Transparency data

DHSC: gender pay gap report and data 2021

Published 27 January 2022

Applies to England

Introduction

In 2017, the government introduced world-leading legislation that made it statutory for organisations with 250 or more employees to report annually on their gender pay gap. Government departments are also covered by the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017 which came into force on 31 March 2017. These regulations underpin the Public Sector Equality Duty and require relevant organisations to publish their gender pay gap by 30 March annually. This includes the mean and median gender pay gaps; the mean and median gender bonus gaps; the proportion of men and women who received bonuses; and the proportions of male and female employees in each pay quartile.

This report fulfils the department and its executive agencies’ reporting requirements, analyses the figures in more detail and sets out what the department and its agencies are doing to reduce the gender pay gap. This report is also in line with the recommendations made from the Inclusive Data Taskforce report published in September 2021. The reporting period is 1 April 2020 to 31 March 2021.

For the reporting period the Department of Health and Social Care was formed of the core department (DHSC) and its executive agencies, Public Health England (PHE), and the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). As part of ongoing Public Health Reform, the new UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) was established when PHE ceased to exist on 30 September 2021. This report will discuss PHE’s gender pay gap, and their forward-looking action plan will be incorporated into UKHSA following the March 2022 snapshot. The gender pay gap action plan for Test and Trace has been incorporated into DHSC’s report. The individual organisations hold the responsibility of analysing their reward mechanisms (such as pay and bonuses) to assure themselves that there is no gender bias.

The department and its executive agencies are committed to the fair treatment and reward of all staff, addressing inequality and ensuring equality of opportunity for all staff. The department and its executive agencies pay approach is based on the principles of consistency, fairness and transparency, supporting the fair treatment and reward of all staff irrespective of gender.

Building a diverse and inclusive workforce that reflects the people we serve is one of the Civil Service’s top workforce priorities. The Civil Service should create opportunities for all in a truly meritocratic way and reward all civil servants fairly, regardless of gender, ethnicity or any other personal characteristic.

Gender pay gap report

The gender pay gap shows the difference in the average pay between all men and women in a workforce. If a workforce has a particularly high gender pay gap, this can indicate that there may be a number of issues to deal with.

The gender pay gap is different to equal pay. Equal pay deals with the pay differences between men and women who carry out the same jobs, similar jobs or work of equal value. It is unlawful to pay people unequally because they are a man or a woman.

For this report, hourly pay is calculated using base pay, allowances and bonuses paid in the relevant pay period as defined in the regulations.

Table 1: 2021 gender pay and bonus gaps

Note: ‘Health and Social Care’ refers to the overall figures from DHSC, PHE, and MHRA.

Reporting organisations	Pay gap	Bonus gap
Mean	Median	Mean	Median
DHSC	6.3%	15.4%	13.7%	0.0%
MHRA	7.9%	8.7%	- 0.6%	25.4%
PHE	13.2%	10.0%	36.0%	0.0%
Health and Social Care	11.5%	10.0%	24.6%	0.0%

This means that the overall mean and median hourly difference in pay is £1.62 and £2.30 respectively.

Table 2: percentage of men and women receiving a bonus

Reporting organisations	Percentage of individuals receiving a bonus
—-	Men	Women
DHSC	42.7%	45.4%
MHRA	22.5%	23.2%
PHE	56.6%	50.1%
Health and Social Care	47.2%	46.0%

Table 3: distribution of women through each pay quartile

Reporting organisation(s)	Percentage of women in each pay quartile
Lower	Lower middle	Upper middle	Upper
DHSC	62.8%	61.3%	58.4%	56.2%
MHRA	62.7%	59.5%	59.1%	46.2%
PHE	74.6%	73.1%	67.9%	59.2%
Health and Social Care	70.3%	69.6%	62.1%	56.5%

Table 4: workforce analysis

Grade (decreasing seniority)	Number of men (% of total male workforce)	Number of women (% of total female workforce)	Percentage of women in the grade
SCS	420 (10.3%)	480 (6.2%)	53%
Grade 6/7	1450 (35.5%)	2220 (28.8%)	60%
SEO/HEO	1500 (36.7%)	3170 (41.1%)	68%
EO	450 (11.0%)	1140 (14.8%)	72%
AA/AO	270 (6.6%)	700 (9.1%)	72%
Total	4090	7710	65%

This table shows the distribution of men and women across each grade for Health and Social Care. While the most senior grades (senior civil servants (SCS)) are broadly balanced between men and women, women are overrepresented throughout the junior grades.

