The Government has published its draft regulations entitled The Equality Act (gender pay gap information) Regulations 2016 which are intended to come into force in October 2016. Consultation closed on 11 March 2016 on the draft regulations. The regulations are intended to implement the mandatory gender pay gap reporting duty under section 78 of the equality act 2010. This follows research that shows that the average pay for men is greater than that for women. In 2015, the gap was 9.4% for full-time employees and for all employees was 19.2%.
Employers with at least 250 employees will be required to publish an annual report showing the overall pay gap in their organisation. Employers will be required to publish mean and median pay information and how many men and women appear in each group within its workforce. The first reporting obligations will come into effect in April 2017 and the data must be published on the company website and maintain for a period of at least three years on the website. The information must also be sent to the government. The Government has said that it will name and shame those that fail to comply with their obligations and will also review the civil and criminal penalties in due course.
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