Ethnic minority workers face pay gap
Matthew Pinto-Chilcott – FCIPD, ACEL Owner of Consensus HR comments: “Wow! Another report into discrimination in the workplace, following one of our last blogs on the 8th November 2022 titled ‘One in five Britons faced workplace discrimination’, this recently placed news article in the press shows that many ethnic minority groups are suffering a large pay gap compared to their white colleagues. How can this be the case in 2022 when everybody should be treated equally regardless of any of the protected characteristics under the Equality Act 2010? An employee’s Salary should be for the role and performance of the employee managed accordingly through the use of a consistent user friendly Performance Review process. Companies who are guilty of this should face the consequences of Employment Tribunal claims from day one of employment with uncapped awards. We have always encouraged open transparency of salaries for roles within a company and when advertising for a role, to ensure this is shown both internally and externally with details of salary or salary banding. This is an area in the future which may change drastically when ALL companies are required to publish salaries and ethnicity of employees.”
Most ethnic minority groups in Britain still suffer from a substantial pay gap compared with white employees, according to a study by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS). The study found that while young people from south Asian backgrounds and black African groups were now more likely to attend university than white peers, minorities still trail white people on wages. The IFS report shows that the average weekly earnings of Bangladeshi men were 42% below the white average in 2019. The figure was 22% for Pakistani men and 13% for Caribbean men. However, the average British Indian man earned 13% more than the average white worker. Professor Heidi Safia Mirza, of University College London, said that most minority groups “continue to earn less than their white British counterparts, and all earn less on average than we would expect given their education, background and occupation.” She added: “Evidence of discrimination in the labour market is clear, and wealth inequalities are likely to prove especially hard to shift.”
Human Times – 14th November 2022 – Monday November 14, 2022, 12.01am, The Times –
