From April 2018, all organisations employing over 250 employees were required to publish their Gender Pay Gap figures to a government portal. The Gender Pay Gap looks at the difference in the average pay of men and women in an organisation. This is different from Equal Pay, which is where men and women are paid the same pay for the same work.
This is Estuary’s annual gender pay gap report for the snapshot date of 5th April 2023.
This has decreased for the third consecutive year, from 16% in 2022, and from 23% in 2021.
When breaking down the mean gap further between Care & Support and Office staff, the gap for C&S is +12% and for Office 9.5% - again, this evidences a decrease compared to the previous year (in 2022 the gap was 12.2% for Office and +3.8% for C&S).
Pay quartiles by gender
This table shows our workforce divided into four equal-sized groups based on hourly pay rate. Band A includes the lowest-paid 25% of employees (the lower quartile) and band D covers the highest-paid 25% (the upper quartile).
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A quartile is one of four equally sized groups created when you divide a selection of numbers that are in ascending order into four. The "lower quartile" is the lowest group. The "upper quartile" is the highest group.
The figures in this table have been calculated using the standard methods used in the Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017.
Why do we have a gender pay gap?
Summary of the Data Findings:
Estuary is a diverse business with a predominantly female workforce. As at 5 April 2023 the total workforce comprised as follows:
The split between Office and Care & Support (inc Bank) was:
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|
Office |
Care & Support |
|
Male |
48 (2022 – 49) |
28 (2022 - 35) |
|
Female |
85 (2022 – 89) |
99 (2022 – 112) |
|
Total |
133 (2022 - 138) |
127 (2022 - 147) |
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|
51% of total workforce (2022 - 48%) |
49% of total workforce (2022 - 52%) |
There is very little change from 2022, 2021 and 2020 in the makeup of our staff. Total Staff Turnover was 5.9% as at 31st March 2023.
A large part of our service provision is within our Care & Support directorate, where we employ nearly half of our people, and comprises of 78% female staff and 22% male staff. It is recognised nationally that the care and support market is predominantly female in its workforce. Skills for Care report that the care sector in 2022 comprised 82% female and 18% male staff; and in the NHS, women are employed in 90% of frontline care roles.
Although the gender disbalance within our own Care & Support directorate is slightly lower than these national averages, it still large - and it contributes significantly to our pay gap, as average pay rates in Office roles (£22.60 per hour) are 95% higher than in our Care & Support roles (£11.58 per hour).
During the reporting period preceding April 2023, the proportion of men in the workforce receiving a bonus was 1.5% (2022: 2.4%) (2021: 8.8%) and the proportion of women who received a bonus was 6.2% (2022: 8%) (2021: 12%).
Bonuses reported for 2023 can be categorised as thirteen Long Service Awards which are fixed sums irrespective of gender (77% awarded to females, 23% to males), plus seven performance awards paid during this period (86% awarded to females, 14% to males).
The Mean Bonus Pay Gap for Estuary is +117.1% (2022: 37.5%) which means that the average sum paid to women was more than 100% higher.
Estuary are committed to continuing to address the gender pay gap. The sector has ongoing multiple challenges regarding recruitment in areas such as Care and Support and Built Environment. Traditionally Care and Support is predominantly more female and therefore our gender gap continues to reflect this. Although we still need to do more, we are pleased that the action we have taken so far has resulted in a significant reduction in our pay gap this year which is largely as a result in a higher number of women being employed within our lower middle and upper middle quartile pay bands.
Action Plan: Estuary will continue to work to eliminate its gender pay gap through the wide-ranging work of our Corporate EDI Strategy and Action Plan. Led by an HR Manager and EDI Lead, the Action Plan incorporates a number of specific actions around gender disparity which include:
1. Improved data on our workforce, which will allow us greater insight into any issues relating to inequality and take decisive action to address this. This includes:
2. Formally monitoring and reporting on data in relation to gender and recruitment, promotion, reasons for leaving, pay and working patterns. Reports will be produced quarterly and submitted to the Executive Team and Board.
3. Increasing the current rates of equality, diversity, and inclusion data submissions from our employees through a targeted communications campaign.
4. Implementation of a new Equality Analysis process, and further analysis of our HR policies and procedures under this new process to identify and address any disparities or unintended discriminatory impacts in relation to gender and other equality strands.
5. We will conduct a full review of our onboarding process to further improve the attraction of diverse applicants, supported by Inclusive Recruitment and Unconscious Bias training which will be rolled out to all hiring managers. This will go together with our ongoing commitment to hybrid working, offering more flexibility for prospective applicants of all genders.
6. In another key step towards reducing inequality at the recruitment stage, we will continue to monitor and assess the impact of CV anonymisation following the implementation of this new functionality within our recruitment software in August 2023.
7. Furthermore, a restructure in our Senior Management Team this year has resulted in an increased proportion of women in senior roles. Women now make up 50% of all Executive and Assistant Director posts at Estuary.
8. Any further initiatives launched throughout the year will be reported on the company intranet and/or other all-employee communications.
As yet, there is still no legal requirement for organisations to report on race pay gaps; we have therefore undertaken this review as good practice as part of our Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion monitoring.
