Gender Pay Gap

What is the Gender Pay Gap?

The gender pay gap highlights the difference between the average hourly pay rates of men and women across the organisation. This is different to recognising equal pay, which involves comparing the salary of men and women undertaking the same role or work of an equal value. The gender pay gap aims to demonstrate the difference across the organisation as a whole.

Understanding our Gender Pay Gap

The gender pay is based on a snapshot of data taken as at 31 March 2024.

Figures on 31 March 2024. The mean gender pay gap is the difference in the average hourly pay for women compared to men. The median gender pay gap is the difference between the ‘middle’ hourly pay rate for women compared to men if you listed them separately from lowest to highest pay.

When compared to last years' data (snapshot taken as of 31 March 2023), our gender pay gap across the organisation has decreased, with our mean gender pay gap decreasing from 10.9% to 10.3% and our median gender pay gap decreasing from 23.5% to 23.1%

Figures as at 31 March 2024. In 2023/2024, 181 people received a bonus payment, representing just under 3% of the workforce. A bonus is paid in recognition of performing work of an outstandingly demanding, unpleasant or important nature.

The gender pay gap also examines the number and amount of bonus payments made. As at 31 March 2024, 3.7% of men received a bonus, compared to 2.2% of women.

 Pay quartiles involve sorting the individual hourly pay rates of each employee into order from highest to lowest. The top 25% of earners are then categorised in the top quartile, whilst the bottom 25% of earners are placed into the lower quartile. This allows us to see the gender split across the highest and lowest earners in the organisation more clearly.

There are various factors that have an impact on the size of the gender pay gap within Lancashire Constabulary. Our workforce consists of two main groups; police officers and police staff. Both groups have very different employment terms and conditions, with police officer roles typically having higher salaries, with 61% of these roles occupied by men. In contrast, police staff roles typically have lower salaries, and women made up 66% of this group as at 31 March 2024. As proportionally more women occupy police staff roles in the organisation, this results in them holding a greater proportion of the lower-middle and lower quartile jobs.

Due to the significant difference between police officers and police staff, we feel it is also important to calculate the gender pay for each of the groups separately.

The median gender pay gap has increased slightly for police officers on last year, increasing to 1.0% in 2023/24 (from 0.8% in 2022/23). Female recruitment at Constable rank continues to be high, and numbers of women have increased in the ranks from Sergeant to Superintendent. The proportion of female to male officers remains the same as last year (39% to 61% respectively)

For police staff, the median gender pay gap remains the same as last year; for PCSOs, there is no difference.

In a change to last year, the gender pay gap for Police Control Room Operators (PCROs) is now just higher at 0.8% (last year it was 0.9% lower), even with 58.7% of females working less than 1 FTE, compared to 33.3% of males.

The individual breakdown of roles demonstrates that the gender pay gap is not as severe as it first appears, and that the difference for each group of staff can be somewhat explained by looking at the proportion of men and women currently undertaking those roles.

Further to this, we have identified additional factors that are influencing the overall gender pay gap for Lancashire Constabulary:

• There continues to be a lower proportion of women in higher paid roles and ranks which is reflected by the increase in the overall gender pay gap, although we will see an increase in women in more senior roles over the next few years as new officers and staff begin to progression within the organisation.
• Significantly more women have a flexible working arrangement, which in turn can reduce or even cease additional allowances that they would otherwise have been entitled to (e.g. unsocial hours and weekend working allowance). Across all of the individuals who had a flexible working arrangement as of 31 March 2024, over half are women.
• We offer police staff the ability to buy additional annual leave, which in turn further reduces hourly pay. In 2023/24, 70.9% of requests to purchase additional annual leave were made by women.

How are we addressing the Gender Pay Gap?

Our gender pay gap demonstrates that, whilst we’ve seen improvements in female representation in different ranks and roles, there is still plenty more to do.  It also highlights the continuing need to identify the barriers that may prevent women from progressing throughout their careers and provide support to help them overcome these.

Our strategy to reduce the gender pay gap will continue to focus on the key areas discussed in previous years: recruitment, progression, training and data analysis. Our Culture & Inclusion Board meets on a quarterly basis to discuss and progress workforce diversity initiatives and will continue to provide support to positive action to encourage a greater number of women both to join the organisation and seek career progression.

There are significant cultural and societal changes required to address some of the causes of the gender pay gap, and whilst this will take time, we are seeing positive improvements in these areas.

We remain committed to our work to reduce the gender pay gap further and to support our ‘Plan on a Page’ Vision, Strategy and Values.  We will do this by ensuring that everyone can be themselves at work and by attracting, retaining, and developing our people to maximise their potential.  We aim to represent the communities we serve and will keep them safe by putting victims at the heart of everything we do and by delivering an outstanding service to the public and building confidence.