HR Committee – 8 January 2026
Gender Pay Gap Report
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Purpose |
For information |
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Classification |
Public |
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Executive Summary |
To provide a report on our Gender Pay Gap data for the period ending 31 March 2025 showing that the gender pay gap is decreasing |
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Recommendation(s) |
That the HR Committee note the contents of the report. No action is required by the Council due to the positive findings |
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Reasons for recommendation(s) |
Employers with 250 or more employees are required to publish gender pay gap information on a yearly basis. Data must be published on the Government Equalities website and on an individual organisations’ website |
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Ward(s) |
All |
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Portfolio Holder(s) |
Councillor Jeremy Heron – Finance and Corporate |
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Strategic Director(s) |
Alan Bethune |
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Officer Contact |
Jade Carter Payroll Manager 02380 285947 Jade.Carter@nfdc.gov.uk |
Introduction and background
2. For the Gender Pay Gap there are six categories that need to be measured and reported:
1. The percentage of men and women in each hourly pay quartile
2. The difference in mean (average) hourly pay for men and women, expressed as a percentage
3. The difference in the median hourly pay for men and women, expressed as a percentage
4. The percentage of men and women who received bonus pay
5. The difference in mean bonus pay of men and women, expressed as a percentage
6. The difference in median bonus pay of men and women expressed as a percentage
3. A positive gender pay gap percentage shows that women have lower pay or bonuses than men in our organisation. A negative percentage shows that men have lower pay or bonuses than women in our organisation. The methodology as to how the measures are calculated is provided at Appendix 1.
This report includes two additional measures: ethnicity data and gender representation by pay quartile. Including these measures enhances transparency and supports the council’s commitment to ensure fair wages.
OUR DATA FOR YEAR ENDED 31/3/2025
4. Measure 1
The percentage of men and women in each hourly pay quartile are shown here, with last years figures for comparison.
|
Quartile
|
Men March 2025 |
Men March 2024 |
Women March 2025 |
Women March 2024 |
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Upper Hourly Quartile
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125 (62.19%) |
125 |
76 (37.81%) |
74 |
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Upper Middle Hourly Quartile
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106 (52.48%) |
112 |
96 (47.52%) |
88 |
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Lower Middle Hourly Quartile
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80 (39.6%) |
76 |
122 (60.4%) |
124 |
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Lower Hourly Quartile
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142 (70.3%) |
147 |
60 (29.7%) |
53 |
5. Measure 2
· A standard mean male hourly rate of £18.24 (£17.44 in March 2024)
· A standard mean female hourly rate of £18.14 (£17.32 in March 2024)
A difference of 10p – 0.5% (A difference of 12p, 0.7% in March 2024)
Benchmarking data for the 2025 measures is not yet available, however, this is a summary of the how the Council fared for 2024 (based on a sample of 151 councils):
6. Measure 3
· A standard median male hourly rate of £16.75 (£15.68 in March 2024)
· A standard median female hourly rate of £16.52 (£15.41 in March 2024)
A difference of 23p – 1.4% (A difference of 27p, 1.7% in March 2024)
Benchmarking data for the 2025 measures is not yet available, however, this is a summary of the how the Council fared for 2024 (based on a sample of 151 councils):
7. Measure 4
The percentage of men that received bonus pay is 1.99% and the percentage of women that received a bonus is 3.11%.
8. Measure 5
The mean gender pay gap using solely Bonus pay is -50.45%
9. Measure 6
The median gender pay gap using bonus pay is 0%
10. Ethnicity Data
There is currently no legal requirement for reporting ethnicity data, however, it is advisable to include this information as the Equality (Race and Disability) Bill proposes making such reporting a legal requirement.
Our Ethnicity Data is as follows;
|
Ethnicity |
Number |
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Asian (Inc Chinese) |
7 |
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Black |
6 |
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Mixed |
3 |
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White |
663 |
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Other |
2 |
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Not Known |
145 |
This information is drawn from the ITrent HR Hub system and is input by employees on a voluntary basis. Employees are encouraged on a regular basis to update their personal information
As our subgroup for reporting on is less than 50, we have taken account of the advice on www.gov.uk and not sought to break the data down further.
11. Gender Representation by Pay Quartile
Reporting on gender representation by pay quartiles illustrates the distribution of pay across different pay levels and helps identify any disparities between men and women. This promotes transparency and accountability in pay equity.
|
Pay Quartile |
% Female (New Forest) |
% Female (Mean for all English Single Tier and County Councils) |
% Male (New Forest) |
% Male (Mean for all English Single Tier and County Councils) |
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Lower |
26.5% |
67.9% |
73.5% |
32.1% |
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Lower Middle |
62% |
68.1% |
38% |
31.9% |
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Upper Middle |
44% |
67% |
56% |
33% |
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Top |
37.2% |
64.7% |
62.8% |
35.3% |
CONCLUSIONS
12. The data available shows a continued positive trend in narrowing the gender pay gap. Benchmarking against 2024 data on our Mean and Median percentages of our gender pay gap confirms that we are lower than the comparators. It can also be seen that both the mean and median hourly pay gaps have decreased compared to the previous year, with the difference between the hourly pay for males and females moving closer to 0%. This shows that our gender pay gap is decreasing.
13. Measure 5 shows the mean gender pay gap including bonus pay is -50.45%. This data is easily skewed due to the small number of recipients of bonus payments (9 men and 11 women). The median gender pay gap including bonus (measure 6) is arguably more useful to indicate the typical situation as it is not distorted by unusually high or low bonus figures. This is shown in point 9 and is 0%.
14. The percentage of males in the lower quartile is higher than those of the comparators. One explanation could be that not all comparators deliver an in house refuse service. Another explanation could be that other authorities have responsibilities in Adult and Social care which tend to have a higher proportion of female staff in caring roles.
15. Given these results, no action is required from the Council to support the people strategy.
Corporate plan priorities
16. To ensure fair wages to support the council’s ambition of being an employer of choice
Options appraisal
17. No alternative options have been considered as the report is based on factual KPI’s.
Financial and resource implications
18. None
Legal implications
19. Any employer with 250 or more employees must report their gender pay gap data. Failure to do this could lead to employers facing enforcement actions from the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC).
Equalities implications
20. The council will continue to keep under review its position in relation to gender pay
21. As pointed out in point 10, as our dataset for ethnic minorities is less than 50, we have not sought to break this down further. However, we will continue to encourage those who have no ethnicity recorded on the HR Hub to update their details.
Data protection / Information governance / ICT implications
22. None
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Appendices
Appendix 1 – GPG Methodology
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Background Papers:
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