WARNING - By their nature, text files cannot include scanned images and tables. The process of converting documents to text only, can cause formatting changes and misinterpretation of the contents can sometimes result. Wherever possible you should refer to the pdf version of this document. CAIRNGORMS NATIONAL PARK AUTHORITY STAFFING AND RECRUITMENT COMMITTEE PAPER 1 07/09/07: CAIRNGORMS NATIONAL PARK AUTHORITY STAFFING AND RECRUITMENT COMMITTEE FOR DISCUSSION Title: EQUAL PAY AUDIT Prepared by: Francesca Scott, HR Manager Purpose This paper is to give the Staffing & Recruitment Committee an insight into initial findings of an equal pay audit conducted on CNPA salaries. Recommendation The Committee is requested to: Consider the outcome of the equal pay audit undertaken on CNPA salaries; Note that, at this stage, the results indicate that any inequality in male and female pay is in line with national demographic and socio-economic trends and as such there do not appear to be any organisationally specific issues to be addressed in equal pay; Note that some action may be possible to improve the potential to recruit more females into senior roles and this will be considered as part of ongoing HR policy development. Executive Summary An equal pay audit is designed to assess pay levels across the organisation in terms of gender equality. It should scrutinise all aspects of pay including overtime opportunities, bonus payments, profiles of the different grades across the organisation, and incremental progression in order to highlight any areas where direct or indirect discrimination may be impacting on pay equality. CNPA committed to conducting an equal pay audit as part of its gender equality scheme, because, although the organisation is below the 150 staff threshold set out in the legislation, it is good practice to assess pay for gender equality on an ongoing basis. 1. This equal pay audit was conducted in July 2007 using the salary levels for staff during 2007-08. Overtime is paid only in exceptional circumstances and makes up a small element of the paybill, and so has not been considered in this audit. Only two members of staff have been paid overtime on more than one occasion in the past year and these were one male and one female member of staff, so it would appear that there is no particular inequality in access to overtime. 2. Analysis of salary levels within the organisation can be used in conjunction with recruitment and promotion statistics to give a broader picture of any disparities within pay and promotion levels across the organisation. CNPA has a robust job evaluation system which should eliminate gender discrimination in the grading of different jobs, however this does not entirely eliminate all the potential causes of pay inequality, and it is important that our processes are scrutinised to ensure that inequalities are not allowed to develop inadvertently. There may be sociodemographic reasons behind differences in pay or numbers of male or female staff at different grades within the organisation, but it is not sufficient to assume that this is the case. The Results of the Audit 3. Across the organisation as a whole, there are slightly more women than men employed by CNPA (34 women and 24 men). The average salary across the organisation is £29,783, with the average male salary being £34,252 and the average female salary being £26,533. This makes the average female salary 11% lower than the average across the organisation, and 23% lower than the average male salary. 4. The differentials between average salaries for men and women at CNPA closely reflect the national trend. Evidence from the CNPA equal pay audit suggests therefore that the organisation is affected by prevalent demographic trends rather than particular organisational factors. On average women in Scotland working full time are paid 14% less per hour than men working full time, and those working part time earn 35% less per hour than men working full time. Within CNPA these figures compare as follows: The average full time female salary is 19% lower than the average male full time salary and the average part time female salary is 35.5% lower than the average male part time salary. This is largely due to the fact that there are few part time opportunities at higher grades within the organisation. Currently all our part time and job share posts are within bands 3 – 6, although we had a part time post at Band 2 for a short time following a request that the job be redesigned to be done on the basis of 4 days per week. 5. Graph showing Average Salary Whole Organisation - not available in full text format. 6. CNPA jobs are evaluated to determine which band they should be placed in, and most staff start at the bottom of the band, progressing by annual increments to the top of the scale. The potential for gender inequality is thus reduced by the fact that jobs are objectively evaluated and salaries allocated according to the job content rather than the person. There is still potential for inequality within evaluation systems, such as the weighting given to particular types of work – for example caring tasks have often attracted a lower weighting than manual labour in the past, which indirectly favours more men than women. The CNPA evaluation system has been designed to avoid this type of discrimination. The length of service required to reach the top of the salary scale has in some instances been found to discriminate against women, who traditionally have more breaks in their career and therefore take longer to reach the top of the salary point. Whilst this has not been found to be a problem at CNPA currently, this is an area which should be monitored closely over the coming years. 7. The Equal Pay Audit found that there was no obvious difference in salaries between male and female staff within each band. However, bands 5 & 6 (the two lowest bands within the organisation were both entirely occupied by female members of staff. The management team has a ratio of 2:5 females to male, with one female Head of Group and a female CEO. 8. Average Salary by Band - Graph not available in full text format 9. No's. Male & Female Staff Per Band - Graph not available in full text format 10. An analysis of the salary levels by Group across the organisation showed that in all groups except Natural Heritage and Land Management the average female salary was lower than the average male salary. Much of this difference appears to be due to the higher levels of female staff at admin or support officer levels within the groups, combined with slightly more males than females at bands 1 & 2 across the organisation. To date the only staff to have taken advantage of the career break policy have been females in Bands 1, 2 and 3 which has led to a temporary reduction in the numbers of females in Bands 1 & 2. 11. Average Salary by Group - Graph not available in full text format 12. Conclusions from the Audit The salary differentials across the organisation are broadly in line with the national Scottish statistics published by the Equal Opportunities Commission Scotland this year. Where inequalities in salary levels exist it seems to be linked mostly to demographic factors rather than inherent inequalities within CNPA job evaluation or access to additional pay. 13. CNPA has a number of policies designed to ensure that male and female members of staff have equal access to career progression. Male and female are given support in managing childcare commitments and other work life balance issues to enable them to work effectively at any level of the organisation. We have not refused any request so far for flexible working, and have a range of part time, job-share and ad- hoc working from home arrangements which have been accessed equally by men and women across the organisation. 14. Working harder to achieve an even balance of applicants for posts at all grades across the organisation, and continuing to effectively manage career progression within the organisation may be areas where we could seek to reduce the gender pay gap further within our organisation in the future. This may be done by encouraging flexible working practices, and advertising when recruiting that we have family friendly policies on offer. FRANCESCA SCOTT August 2007 franscott@cairngorms.co.uk