A nice earner... as long as you are not a saver
Jobs for the boys – at firms founded by women
WHEN firms are set up by women, for women, you might expect them to avoid the gender pay gap that bedevils British business. But even at female-oriented firms, men come out on top.
Among those with gender pay gaps of more than 50 per cent are popular women’s brands Sweaty Betty, Space NK and Body Shop. Though male staff are in a minority, they tend to occupy well-paid management roles, while women are more likely to work as sales assistants.
More than 10,000 firms had filed their gender pay gap data by Wednesday. The figures highlight the dearth of women in senior roles across UK business.
Fitness clothing brand Sweaty Betty, founded by Tamara Hill-Norton and husband Simon, says only 1 per cent of its staff are men – but they are all among the 25 per cent highest paid employees. A spokesman said the business employs ‘fewer than ten men.’
Upmarket cosmetics retailer Space NK, set up by Nicky Kinnaird, revealed that while just 62 of its 658 staff are male ‘the concentration of their roles are at more senior levels’.
Karen Millen, cofounded by the entrepreneur of the same name, claimed its 50 per cent pay gap ‘paints a misleading picture of our commitment to gender diversity and equality’.
Only 6 per cent of its workforce is male but they mainly work in head office. The firm has a female chief executive and chief finance officer, along with a board that is 80 per cent female.
Rival fashion chain Hobbs also blamed a high representation of men at senior levels.
At the Body Shop, founded in 1976 by Anita Roddick, Louise Wilson, global human resources director, said: ‘Our level of gender pay gap is not where we want it to be. We will do all we can to reduce it.’
However, the White Company’s founder Chrissie Rucker, who revealed a pay gap of 31.8 per cent, said: ‘I am confident that we pay people fairly, regardless of gender.’
ABIG thank you to those of you who took the trouble over the Easter weekend to comment on our exclusive survey into booming executive remuneration at the country’s building societies.
Some of you spotted issues we did not comment on – such as the parttime chairman of Principality Building Society receiving jawdropping remuneration of £114,000.
‘A nice little earner’ was how one reader described it. A nice big earner would be another way of putting it. Others were keen to point out the disconnect between moribund savings rates and inflation-busting pay increases for building society executives.
‘They should share the financial pain we are suffering,’ was a message received more than once. I could not agree more.
One reader said I was too kind in praising Cumberland Society for the good work it does in the North West, indeed suggesting I was in league with them (I am not). He said the society had a tendency to leave savers in obsolete accounts, paying poor rates. He has a point, though the rates on many of Cumberland’s closed accounts are far better than those offered by leading banks.
One issue touched upon in last week’s report was the lack of female representation in building society boardrooms.
There is only one woman at the helm of a building society – Darina Armstrong at Progressive – which is scandalous given the number of women who work in building societies and the large percentage of women who are customers.
Indeed, among the 44 remaining societies, there is a dearth of female executives. At Family, Nottingham, Skipton and Yorkshire, there is not one in sight, although female non-executives are a little thicker on the ground.
With the current focus on the gender pay gap, it will not surprise you to learn that building societies do not come out of such analysis smelling of roses. More Brut 33 than Jo Malone Red Roses Cologne.
The gap between median pay for women and men at building societies is huge – ranging from 16.9 per cent at Newcastle to 35.4 per cent at Nottingham.
The other societies to have filed their gender pay gap reports are Leeds (25.4 per cent), Skipton (26.4 per cent), Cumberland (27 per cent), Yorkshire (28.6 per cent), West Bromwich (30.8 per cent), Nationwide (31 per cent), Coventry (31.3 per cent) and Principality (31.5 per cent).
To put this into perspective, the average median pay gap in the private sector is 8.2 per cent and 14 per cent in the public sector. Surely, it is time for building societies to better reward women working at the coal face (in the branches) and to promote more women into executive positions.
If they did, I am sure they would become more customer-centric, leaving clear blue water between themselves and banks in delivering customer service par excellence. I AM a big believer in financial education. The more knowledgeable we are as personal finance shoppers, the less scope there should be for firms to pull the wool over our eyes by selling us some dud product (think payment protection insurance).
Financial education was not around when I was at school. Indeed, when I left Bishop Vesey’s Grammar School in Birmingham to go on to further education, I knew more about the economists Milton Friedman and John Maynard Keynes than I did about managing a bank account or the danger of spending wildly on a new credit card. Mind you, I did build a mind boggling collection of vinyl along the way.
Thankfully, financial education is now on the national curriculum and there are some mighty good teachers out there doing their bit to get children interested in money issues. Monthly personal finance magazine Moneywise wants their efforts recognised. So it is running a competition to find the country’s best primary and secondary level financial educators.
If you are a parent, child or school governor and are aware of someone delivering excellent personal finance education in the classroom, you can nominate them. Email editor@moneywise.co.uk or drop me a line and I will forward it on. Even teachers can nominate themselves or colleagues. More details are at moneywise.co.uk.
There are cash prizes totalling £12,500 for schools whose teachers triumph. I look forward to your entries – I am one of the judges. Good personal finance education deserves to be rewarded.