Gender Pay Gap Report - April 2023

South Tyneside Homes manages estates and Council housing stock on behalf of South Tyneside Council. To do this effectively, we have agreed values and objectives with our partners and customers. Our vision is to provide excellent services and quality homes where customers feel safe and supported.

We have committed to making sure that everyone is given a fair chance to access our services and employment opportunities. Our aim is to be an employer of choice, to treat all people fairly and ensure our employees understand and practice our commitment to equality and diversity.

Our People Strategy 2022-25, states the Vision for our people strategy is "to have a motivated, well-trained and diverse workforce that can meet the needs of the business, both now and in the future".

To support our overall strategic objective of becoming an “Employer of Choice” the strategy is underpinned by having four objectives, as outlined below.

• To develop a pro-active approach to engage and ensure the wellbeing of our staff.
• To develop a modern and efficient approach to recruit and retain high quality, diverse staff.
• Ensure staff skilled and knowledgeable to meet current and future challenges.
• Develop our workforce plan to meet the future needs of the business through training and career development opportunities.

We want our staff to be engaged and empowered at work, and to promote a proactive and supportive culture that fosters an inclusive working environment and allows a creative and collaborative workforce that affirms South Tyneside Homes is a great place to work. The Strategy will sit alongside the equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) framework to ensure it is a fundamental part of “how we do things” at South Tyneside Homes.

You can read further information within the EDI Strategy and EDI Policy.

The Government requires all employers with over 250 employees to report their gender pay gap on an annual basis. The gender pay gap data highlights the difference between the average pay of men and women; it is not a measure of equal pay, which relates to what men and women are paid for the same or similar roles or work of equal value. The Company is an equal pay employer. Our pay structure is subject to transparent and robust job evaluation processes using the recommended Gauge System.

South Tyneside Homes collected data on 5th April 2023 at which time our workforce (full pay relevant employees) consisted of 359 men and 182 women (66% / 34% respectively). The figures stated were captured on 5th April 2023, a nationally negotiated pay award is still in consultation and, once settled, will be backdated to 1st April 2023. Full time relevant employees are defined as employees who have been paid their full usual pay during the pay period (April 2023). Any employees who have received reduced pay or no pay during this period, for example those on half sick pay or reduced maternity pay must be excluded from the calculations.

The figures in the table below show that the Company has a mean gender pay gap of 8.1% which is the difference between the mean (average) hourly rate of pay of male and female full pay relevant employees. Although this is an increase from 4.4% in April 2022, the company understand the reason for this rise is as a result of 72 employees transferring their employment from South Tyneside Homes to South Tyneside Council during April 2023 as well as the market forces supplement for trade staff, which was agreed by Board in November 2022.

The median gender pay gap is the difference between the median hourly rate of male and female full pay relevant employees and is 7.4% which has increased from 0% in April 2022. The annual survey of hours and earnings (ASHE) gender pay gap tables released by the Office of National Statistics Great Britain in October 2022 shows an average mean gender pay gap across all employers in the Public Sector of 13.6% and a median gender pay gap of 15.9% therefore the Company remains well below the national average.

The Company does not pay bonus payments and therefore does not have a gender pay gap to report regarding bonuses.

Female employees are slightly over-represented in the Lower and Lower Middle quartile pie charts and significantly underrepresented in the upper quartile pie charts. This shows that male employees make up the higher percentage in the upper pay bands, with 79% of the highest paid staff being male. Female staff in upper middle roles decreased from 34% (50 staff) to 19% (25 staff) and male staff in upper middle management roles increased from 66% (102 staff) to 81% (110 staff).

The median hourly rate for men is £16.38 and women is £15.16 and the average hourly rate per quartile is shown in the table below.

