Tackling the gender pay gap
- Tim Roache
- Mar 29, 2018
- 4 min read
Our union, formed by gas workers in East London, has lived and breathed for 125 years. We have a proud history of social change and of winning rights and justice for working people. But despite being the union of Margaret Bondfield, Eleanor Marx and Mary Turner we have to be honest that GMB’s own structures haven’t always reflected the workforce at large.
Unions that grew out of male dominated industries have traditionally struggled with the representation of women at the higher levels. The reasons for that are complex, it’s about our history, industry, cultural and societal factors. But whatever the reasons, we have to face facts that it’s not acceptable in 21st century Britain and we must deal with it.
That’s important to say today, because we published GMB’s gender pay gap report. It makes for uncomfortable reading. At 25.5% it is cold comfort that our figure is better than many boardrooms. Our headline rate remains stubbornly higher than the average.
It’s not good enough – and so I want to assure our members that there has been progress and there will be more.
Over the last three years, we have narrowed the pay gap by 5.5% - in 2014 it stood at over 30%. I want to set out some of the measures that have been proactively taken to lower the figure in the last few years. To do that, explaining how the pay gap is calculated is important. But an explanation should not be taken as an excuse.
The gender pay gap is not about equal pay for equal work. GMB has long taken on pay discrimination cases to win tens of millions in compensation for our members on that very issue. Following an organisation-wide job evaluation exercise, our own internal 2017 equal pay audit confirms that grade-by-grade, across a staff team of more than 600 women and men, that there is no pattern of disparity across different grades indicative of gender pay discrimination against women.
But there is no room for complacency. We will continue to undertake equal pay audits to ensure the principle of equal pay for equal work continues to be put into practice.
So why then is the headline gender pay gap as high as it is? The reason the figures look like they do - put simply - is that we have more women in the lower pay grades than we do men.
There are many reasons for this, from the type of industries we have long represented to the amount of time spent ‘on the road’ away from families, and also generally around women’s roles in society and barriers to access. In the 1960s and 1970s, the role of women in wider society was very different to today. Our movement was too slow to embrace change, and the structural challenges we now face are rooted in that.
In decades past, it was the case that the union (and many unions) were split down gender lines between ‘staff’ (women in administrative and support roles) and ‘officers’ (men in industrial roles) - an official distinction GMB has now abolished.
And change is happening. Our Women’s Task Force ran for a number of years and cemented policies and practices to support women in our union.
We are transforming our structures to encourage progression for women in our workplaces through a development programme that is enabling many on lower pay grades to gain experience at the more senior officer grade. This is beginning to break down segregation between roles and building the experience women needed to access permanent jobs that were in the past too often out of reach.
Moving from an admin role to having a sheet or being a senior organiser does not happen overnight, but it is happening. Women who have participated in that program are now organisers making a huge contribution to building our union. Flexible working policies and open recruitment and selection are breaking down barriers to progression.
We are currently reviewing how we provide training to make it more accessible - the first step on the ladder to become a GMB employee is often being a workplace rep and women are still under-represented in those structures too.
GMB now has more women senior organisers than ever in our history. Two of our senior directors are now women – and two of our three National Secretaries are women too. We are committed to continuing to encourage women into positions of senior leadership in our organisation.
When I took up my elected post as GMB General Secretary two years ago - I stood on a platform to build a 21st century union. And building it we are - however frustrating the progress can seem at times.
True gender equality is not a cause that should have to wait. So I wanted to be up front with an explanation - not excuses - why we have lagged behind when we should have been leading the way. And to assure our members that we are taking steps to address this historic problem.
