Carolyn Cohn, Iain Withers

LONDON (Reuters] – The gender pay gaps at major banks in Britain have been reduced slightly by a Reuters analysis. Industry observers however believe they are still far from their goal. Numerous insurers have made significant progress.

British companies employing more than 250 people are now required to report the gender pay gap between male and female workers since 2017.

Last year, they were granted a reprieve due to the COVID-19 epidemic – although many of them still filed data. However, there was an additional six-month window to publish 2019/2020 data. Deadline for publication is October 5.

The largest gap in gender pay in Britain has been seen in the financial sector, which is often due to low numbers of female senior positions.

Reuters compiled data on pay gaps from 21 financial institutions. The results showed a decrease in average gender pay gap by just 0.4 percentage point to 33.4% over the period from March 2020 (33.8% in 2019).

Only banks had a one-percentage point pay gap.

In the UK, there was a 14.6% gender gap in average pay for employers.

Ann Francke (CEO of the Chartered Management Institute) stated that “the UK’s financial service industry has been often singled out.”

It really must get its house in order. The industry is hugely lucrative in the UK, and the UK has an opportunity to set the example.

Goldman Sachs (NYSE 🙂 was the company with the largest gender gap between April 2020 and March 2019. However, the gap has narrowed more than other banks compared to a year ago.

Goldman had a gender gap in pay of 51.8%. This is an increase of 1.4 percentage point. In April, the bank informed staff that closing the gap was a priority and stated in an April memo that its goal for firmwide representation at all levels of the executive ranks was 40% by 2025.

UK Finance spokesperson said that there is still much to do. She added that several of their members were committed to the Women in Finance Charter.

insurers Prudential (NYSE:), Legal & General and M&G reported a widening in their pay gaps, according to government filings and company reports.

Graphic: Slow progress: Finance firms edge down gender pay gaps https://graphics.reuters.com/BRITAIN-FINANCE/egpbkydykvq/chart.png

Prudential’s UK gender pay gap widened to 45.2% from 40.3%, which the Asia-focused insurer attributed in its latest gender pay gap report at least in part to the spin-out of its UK life insurer and asset manager M&G in 2019.

However, M&G also reported a widening in its pay gap in the most recent year, to 30.5% from 25%.

“We are determined to narrow our gender pay gap and will do this by achieving better representation of women in all roles at all levels of our organisation, especially in leadership positions,” an M&G spokesperson said by email.

Legal & General’s mean gender pay gap widened to 30.8% from 27.6%.

“Legal & General is tackling the underlying causes of its pay gap by creating a more diverse workforce and a more inclusive culture through sustained, long-term action,” the insurer said in its latest gender pay report.

Admiral, the largest firm surveyed by Reuters had a gender gap that was lower than all other sectors’ most recent average. Last year, Admiral’s gender pay gap was 12.8%.

The 21 businesses surveyed were Barclays (LON -), HSBC Lloyds, HSBC (LON –), NatWest Standard Chartered, (OTC –), Bank of America Merrill Lynch (NYSE )), Goldman Sachs International (NYSE ), Morgan Stanley UBS Credit Suisse (SIX) Deutsche Bank (DE:), PGMS (a Phoenix unit), abrdn, Schroder Investment Management, St James’s Place, Legal & General, Prudential, Admiral Group (LON) Aviva (LON:) and M&G.