Equality Bill

I congratulate all the contributors, not excepting the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies), on the vigour with which they expressed their views. I will respond not in the order in which people have spoken, which would not be possible, but in the order of the proposals, as best I can. New clauses 3, 26 and 33 are on one of the topics that my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Ms Clark) spoke about. They are the successors to the proposals on mandatory pay audits that were extensively debated in Committee. It is true that there was a very full debate indeed in Committee, setting out where the divisions lay. However, I must say that in my view, there is a danger of a sort of inadvertent sloganising. What is the significant difference between a mandatory pay audit and what it would disclose, and requiring, as we will immediately of the public sector and ultimately of the private sector if it does not comply, the disclosure of information from which the pay gap in a firm can be seen, so that pressure can be applied to narrow it? If mandatory pay audits, which are pursued by two of the proposals, are going to be the same as those that have failed to work in a number of areas, we are unsurprisingly not going to support them. The kind of consultant-based mandatory pay audit that has been prevalent is often sexist in its conclusions and has had to be fought. Local authorities that have tried rigorously, with the best will in the world, since 1997 and the single status agreement, to have what amount to mandatory pay audits, have in very large measure, as everybody agrees, landed themselves in employment tribunals because the management of the audits has not been transparent and has therefore produced sex discrimination of its own kind. The audits are quite difficult to get right and can be an enormous burden. For instance, in Sweden, which has had mandatory pay audits for some time, there is simply no evidence that they have worked effectively at all. We are looking to get away from the term "mandatory pay audits" if what it means is what I have just described, and to arrive at a practical solution that will advance the equality of women's pay, which has been unfairly different from that of men for far, far, far too long. My hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran talked about transparency, and that is the name of the game. She complained that in the private sector she was not able to learn about pay differentials, but there will be no place for the private sector to hide on pay differentials in the future. Secrecy clauses will be banned under this Bill, and we will require that immediately—it is not a case of waiting until 2013 to ask the private sector to publish its pay figures. I will come later to the most up-to-date information that I have about the work that is being done, which is being thoroughly supported by the CBI and other employers, with the EHRC and the TUC, to try to work out the optimum measurements that will disclose pay structures effectively without imposing an unfair and unnecessary burden. However, the whole negotiation has been on the basis that pay transparency is agreed to be the most important factor. The issue is what measurements will be needed to disclose those structures. The issue of burden is much further back. However, we are seeking the optimal solution so that clarity may be obtained and action taken on the basis of what is disclosed. I asked a rhetorical question about the difference between a mandatory pay audit and disclosing enough information so that people can discover what is going wrong with pay scales and put that right. That goes beyond direct discrimination. The hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose) does not understand that figures will disclose not just deliberate discrimination, but inadvertent discrimination, historic ghettoisation and many other factors. I suppose that the answer to the rhetorical question is the mandatory element. The issue is whether we continue as we have been doing, as the realisation is emerging that equality, diversity and good business go together and are not the enemies of each other. Should we encourage that to flourish—and observe participation in that—or should we say, "Hey, businesses, you're all under arrest and you must all do mandatory pay audits", even though such audits have not made a significant difference in those countries where they have been tried? The Government's position should not be construed as demonstrating the slightest lack of political will, determination or certainty that we will advance the cause of equal pay, and quickly. I am confident that it will go up 10 gears when the legislation comes into force.