th September 2021 Westminster Hall

[Paul Scully]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for letting me progress with my speech, because that is exactly the point that I was coming to.

We have continued to work with businesses and other organisations better to understand the complexities identified through the consultation. More recently, we have been working with the Business in the Community app and race at work charter members. My right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes) spoke about people and businesses crying out for reporting. The number of charter members is currently 700, which is up from 300 this time last year, so there is clearly a big push of people signing up to the charter. One of the points in the charter is to collect data on ethnicity and the ethnicity pay gap. This work has looked particularly at action planning and what participating organisations believe to be the key drivers of the ethnicity pay gap: culture and leadership; recruitment; retention; and progression.

In parallel, earlier this year, the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities published its report, setting out a road map to racial fairness in the UK, which made an important contribution both to the national conversation about race and to the Government’s efforts to level up and unite the whole country. In the report, the commission pointed to the statistical and data issues that could affect ethnicity pay reporting and suggested a voluntary approach. It made a further recommendation:

“The Commission recommends that all employers that choose to publish their ethnicity pay figures should also publish a diagnosis and action plan to lay out the reasons for and the strategy to improve any disparities. Reported ethnicity pay data should also be disaggregated by different ethnicities to provide the best information possible to facilitate change. Account should also be taken of small sample sizes in particular regions and smaller organisations.

To support employers undertaking this exercise, the Commission recommends that the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) is tasked with producing guidance for employers to draw on.”

[Abena Oppong-Asare]

The information that the Minister has provided is very helpful, particularly on the work that Business in the Community has done and also his quoting the report from the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities. I would be grateful if he clarified exactly what the Government have done since they conducted the survey and consultation in October 2018. I have heard what organisations have been working on, which is fantastic, but I would really like to hear what the Government have been working on to address this issue.

[Paul Scully]

The Government are clearly working towards this and I will continue developing that journey in my speech. What we want to do is to make sure that we are delivering on something that is possible. What I do not want to do is what the Leader of the Opposition did last week, by talking about setting a £10 minimum wage, then this week advertising for stewards for the Labour party conference and paying £9.75 an hour. Politics is the art of the possible. We must ensure we get this right and that we diagnose and solve the problem correctly.

[Abena Oppong-Asare]

I am still not clear what the Government have done since October 2018. I would be grateful if the Minister would clarify and set out what the Government have done since then to address this issue.

[Paul Scully]

As I said at the beginning of my response, I am developing that journey covering the last two years’ worth of work if the hon. Lady will remain patient. The hon. Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Steven Bonnar) talked about racism, and clearly we need to ensure that we tackle racism in all its forms. However, the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities found that most of the disparities when tackling ethnicity pay do not have their origins in racism. There are other factors that may be at play, such as geography, class, sex and age. However, whatever the cause of the pay gap, it is essential that we get organisations to tackle this.