Labour call for “annual equal pay checks” to see which companies are paying women less than men

Labour have called for an annual equal pay check to see which British companies are paying women less than men.

Tomorrow in an opposition day debate Gloria de Piero, the shadow equalities minister, will say that there needs to be an “annual equal pay check”. She will say that this should be carried out by the Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC).

As of next year, companies that employ more than 250 have to publish figures showing the pay gap between men and women. But Labour have said that as this is published in a company’s annual report, it doesn’t have to be recorded in one place. Instead it can be spread out over a company’s documents.

Labour is calling for the EHRC to work with the Low Pay Commission to look at all of the data collected by UK companies and show trends across different sectors.

De Piero is going to table a motion  saying that an annual equal pay check would monitor whether the UK closing the gender pay gap. As it stands, there is still a pay gap of 19% in the UK – the sixth highest in the European Union. On average, women earn 81p for every pound men earn.