France, UK Pursue New Gender Pay Initiatives

August 03, 2018

The French government’s new plan to address gender pay gaps includes software that would be integrated within a company’s payroll system to identify wage inequality while members of the UK Parliament are recommending employers be required to disclose the reasons behind any gender pay gap in their workforce and how they plan to address it.

France would provide free software that would be directly integrated within a company’s payroll system.  When the software reveals wage inequality, the company would have to negotiate a “wage catch-up” with trade-union representatives.

Employers in France would have three years to ensure compliance or face a penalty of up to one percent of total payroll in addition to the current one percent penalty already imposed on companies that fail to negotiate on gender equality.  Companies would also have to publish their overall score on the unexplained pay gap on their website.

Meanwhile, a new report from the UK Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee recommends employers be required to provide some narrative reporting alongside their gender pay statistics and an action plan setting out how pay gaps are being and will be addressed, including objectives and targets.