The Company has a small proportion of part time employees (less than 30 hours per week). 499 employees (92%) are full time and 42 employees (8%) are part time. Of the 42 part time staff, only 6 (1.69%) of these are male compared to 36 part time women at 24.66% of female staff. These figures show that there is work to be done to promote flexible working opportunities across the organisation, but particularly with male employees in senior roles, including the advertising of roles to part time applicants where possible. The numbers of full time and part time staff in each quartile are shown in the table below:

In 2022/2023 the following progress was made around equality, diversity inclusion and the Gender Pay Gap:

• Rolled out Equality, Diversity and Inclusion training for over 400 staff which included a focus on disability awareness. The focus of the next years training will be on Gender awareness.
• Developed a Hybrid Working Policy.
• Actively promoted the government childcare scheme to support staff to meet the costs of childcare.
• Developed a succession plan that supports the Board in becoming representative of the local community.
• Reviewed current workspaces to include areas for collaborative work and to provide appropriate rest areas.
• Developed procedures for collecting, updating and using workforce profiles. The senior management team have agreed areas of positive action to try and achieve a more diverse workforce that is representative of our local community.
• Reviewed our flexible working policy to give the right to make a flexible working application from day one. This will support staff with achieving a better work life balance and to support caring responsibilities.
• Established that more jobs could be advertised as open to flexible/part time/job share. The Recruitment Policy has been amended to encourage roles to be advertised as suitable for job share. The Flexible Working Hours Policy has been reviewed and we now offer this as a day 1 right to request. Working groups have taken place with managers to consider how additional flexibility can be offered to staff across the business.
• Promoted the current policies available to support staff, including the Carers Policy, Menopause Policy and Domestic Abuse Policy.
• Reviewed the recruitment and selection policy to ensure our approach can attract the best candidates to vacancies and is inclusive.
• Established a Corporate Inclusion Group chaired by executive level EDI champion. The group also includes all Heads of Service and the Board member sponsor for EDI.
• Created a forward plan for the Corporate Inclusion Group, to ensure relevant Equality reports and documents are discussed at meetings and actions agreed.
• Celebrated diversity, such as holding an event for International Women’s Day, attended by 27 people. At the International Women’s Day event there was a question-and-answer session with the Mayor and Mayoress, a presentation from the CEO of Women’s Health in South Tyneside (WHiST) about the services that they offer to residents in the Borough. One of our tenant Board members, talked inspirationally about her journey to balance being a board member with studying for a social work degree as well as being a single parent to three young children. We had a ‘Walk the Wall’ session where we encouraged staff to share their views on what equity means to them, and how their female colleagues inspire them. We also played a game of ‘Gender Guess Who’, where we challenged all of our unconscious biases and discussed the work still required in some areas for all opportunities to be fully inclusive for women and men. This was followed up with an email to all staff to tell them what happened at the event and what work we are currently doing to progress gender equity at STH.
• Agreed a Menopause Policy, to support staff and managers.
• Agreed a Domestic Abuse Policy, to provide additional advice and guidance on support that can be offered.
• Revised the carers policy that recognises the needs of people; with diverse responsibilities such as caring for parents, children and people with disabilities.
• In partnership with the council, we have launched a range of staff groups including a Women’s Group Network and a Carer’s Network.
• Established an EDI reporting framework.
• Carried out annual staff satisfaction survey broken down by protected characteristics.

The Company is committed to taking action to reduce the gender pay gap, plans for 2023/24 include:

• Develop practical guidance and decision-making framework for managers on reasonable adjustments to support their staff – Q2 23/24
• Carry out annual staff satisfaction survey broken down by protected characteristics – Q2 23/24
• Improved marketing of South Tyneside Homes as an employer of choice and to reach a higher number of potential employees, including those from diverse backgrounds – Q4 23/24
• Target apprentice recruitment to address underrepresentation in our staff profile – Q4 23/24
• Analyse whether we have any other pay gaps by diversity strands – Q4 23/24
• Promote staff benefits to attract wide range of candidates – Q4 23/24
• Review our current offer for reward and recognition and the benefits and discounts that are offered to staff (including the long service offer) Q4 23/24

We have also begun considering thinking about actions beyond this year. You can read our full EDI Strategy here.

Research has been carried out on comparator employer data for 2022 (2023 data has not been published yet):

Three comparator employers had a worse gender pay gap than South Tyneside Homes and one had a lower gender pay gap.