The Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission (Veohrc) is to develop new educational resources to help smaller organisations access the benefits of greater gender diversity.
According to the Commission, the resources are to be developed in response to its report Equal pay matters: Achieving gender pay equality in small-to-medium enterprises, released earlier this week on Equal Pay Day (31 August), which found small and medium-sized businesses in Victoria had a limited understanding of gender pay equality.
Veohrc said its Report focused on three industries, the arts, financial services, and healthcare and social assistance, and made 10 recommendations to address barriers to gender pay equality in smaller organisations.
“Our Report provides a framework for achieving pay equality in these organisations and paves the way for policy makers, business, industry bodies, unions and regulatory bodies to work collaboratively to improve gender pay equality in small and medium organisations,” it said.
Commenting on the Report, Minister for Industrial Relations, Tim Pallas said the research found that one of the drivers of pay inequality in smaller organisations was a limited understanding about the concept of equal pay and how it applied to them.
“They face internal issues such as a lack of transparency around pay, limited access to flexible working and parental leave,” Mr Pallas said.
“They’re also affected by external drivers such as rigid gender stereotypes and, in some instances, an absence of industry standards,” he said.
“The new educational resources will be developed with industry and cover the concept of gender pay equality, how to achieve it and the benefits of workplace diversity for businesses.”
Mr Pallas said the new resources were also expected to help organisations understand their legal obligations to ensure equal pay.
The Minister said data from the Australian Workplace Gender Equality Agency showed the national gender pay gap widened during the pandemic to 14.2 per cent, up from 13.4 per cent last year, with men on average earning $261.50 a week more than women.
He said the increase was largely driven by higher growth in men’s full-time wages.
The Commission’s 92-page Report can be accessed at this PS News link.
