by René Lavanchy
A row has erupted between the Government’s equalities office and the Institute of Directors after the latter announced that equalities minister Harriet Harman had rowed back on a promise to make private companies more transparent about the gender pay gap.
Ms Harman promised last year that ministers would look into forcing companies to provide information about the pay gap between men and women in their businesses to allow them to bid for Government contracts.
But the IoD said last week that Ms Harman’s office had ruled out to them any such move. Head of employment policy Alistair Tebbit said: “We are delighted that Harriet Harman has listened to the IoD’s arguments on this issue and seen sense”, adding that gender pay audits were useless.
A Government Equalities Office spokesperson said the IoD had “misunderstood the position” over what constitutes a pay audit, but Mr Tebbit told Tribune that equalities office director-general Jonathan Rees had sent a letter to the IoD ruling out any form of link between Government contracts and pay transparency.
