Transcript - Is there a gender pay gap in Jersey - Chief Minister - 20 January 2020

Gender Pay Gap Review Panel Gender Pay Gap

Witness: The Chief Minister

Monday, 21st January 2020

Panel:

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet of St. Saviour (Chair) Deputy K.F. Morel of St. Lawrence

Deputy J.H. Perchard of St. Saviour Senator K.L. Moore

Witnesses:

Senator J.A.N. Le Fondré, The Chief Minister

Connétable R.A. Buchanan of St. Ouen , Assistant Chief Minister

Mr. M. Grimley, Group Director, People and Corporate Services

Ms. D. Drieu, Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services Mr. S. O'Regan, Group Director, Education

[10:02]

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet of St. Saviour (Chair):

Welcome, Minister and team. This is the Gender Pay Gap Review Panel public hearing with the Chief Minister and the Assistant Chief Minister. I am Deputy Louise Doublet and I will let the rest of my panel introduce themselves.

Senator K.L. Moore : Senator Kristina Moore .

Deputy K.F. Morel of St. Lawrence : Deputy Kirsten Morel .

Deputy J.H. Perchard of St. Saviour : Deputy Jess Perchard.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet : And our officer.

Scrutiny Officer: Kellie Boydens .

The Chief Minister:

Senator John Le Fondré, Chief Minister.

Assistant Chief Minister: Constable Richard Buchanan.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

Denise Drieu, Head of Organisational Development and Learning for the Government of Jersey.

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

Mark Grimley, Group Director of People and Corporate Services.

Group Director, Education:

Sean O'Regan, Group Director, Education.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Minister, do you have the statement in front of you and have you read it and understood it?

The Chief Minister: Yes.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

You probably know it off by heart by now. Welcome to those in the public gallery. If I can ask you to maintain silence during the hearing, including turning your phones off please. Thank you for attending. The subject is on the gender pay gap. It is an update following publication of our Scrutiny review and the subsequent publication of the Government's gender pay gap report yourselves. So the first question I am going to open with is a question from a member of the public. I will read it as it was sent to us: "Why has the decision been taken to not bother large employers by requiring them to publish gender pay gap data like in the U.K. (United Kingdom) especially when evidence suggests it would be beneficial to the Jersey economy?"

The Chief Minister:

I will hand over to Richard straightaway.

Assistant Chief Minister:

I have some sympathy with that view, as you know. I have sort of made a public statement on this. What we are proposing to do is to we have obviously set the tone as Government with publishing our gender pay gap. What we are going to do is wait for 12 months and then see what employers in the Island do. If there is no real movement in that direction then we will consider legislation to make people publish their gender pay gap. What we have to consider in Jersey is the size of the employers. In the U.K. the baseline figure is 250, which obviously picks up a lot of U.K. companies. In Jersey that would not pick up very many at all. So we looked at figures 150, is it not?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: 150 picks up 60 organisations whereas 250 only picks up 25 currently.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Have you done any work on maybe 50 employees or 100 employees?

Assistant Chief Minister:

Not really. One of the stages of producing legislation is obviously to consult with industry and see what their views were as well in terms of the numbers and if it produced a meaningful answer then we probably would look at going down as far as 50.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

So you said you were going to wait for 12 months and then see if there was any movement but how will you know whether there has been any movement in terms of companies closing their pay gaps?

Assistant Chief Minister:

It is not a question of closing their pay gaps. It is more about publishing the pay gap. Whether companies close their pay gap or not we will not know unless they produce the evidence to do it. The only way of seeing that is through the publication of gender pay gap reports similar to ours. It is sort of a reverse process because if the company is forced to publish the gender pay gap it becomes public. Certainly those companies, from my experience, who have U.K. boards that run them, if they publish something that is detrimental to their reputation then they will quite quickly take action to put it right or at least it is a driver to put it right.

Senator K.L. Moore :

Given that there is a lot of knowledge and understanding of this subject area and we are well into the 21st century now, is it not commonplace and something that employers would expect to do?

Assistant Chief Minister:

You like to hope so but my experience of working in commercial businesses is that they are driven by other factors other than social responsibility. That is the ability to make profits and work effectively and that is one of their big key drivers. But as the Deputy mentioned in the question, and PwC clearly highlights it in their gender pay report that was published last year, there is a benefit to those businesses in addressing the gender pay gap and also benefit to the general economy so it is surely in the Government's interest to really charge forward on this matter.