Note: the PHE workforce includes different sets of terms and conditions with different pay scales and arrangements. While the majority (circa 75%) of the PHE workforce fall under the standard Civil Service pay arrangements and grade framework the remaining workforce are on the NHS (Agenda for Change and Medical and Dental) pay frameworks or on Medical and Dental terms and conditions. While the entire workforce is included in the PHE gender pay gap figure, the range of different pay arrangements results in a more complex relationship impacting on the gender pay gap figure.

The pay gap

The department and its executive agencies are structured using Civil Service grades ranging from Administrative Assistant to the Senior Civil Service. Grades reflect levels of responsibility and each has a set pay range. Staff are subject to an annual pay review, and receive pay increases upon promotion.

The Health and Social care mean pay gap has increased marginally to 11.5%. This represents a 0.3% increase from 2020 but a 2.7% reduction from 2017 (when reporting began). The median pay gap has seen a reduction to 10.0%. This represents a 1.5% reduction from 2020 and a 3.3% reduction from 2017.

While any increase in the pay gap figures is disappointing, it appears both the mean and median pay gap are on positive trajectories overall. Both measures of Health and Social Care’s gender pay gap remain below the UK average of 15.4% in 2021.^{[footnote 1]}

The difference in hourly pay is driven by a number of factors including:

• the compounding effect of a higher proportion of men in the most highly paid Senior Civil Service grades, and a higher proportion of women in the most junior grades
• the disproportionate impact of a number of very senior roles on the pay gap (within this reporting period a large number of highly paid individuals were recruited to lead the NHS Test and Trace response to COVID-19, 71% of whom were men)

Proportion of men and women in each pay quartile

In the lower quartile 70.3% of employees are female, compared to 56.5% in the upper quartile. The disproportionate distribution of men across the organisation (with men represented more at more senior grades) is one of the factors driving the gender pay and bonus gaps. It has more of an impact on the bonus figure, as at the most senior levels there is more bonus opportunity and the level of bonus is considerably higher.

The bonus gap

In the department and its executive agencies, end of year performance awards were paid as a set value depending on grade and performance. End of year awards in the core department were paid during the reporting period, but the department has since moved to a fully in-year reward scheme for grades below SCS. The scheme aims to spread financial recognition to a wider population.

The bonus pay gap is driven by the opportunity for higher bonuses in the most senior grades where the proportion of men is not in line with the overall population.

The Health and Social Care mean bonus gap saw a significant increase in 2021 to 24.6%. This represents a 4.9% increase from 2019, but an 8.5% reduction from 2017. The overall trend of the mean bonus gap is positive, on average seeing 2.1% reductions across each year of reporting.

The median bonus gap is 0.0% (and is also 0.0% in PHE and the core department). This represents a 30.0% reduction from 2019 and 10.4% from 2017 and indicates that there is not widespread disparity in the distribution of bonuses across the workforce. While this is positive, we remain cautious that the median bonus gap has been subject to change over time.

These figures add further evidence that the bonus gap is driven by an over-representation of men in the most senior grades where the bonus potential is highest, and over-representation of women in the junior grades. For example, PHE paid a flat bonus award to all eligible staff, but the greater number of men than women in the SCS has impacted the percentage gap.

Targeted action to reduce the gender pay gap

Since the publication of the 2020 gender pay report the department and its executive agencies have taken a number of steps to reduce the gender pay gap.

PHE and NHS Test and Trace came together to form the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) from 1 October 2021. Consequently, the action plans within this report relating to PHE are up to September 2021. UKHSA is committed to addressing and reducing the gender pay gap and is carrying forward the action plans set out in this report. However, UKHSA will review its action plan again once the first set of UKHSA gender pay gap figures are produced.

The department and its agencies are addressing the gender pay gap through a range of actions within workstreams including:

• ensuring the fairness and equality of recruitment; including name blind recruitment and targeted advertising target underrepresented groups such as parents
• talent, progression and career paths; working towards a more balanced gender representation across the grades through promoting developmental and talent opportunities and mentoring schemes, providing visibility to SCS leaders while also supporting career development
• use of effective pay strategies; targeting increases at the lower end of pay scales to drive progression, and committing to shorten the pay ranges to reduce equal pay risks
• policies focused on supporting equality in the workplace; membership of Working Family / Employer for Carers and Disability Confident Leaders; and fair, consistent and inclusive working models supported by flexible working policies including the development of new hybrid working models
• building an inclusive culture; ensuring that diversity and inclusion is a central part of everything we do

1. ONS: Gender pay gap in the UK: 2021 ↩