Fire service reports pay gap puts women 1p per hour ahead

A West fire service has become one of the region’s first public bodies where women are paid more than men on average – by 1p an hour.

Avon Fire and Rescue Service’s annual pay gap report reveals female employees receive an average hourly wage of £15.66 compared with £15.65 by their male counterparts, which works out as a 0.07 per cent difference.

It shows the service has cracked the pay gap, which has fallen from 4.48 per cent the previous year when women earned an hourly wage of £14.68 – 69p less than the £15.37 rate for men. The Avon report comes less than three years after government inspectors found that female employees were treated “inappropriately”.

The figures are based on the snapshot date of March 31, 2021. The official UK gender pay gap is 7.4 per cent, the report papers say.

In a statement in the report, authority chairwoman Cllr Brenda Massey and chief fire officer Mick Crennell said: “Avon Fire Authority is committed to developing a culture which puts diversity, inclusion, cohesion and equality at the heart of all our work. Gender equality and ensuring people are paid fairly for the work they do is a key aspect of this.

“We are encouraged to see that Avon Fire and Rescue Service has a gender pay gap which has reduced from last year and is still lower than the current national average.

“We do, however, recognise that we have much more to do in order to ensure our organisation is truly inclusive for women.”

The report said the service had made “considerable progress” to complete its culture change action plan in response to a damning government inspection in 2018.

HM Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services rated the organisation “inadequate” at promoting the right values and culture and ensuring fairness and promoting diversity.

This pay gap report, however, said there had been an increase of women in the top quarter of earners in the organisation from 17.9 per cent in 2020 to 20.4 per cent this year.

As of March 31 there were 901 employees, of which 744 were men and 157 women.