A brief history of the gender pay gap

For 15-year-old Keeley Baigent, a student at Loughborough’s Our Lady’s Convent School, law became her goal. It wasn’t a path that came from anywhere in particular, but through hard work and a supportive family it led her everywhere.

That path has led to Keeley becoming Company Director of her own company, ksabLAW. So how does a young girl at an all-girls school with no family members in law settle on a path for a career in it?

“I knew I wanted to become a lawyer at the age of 15 years old. I can’t remember why I had this desire – and I’m unsure of where it came from, as no one I knew was a solicitor or barrister or even worked in the law,” she tells me.

In addition, she was the only pupil in her school year to go on to study law at university. Having made the grades, she attended Nottingham Trent University to graduate as a solicitor. “My head teacher taught us girls that we could do and be anything we set our minds to – there were no restrictions from that perspective,” she adds. After completing her law degree, which included a one-year period of employed work, she went on to a postgraduate Legal Practice Course (LPC) at De Montfort University, where she developed an affinity with employment law. After completing her training contract, building up valuable experiences and working within practices in different legal areas, she qualified as a solicitor in 2002. Keeley was promoted to associate solicitor in 2005 and

Partner at Nelsons Law in 2008 until 2018 when Keeley decided it was time to step out on her own.

“The primary reason for me founding ksabLAW was to provide me with flexibility alongside bringing up our two children – who at the time were six and two years old. We adopted our children and I felt compelled to ensure I was around for them, especially in their early years.

“I really enjoy my work so I wanted to continue with it whilst raising my family in a way that didn’t compromise the business or my personal life. So many mothers feel this pull in different directions, and for me it was about ensuring I felt fulfilled in both.”

Balancing career and a young family, especially if it’s your own business, takes a fair amount of determination and skill to manage. When I ask her how she’s achieved this, she replies: “I am lucky enough to have been influenced and supported by very strong female figures in my life. They have taught me about loyalty, strength, resilience, and kindness.

“How the female family members in my life in particular have dealt with serious illness and personal tragedies with such positivity and strength has taught me a great deal.”

Keeley has gone on to become one of the most highly regarded and recognised employment law specialists in the East Midlands. When I ask her what 15-year-old Keeley would think to that, she replies: “I think she’d be pretty proud of herself!”

We all have a responsibility to ensure that the organisations in which we work operate in an ethical way, free from gender pay inequality, sex discrimination and sexual harrassment.

Ensuring that female employees are adequately represented within organisations – particularly at a senior level – is essential in creating a culture free of inequality and discrimination. In addition, conducting regular reviews to ensure that promotions and pay increases are applied fairly and equally to both men and women will help in securing a fair environment.

Legislation promoting equality in the workplace between men and women and to prohibit sex discrimination (including sexual harassment) first came into force in 1970 under the Equal Pay Act 1970 (EqPA 1970) and 1975 pursuant to the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 (SDA 1975).

The EqPA 1970 was enacted at a time when it wasn’t uncommon for employers to openly pay different rates to men and women performing the same job, or to reserve lower-paid jobs for women.

Although such overt discrimination is less common today, a significant gender pay gap remains. A substantial difference in average hourly rates for men and women persists in the UK, quoted at anywhere between 12% and 21%, depending on the method of analysis used on the data.

Today, the main function of equal pay law is tackling the effect of long-standing job-segregation and undervaluing of jobs traditionally seen as ‘women’s work’, such as caring, catering and cleaning roles. In recent years, thousands of women have brought equal pay claims to address the ongoing effects of this historical segregation.

Continuing inequality is still operating between men and women conducting the same or similar work. Only last March, a bank was ordered to pay over £2m compensation to a female employee who brought successful claims for equal pay, sex discrimination and victimisation (Macken v BNP Paribas London Branch 2021: 10 WLUK 640).

In fact, the legal profession has some of the biggest gaps in salary between male and female employees that are not due to their level of education or years of experience.

Gender pay inequality is also more prevalent in senior roles. In March 2021, a report on Women in Economic Decision Making in the EU showed that limited progress had been made to achieve gender balance within the boardroom, with just 32% of boards in the UK made up of women.

To comprehensively address pay inequalities, an employer can conduct a job evaluation study (JES). A JES is an analytical procedure for ranking jobs in a non-discriminatory way. They will then be grouped into salary bands and all jobs within a particular band will be ‘rated as equivalent’ for the purposes of the EqA 2010 and should therefore be paid on the same scale, unless a material factor applies.

We have come so far – but there is still a way to go.