Gender Pay Equality

From a statutory reporting perspective, Progress Housing Association Ltd’s gender pay gap report for 2024 reveals a mean pay gap of 8.2%, which is lower than the 8.6% in 2023), and a median pay gap of 10.9%, which is unchanged from the previous year.

Since 2023, we have seen an increase in males within the
upper quartile.

We do not pay bonuses except for recognition payments and long service awards. So, the typically small numbers of individuals who receive payments that fall within the bonus calculation can lead to larger variances than you would see in an organisation with performance-related pay.

We pay attention to the gender pay gap across the entire Group beyond the legal obligation to report it.

The statutory report only shows a snapshot of the pay gap at a certain point in time, but we need to look at the bigger picture and the underlying causes of the gap.

• The mean pay gap for the whole Group is 6.8%, slightly down on the previous year.
• The median pay gap is 15%, higher than the 14.8% in 2023.
• The Group has decreased by 1.5% in the number of employees.
• The number of male colleagues has increased by 3.4% and and the number of female employees has decreased by 5.3%.
• Women comprise 55% of the employees (425), while men comprise 45% (349).

The pay gap is influenced by the roles and salaries of the new employees, as well as any internal employee changes and departures within this reporting period.

Organisations must report the percentage of men and women in each pay quartile as part of the gender pay reporting requirements. This is done by ranking the full-pay relevant employees from the highest to the lowest paid and splitting them into 4 equal groups (quartiles).

Then, the proportion of men and women in each group is calculated. The data on this page shows the number of men and women in each quartile on 5 April 2024. The main factors that affect the gender pay gap this year are:

• More men in the upper and upper middle quartiles.
• More women in the lower and lower middle quartiles.

The bonus gap between men and women in the Group has changed significantly in this reporting period. The mean bonus gap is now 33.3%, compared to -4.5% in 2023. 74 employees received a bonus in 2024, 52 employees received a bonus in 2023, and only 36 received a bonus in 2022. The median bonus gap in 2024 is 41.2%, compared to 62.5% in 2023. The Group does not usually pay bonuses, except for Concert Living, so the small number of bonus recipients can cause large fluctuations in the bonus gap, unlike an organisation with performance-based pay.

The bonus gap for the Group is £386 for the mean and £206 for the median. The bonus calculation includes one-off financial recognition payments and long service awards. Concert Living has a different bonus scheme that pays higher bonuses to a small group of employees than the rest of the organisation. This difference is due to more women receiving long service awards in this year. The Group has to show the number of men and women receiving bonuses in the reporting period and the mean and median gender pay gaps in bonus payments. The Group’s numbers may change a lot because it does not have a regular bonus scheme, and the bonus payments include awards for long service and special recognition.

The Gender Pay Gap Report is one of a several data sets we can use to better inform the Group’s equality and diversity agenda and highlight where we could be more inclusive and diverse.

Whilst we can take some immediate actions in terms of process and practice to reduce our pay gap, the results of these measures may not be evident for some time. In other words, this is a longer-term strategy and commitment to change by the Group. Activities and areas of focus are noted below.

Our 4 colleague networks, Pride in Progress, CarersTogether, Meno Movers and Roots, continue to connect colleagues, provide the opportunity to share experiences and increase confidence in leading conversations about equality, diversity, inclusion and belonging.

In the last 6 months, we have supported 14 apprenticeships across a wide range of specialisms and skill levels, including training new
employees and upskilling existing employees.

Future activity into 2025 We will continue to review our recruitment practices, ensuring they are values-based; the candidate’s values, behaviours and attitudes align with the values, culture and expectations of our workplace. Interview questions are now provided to candidates ahead of their interview.

Our Brighter Futures programme allows young people to work with us in fully paid 6-month job placements, a great opportunity for some of our tenants to gain confidence, learn new skills and boost their CVs. Providing these types of development opportunities will continue to be a focus for us.

We are now in the fourth year of the innovative Project SEARCH programme, providing internship opportunities for autistic people or those with learning disabilities. Each placement aims to provide valuable work experience and opportunities to develop their skills and gain confidence in their abilities.

We received an award for ‘80% or Higher Outcomes’ at this year’s DFN Project SEARCH annual conference. We encourage women to apply for roles traditionally in our society performed by men and encourage men to apply for roles traditionally in our society performed by women. Some examples of these are property services, trades and care roles.

The House of Commons Women and Equalities Committee urged the government to make it mandatory for employers to report on the pay gap between workers from different ethnic backgrounds by April 2023. This was to help tackle the pay inequality based on ethnicity.  The government did not make it mandatory but gave some guidance in April 2023 on how to report on ethnicity pay. Ethnicity pay reporting: guidance for employers - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

The Group’s ethnicity pay report for the reporting period is below. It followed the same method and data set as the gender pay gap report. The Group has 22 employees who have disclosed that they come from ethnically diverse backgrounds, which is 3.9% of the workforce. The average pay gap between the mean and median is 2.9% and -1.8%.

The number of employees who have not shared their status has increased. We do not hold data for 28.1% of employees, so we will actively seek opportunities to increase the data. We remain extremely committed to our equality, diversity and inclusion principles which help us to be an attractive and fair employer. We will continue to encourage people from a range of ethnicities to work with us and keep improving representation across the organisation. With a sample size of 3.9% of the workforce, small changes can significantly impact the annual figures.

The Gender Pay Gap Report is one of a several data sets we can use to better inform the Group’s equality and diversity agenda and highlight where we could be more inclusive and diverse. Whilst we can take some immediate actions in terms of process and practice to reduce our pay gap, the results of these measures may not be evident for some time. In other words, this is a longer-term strategy and commitment to change by the Group. Activities and areas of focus are noted below.

Our 4 colleague networks, Pride in Progress, Carers Together, Meno Movers and Roots, continue to connect colleagues, provide the opportunity to share experiences and increase confidence in leading conversations about equality, diversity, inclusion and belonging.
In the last 6 months, we have supported 14 apprenticeships across a wide range of specialisms and skill levels, including training new employees and upskilling existing employees.

Future activity into 2025

We will continue to review our recruitment practices, ensuring they are values-based; the candidate’s values, behaviours and
attitudes align with the values, culture and expectations of our workplace. Interview questions are now provided to candidates ahead of their interview.

Our Brighter Futures programme allows young people to work with us in fully paid 6-month job placements, a great opportunity for some of our tenants to gain confidence, learn new skills and boost their CVs. Providing these types of development opportunities will continue to be a focus for us.

We are now in the fourth year of the innovative Project SEARCH programme, providing internship opportunities for autistic people or those with learning disabilities. Each placement aims to provide valuable work experience and opportunities to develop their skills and gain confidence in their abilities.

We received an award for ‘80% or Higher Outcomes’ at this year’s DFN Project SEARCH annual conference.

We encourage women to apply for roles traditionally in our society performed by men and encourage men to apply for roles traditionally in our society performed by women. Some examples of these are property services, trades and care roles.