Assistant Chief Minister:

We are not disagreeing with you. We totally agree with that statement. It is a question of how you do it and whether what you do is effective. You can produce legislation but it has to be the right legislation and it has to assist the process and that is what we are considering. But we are giving industry a period to do it voluntarily and we will be encouraging them publicly to do that.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Can I put it to you though that businesses might prefer to have the legislation rather than have a situation where certain companies are publishing in a staggered fashion because I think those that do publish will in a similar way to the BBC in the U.K. published ahead and they were subject to quite a lot of vitriol. It can be quite a difficult thing to put out there so is it not better and fairer if we put some clear legislation in and then all companies are required to publish at the same time; would that not be a better way of doing things?

The Chief Minister:

Usually on these types of things trying to get people to voluntarily adopt a particular standard is usually the preferred way initially and then obviously if they do not then you then start thinking about the legislation. That is why Richard is talking about the 12 months. I think the other thing is that there is current expectation as well or anticipation, I suppose, that a lot of the organisations over here, if they do have U.K. parents, will probably be doing one would anticipate they would be doing that work anyway because their U.K. parents it is obliged to. That is really the discussion, I think, that needs to be taking place over the next 12 months. Would you like to add to that?

Assistant Chief Minister:

I would certainly envisage that we would start thinking about consulting industry during this 12-month period and finding out what their views are, not least so we can put together an initial proposal in terms of the legislation.

The Chief Minister:

I think also, one issue is that you then also have to identify how big a company you are trying to or how big a business you try and target because obviously the smaller the size you set it at the more identifiable it becomes of employees which then gets into privacy, G.D.P.R. (General Data Protection Regulation) and all that type of stuff. Denise, I do not know if you want to add anything on that front.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

I know that is why the U.K. have stuck with that higher number, although I believe they are considering lowering the number at the moment, but I would agree. Because we have got a lot of small industry it would be difficult to do meaningful reporting for those smaller industry organisations but we would need like you say, if we consulted on it and something like 50 would be a fair figure maybe potentially.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Are you saying that you will, Chief Minister, be bringing gender pay gap reporting legislation in 12 months' time?

The Chief Minister:

I think what we are saying is that we want to give industry 12 months to adapt and then we are going to

Deputy J.H. Perchard: Adapt to what, sorry?

The Chief Minister:

To start producing reports and if they do not then we will set

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

If they do not. So if how many of them do not, as a percentage?

Assistant Chief Minister:

I think it would have to be a figure going towards 75 per cent before it became meaningful.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

So if less than 75 per cent of businesses voluntarily publish their gender pay gap you will be bringing legislation?

Assistant Chief Minister:

Then we would start the process to bring legislation, yes.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Businesses of which size; was it the 150?

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

I want to know irrespective of what size you determine what percentage of the remainder you are expecting to but you have just said; that is clear. Less than 75 per cent would result in legislation being proposed.

Assistant Chief Minister:

Yes, and it would not necessarily be within our target group. I mean if smaller companies produce a report then we would welcome that.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Given that we had a hearing with you almost a year ago to the day, it was on 17th January last year, how likely do you think it is that 75 per cent of businesses of whichever size you determine are going to voluntarily publish their gender pay gap in the next 12 months?

Assistant Chief Minister:

Difficult question to answer, to be honest. We hope that by setting the example of publishing our own report it acts as a spur to other industries and other businesses to do the same. That would be the ideal world that we live in but I suspect that in a year's time we would be looking at bringing in legislation.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

If 75 per cent or more businesses do voluntarily publish their gender pay gap are you saying that you will not therefore bring the legislation?

Assistant Chief Minister:

If that was the case then there would not be a lot of point.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Why not?

Assistant Chief Minister:

Because they are publishing the information anyway.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

75 per cent would be but there is the 25 that would not be of the group which you determine.

The Chief Minister:

It is a little bit hypothetical. I think it is one of those we have published ours, so we have set the example, we are now saying to the private sector, particularly given the way the world is moving we expect you guys to start doing something similar. Let us see where that message comes back from and do not forget that both the head of the I.o.D. (Institute of Directors) and the head of Chamber over here are female, and there are conversations, which I am sure you know far more about than I do, happening certainly within those organisations, as far as I am aware. Certainly in the I.o.D. definitely. Therefore you can use that as a movement to try and encourage business as a whole to be publishing. But let us just see what that result is before we start saying it is going to be this. Because it is a slightly

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

How will you measure the results?

