Poll: Just 8% of employers publish disability pay gap

Disability pay gap in the UK stands at 20% for 2020

Employee Benefits poll: Fewer than one in 10 organisations currently publish their annual disability pay gap, according to our research.

Only 8% of respondents to an online survey said they made the data available to the public on a regular basis.

A further 33% are considering reporting on disability pay while the remaining 58% did not indicate any intention to do so.

The government’s National Disability Strategy, published this summer, outlined plans for a consultation on potential disability reporting requirements for large employers.

The Trades Union Congress (TUC) last month (November) revealed that non-disabled workers earned 16.5% more per hour in the year to 30 June 2021 than those who met the definition of disabled under the Equality Act. This figure – which came from the union’s Labour force survey, in which 2,134 workers were polled – was down 20% in the prior year.

The TUC found that the median hourly pay for a worker with a disability was £11.55, compared with £13.45 for those without a disability. Meanwhile, the median hourly wage for disabled women (£11.10) was more than £3 lower than that of non-disabled men (£14.60).

TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said at the time that with a cost-of-living crisis looming, urgent action from ministers was needed, as disabled people “deserve much better”.

She explained that disabled workers had been hit hardest by the Covid-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic, with many pushed into financial hardship and left without a safety net.

“As we saw with the last financial crisis, disabled people are all too often first in line for redundancy, and those who keep hold of their jobs face a yawning pay gap,” said O’Grady.

“We need mandatory disability pay gap reporting to shine a light on poor workplace practices that fuel inequality at work. Without this, millions of disabled workers will be consigned to years of lower pay and in-work poverty.”