Headcount profile
The table below sets out headcount data as at 5 April 2023 in relation to race.
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Office |
Care & Support |
Total |
Bank |
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Race |
White = 75% (105) GM = 9% (13) U = 16% (22) |
White = 42% (51) GM = 48% (58) U = 10% (12) |
White = 60% (156) GM = 27% (71) U = 13% (34) |
White = 21% GM = 79% U = 0% |
Key: GM: Global Majority, meaning non-White.
U: Undisclosed
In terms of race Estuary is primarily White, amounting to 75% of people in Office roles and 42% of people in Care and Support. There is a larger disclosed Global Majority (GM) population in Care and Support at nearly half (48%) of headcount, and just 9% in non-Care and Support operations.
The proportions of both White and GM employees have increased in 2023 compared to 2022 (from 59% to 60% and 25% to 27% respectively), but this can be explained by a decrease in rates of non-disclosure (16% of employees did not disclose their race in 2022, reducing to 13% in 2023). As we progress with our EDI Strategy and Action Plan, this is a positive indicator that employees are feeling more comfortable to disclose their race than they were 12 months ago, leading to improved quality of data.
However, in the non-Care and Support business there is still a noticeable 16% of employees who have chosen not to disclose their race, and this is 10% in Care and Support.
It’s notable that this information is gathered as part of the recruitment process, where some people fear that they may be rejected on grounds of race or other areas of prejudice, so this is not always disclosed. To combat this, Estuary introduced CV anonymisation to its recruitment process in August 2023, and we hope to see an improvement in next year’s figures as a result.
Average hourly rate for employees who have disclosed their racial identity:
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Office |
Care |
Bank |
All |
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White Male |
£24.38 |
£11.06 |
£8.83 |
£20.76 |
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GM Male |
£17.38 |
£10.46 |
£8.38 |
£11.34 |
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White Female |
£21.39 |
£13.06 |
£9.28 |
£17.74 |
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GM Female |
£25.63 |
£10.46 |
£9.23 |
£12.88 |
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All Male |
£23.77 |
£10.92 |
£8.52 |
£18.79 |
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All Female |
£21.80 |
£12.23 |
£9.28 |
£16.50 |
Average Pay Gap analysis
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Office |
Care |
Bank |
All |
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GM Male to White Male |
28.7% (2022: 3.5%) |
5.4% (2022: 0%) |
5% (2022: 13%) |
45.3% (2022: 36.7%) |
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GM Female to White Female |
+19.8% (2022: 2.2%) |
19.9% (2022: 18.9%) |
5.3% (2022: 2.1%) |
27.39% (2022: 28.8%) |
|
GM Female to GM Male |
+32.2% (2022: 13%) |
0% (2022: 9.8%) |
+9.2% (2022: +0.4%) |
+11.9% (2022: 4%) |
|
GM Male to All Male |
17% (2022: 2.5%) |
50% (2022: 0%) |
60% (2022: 7%) |
46.1% (2022: 32.3%) |
|
GM Female to All Female |
+41% (2022: 3.4%) |
42.4% (2022: 13.1%) |
48.8% (2022: 0.8%) |
31.1% (2022: 22.5%) |
This year, there is a positive pay gap between men and women within GM-only employees at over +11.9%, in contrast to the overall gender pay gap which stands at 12%. The positive pay gap between GM men and women can be attributed to a significant increase in hourly rates for GM women in non-Care & Support operations, increasing from £19.27 in 2022 to £25.63 in 2023.
There is also a positive pay gap between office-based White and GM women of +19.8%, showing strong progress in representation of non-White women in higher-paid corporate roles.
However, it is notable that this progress is not reflected in the overall pay gap figures, as there remains large gaps of 45.3% between White and GM female employees, and 27.39% between White and GM male employees.
Although this can be partially explained by GM employees having much greater representation within Care & Support (which is a lower-paid department), there are still significant pay gaps between both White and GM male and female employees within Care & Support itself which demonstrates this issue cannot be explained by departmental pay differences alone and indicates that GM employees are under-represented in higher-paid roles in this area.
We continue to monitor our Race Pay Gap and publish a Race Pay Gap report alongside the Gender Pay Gap report on an annual basis, to both meet and exceed the requirements set out in legislation.
Estuary will continue to campaign to attract and recruit a more diverse workforce, at all levels. Our recruitment platforms are used nationally and therefore we can attract a wide candidate pool geographically aligned with supporting our local communities with local jobs. The introduction of CV anonymisation software into the recruitment process in August 2023 has been another key step forward in improving inclusion at the start of the employee lifecycle.
We have a robust and ambitious Equality, Diversity & Inclusion (EDI) Strategy and Action Plan, formally agreed by our Board of Management in late 2023, and work on this plan is now being managed by a dedicated EDI Lead. As part of this, we will roll out a new Equality Analysis process along with a full suite of Equality, Diversity & Inclusion training to all employees in 2024-25. The ongoing development of our EDI Champions forum and a range of other diversity and inclusion-related events in the year ahead will also help us to foster a more inclusive culture, and in turn a more representative workforce, from the ground up.
We also remain committed to improving the diversity of the Board, Executive Team, and Senior Leadership Team, with a Board EDI Champion being formally appointed in January 2024.