The Chief Minister:

We have said 75 per cent.

Assistant Chief Minister:

75 per cent. I mean I think if we are being meaningful and thinking about this carefully, if 75 per cent of companies over 50 employees started publishing their gender pay gap then we would consider legislation unnecessary. If they did not then we would consider it to be necessary.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Can I just pick up on that because surely if it is becoming something that businesses do in Jersey but there are 25 per cent or a similar number that are not doing it, surely that is an even more compelling reason to introduce the legislation because those companies logically you would expect they are hiding something, which they do not want to publish.

Assistant Chief Minister:

Not necessarily. You could turn that argument round on itself by saying that if you get 75 per cent of companies to publish in the first year it is a compelling reason for the other 25 per cent to publish because they will be out of step with industry generally.

The Chief Minister:

Can I just give an example? So if I have understood it incorrectly - and I do not like doing this on the hoof - I think Denise indicated that if it is above 150 employees it was about 60 entities so therefore 50 per cent would be 30, therefore 25 per cent would be 15 companies that would not be publishing, do you see what I mean? So are we going to legislate for 15 companies?

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

You are not legislating 15 companies, you are legislating for all companies but it is a case that 75 per cent happen to already be complying.

The Chief Minister:

Yes, so if 75 per cent are already complying are you going to go through the whole thing of legislation for 15?

[10:15]

That is something you have to assess once you can see is that impact starting to come through and what are the reasons for those other 15, if it is 15, for not publishing? That is what I am saying. I think let us go for the improvement bit, which is we have reported, let us get business reporting and then let us see what it looks like.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

You have set 75 per cent as your goal of companies of a certain size, which is yet to be determined. 75 per cent is very high and 12 months is not very long for a big change in a business. How are you communicating to businesses that if that 75 per cent is not reached there will be legislation coming that they will then have to adhere to? How are you making that clear enough to businesses now so they have the time to change the policies they need to change and write reports they need to report.

Assistant Chief Minister:

We have been communicating that through the industry bodies, Institute of Directors, Chamber of Commerce, so the message is quite clear to those companies on what we are trying to achieve.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Has that process started already?

Assistant Chief Minister: No, it has not. Not yet, no.

The Chief Minister:

Although as I said, I have had a conversation with I.o.D. but that has been an informal conversation. I think they have been indicating there is a whole load of work happening. I do not know the specifics though. But it will be on my next meeting with them.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Can you update us please on your progress for implementing the recommendations within the Scrutiny report?

The Chief Minister:

I suppose at a high level, obviously since the report - you have now got the gender pay gap report that was issued, that was issued in October - there have been some staff events to go through the details on that and I will let Denise and Richard address that. Obviously Richard, as you have probably gathered, is the front person on this one. I think, Richard, you presented to the Diversity Network at some point and obviously things like the Government Plan put some money in, which is towards improving the H.R. (human resources) functions, which is then about getting the right rigour into the right places within the organisation. Obviously Mark can talk to that. So I will hand to Richard and Denise and then to Mark.

Assistant Chief Minister:

We obviously had quite a lot of publicity when we published the gender pay gap and I also sat on the diversity forum panel when they met in the autumn.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet : Diversity Network.

Assistant Chief Minister:

Yes, right. Like you, I am sure you attend so many panels, getting the name right, especially when you get to my age it is a bit tricky. I gave the commitment that if they wanted more support we would be more than happy to do so because it was a very worthwhile forum; a lot of good industry players so it was worth doing. We also held a meeting with the subsidiary companies, with Janet, and made it very clear to them that we expected them to follow diversity guidelines and to have equal opportunity appointment on their boards and also we expected them to work towards publishing a gender pay gap report. That generally was well received and we are currently following that up with them.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

I can talk about I WILL (Inspiring Women into Leadership and Learning) because I am a member of the steering group. Unfortunately Kate Nutt was unable to attend this morning so I agreed to represent I WILL today. As you know, I WILL is a new group that has been set up within Government to support women into leadership and we have now got just under 400 members. We meet on a regular basis so last year we did a number of events, which included events on things such as imposter syndrome and unconscious bias, which I know is something you are particularly keen on us running out across government. So those were open events that were available to all staff but promoted through I WILL. We also launched the mentoring scheme so we now have 60 relationships which commenced this year and a training scheme taking place this month and in February for those partnerships to go through mentoring training and then commence relationships for one year. So those are the 60 women that have been mentored by senior leaders across the organisation. We are about to also launch a shadowing scheme which provides opportunities. They are open for men and women but they are promoted through I WILL to participate in shadowing placements with leadership across government. We have made quite a lot of movement. We also got a programme of activity for the coming year, which is about bringing role model speakers, whether that be local or from outside the Island, female role models to come and talk. Again those events, all those supported by I WILL are open to all government employees and a programme of network and learn events where we have about 6 or 7 events through the year which will be topics that women in the organisation have asked us to run events on.

Assistant Chief Minister:

I also held a meeting with Kate Nutt and Mark, and invited them to come to S.E.B. (States Employment Board) to talk about the I WILL

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Can you just clarify for the transcript what Kate Nutt's job role is please?

Assistant Chief Minister: She is chair.

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

She is a group director for External Affairs but she also chairs the I WILL network.

Assistant Chief Minister:

I invited her to come to S.E.B., to talk to S.E.B. about the I WILL initiative and explain how it works and also to talk to us about what resource level she needs and what further support S.E.B. can give her to make it a successful venture.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Are the I WILL committee's resource needs currently being met based on that conversation?

Assistant Chief Minister:

We are having conversations about what she needs for the forthcoming year in terms of resources going forward. Yes, we are looking at ways that we can meet those resourcing requirements.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Was I WILL set up as a direct reaction to the gender pay gap review?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

It was not about the gender pay gap review, it was set up because of the recognition of need to improve representation of women in senior leadership roles. So it was before the gender pay gap review.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

In terms of funding, do you have the figures on what the levels were last year and what the levels would be for this year?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

In the Government Plan, Members agreed an increase in the People and Corporate Services budget. That was probably in recognition in some way that every time we have asked to take action on issues there has always been a capacity issue. Within the plan for this year, which we are drawing up in the people strategy that will go to the States Employment Board this and next month for approval, there is a strand on diversity and equality. In terms of specifically the gender pay gap, and it is accepted in the ministerial response to this report, there are a number of areas that we need to look at to remove barriers to progression because it is one of those things where it is a systemic response. For example, people returning to work, we need to have more flexible work policies that this panel has already recommended. We need to look at the types of jobs that people are being attracted in to, we need to remove bias from our recruitment process. We have been through all those but

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :  

Can I just pause you there to ask the question again? What was the funding amount for the I WILL initiative for last year and what will it be for this year?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

I can answer that. At the last year anyway because last year the I WILL initiative was set up once we were about a quarter through the year so we had to find budget from somewhere. So it was a small budget last year, it was £10,000 that was allocated to that.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :  Where did that come from?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

It came from with our People Services budget. But also what happened is I WILL has worked quite hard to get sponsors for events in order to improve what we can deliver as a steering group.

Deputy J.H. Perchard: And next year?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: Next year has not been agreed as yet.

Deputy J.H. Perchard: This year, sorry.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: This year has not been agreed yet.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Has not been agreed yet. What level of funding is required to fulfil the aims of that group?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

Not sure. We have identified a programme of work and some specific things we would like to achieve but the panel is still in discussions because really it is about looking at the people strategy and understanding because we recognise that it should not just be about gender but we also have to look at diversity as a whole. So although the I WILL group are supporting women in leadership they are also trying to make sure that there is that balance ensuring all diversity aspects are supported.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Chief Minister or Mr. Grimley, could you give some detail on how much money could be available this year from the People Services budget?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

In the people strategy there is a specific strand on equality and diversity. We have commissioned to work with Liberate in the first instance to help us bring up our programme. We have one post within our structure which is at a mid-tier level, which I know the panel may want to ask questions about. That post is around £70,000 worth of bond costs and then the programme with Liberate will be around £50,000 to get the initial programme up and running. On top of that, the Assistant Chief Minister is committed to the I WILL programme to take their programme and see how that fits within our wider funding. We have not got the full programme yet because we have only just started that business planning.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

When will the Equality and Diversity programme be available?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

Liberate are working with us on a department by department basis at the moment, so I expect over the next 6 to 8 months they will build up a full programme but we are starting with some of the larger departments.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Is that the unconscious bias training? Is that what Liberate are doing?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

It goes wider than the unconscious bias training. So it is around setting up the staff networks, awareness of different characteristics and how that affects people at work and also complimenting the work we have got with Team Jersey around the culture.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Just focusing on unconscious bias training, I think some new research has come to light that unconscious bias training is not quite enough because it is difficult to change people. You can make people aware of their unconscious bias but what does make change within an organisation is changing the systems and the structures. Can you outline whether you have thought about that and what kind of changes you might make to the system?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

So I am not aware of that latest research but, as I was saying earlier, there are a number of things that we need to look at. The first thing is our ethos as an employer, what is it we want to achieve. That drives our policies. At the moment I think policy has been driven very much by legislation, making sure that we are compliant. What we do not look at is the culture that we are trying to create here. That culture ought to be one that removes barriers and where everyone has an opportunity. If we start with that we then get into things like our terms and conditions of employment, our flexible working policies. We look at removing bias within recruitment, attraction strategy. So we talk very much about panels being trained on unconscious bias but how you sell those roles and how you describe them do have a natural bias in it too. So you are right, it is a systemic approach and money to chomp through this bit by bit.

Senator K.L. Moore :

Could you give an example of how that has been done recently? Because as you were describing some of those examples towards the end one can only think of the adverts that are going out looking for consultants saying what a wonderful place Jersey is to live, has 5-star hotels and free transport to and from paid for by the Government of Jersey. I am interested to know how that helps the diversity strategy.

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

So I know just before I came one of the departments had a review of all their adverts going out and their role profiles, that I think is a prototype rather than practice at the moment. I had a conversation last week about nurse and social worker recruitments, for example, when we started to talk about our route to market. Naturally our route to market would be microsites and advertising. What we do not do is look at the imagery that goes with that or how we describe the roles and what we are trying to achieve. So the language in those will be very important. For example, if we put male nurses in the nursing adverts and female doctors into those you just create an imagery that says we are different and that we have different expectations here.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet : Is that happening?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

That is part of the resourcing strategy we are drawing at the moment. The department is going through its target operating model at the moment to help us increase our capacity. So you will see in the people strategy an intent and you should see by the end of the year a lot of this starting to come through.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

From the perspective of diversity, and I think what Senator Moore was kind of getting at, was some of these adverts seem to avoid advertising themselves to people on-Island and from that perspective people who already live here in Jersey are being marginalised through some of this advertising. Is that something that you are going to look at? To see adverts which talk about 5-star hotels, et cetera, they are not appealing to Islanders.

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

Absolutely. So one of the key strands in the people strategy which I now realise that we are probably building up quite an expectation for them, is around on-Island recruitment and attracting from the Island and developing careers on-Island.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

Could I just ask with regard to funding for the I WILL programme? You mentioned, I assume, corporate sponsorship - you mentioned sponsorship and I took it to mean corporate sponsorship - but is the intention that there will be a core budget from Government to fund that?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: Yes, definitely.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

So any corporate sponsorship would just be above and beyond that and the programme itself will not depend or rely on it?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: No.

Assistant Chief Minister:

I can confirm from my perspective that that is absolutely the case. What we are discussing with the I WILL programme is how we can best meet their expectations, i.e. through internal training and also externally funded training.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

The thing I am slightly concerned or confused about really is obviously we passed the Government Plan in November 2019 and you are telling me today that you have not got Government funding for this programme; here we are marching deeper and deeper into 2020. So you are still looking for funding for this year. Why was that not part of the Government Plan programme?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

When we met with the I WILL network only last week what we asked for is a full comprehensive programme from members. So they came with a particular project. We said: "What does this look like for the whole year?" Part of that funding is also around where we are going to do work with other bodies, so for example, States Employment Board is commissioning some work around the pipeline in representation in boardrooms.

[10:30]

The I WILL network wanted to do something very similar about representation on non-executives. We are trying to build together a whole programme. The funding was only passed at the end of last year and we structured my team to give us the capacity to do this. So we have asked for full programme from a number of people so that we can piece this together. We do not have all the funding that we need but we can make it work smarter.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

The fact that you met with this team last week, coincidentally I am sure just a week before you happened to be sitting in this hearing, suggests, given that all the funding for the year ahead was decided last year, suggests to me that this is still very much something that is off the side of a desk at the back of your mind and now and again pops up and you think: "Ooh, I have got to do something about that." Would that be a fair assessment of how the I WILL programme is being considered in Government?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

Certainly not. It has got high level sponsorship from the chief executive. The States Employment Board have asked for them to attend. The meeting did not take place week just because of this. It was booked in for pre-Christmas but events overtook us. The Assistant Chief Minister asked to attend that meeting as well to make sure that he was giving it his sponsorship.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

In terms of support for that group because you mentioned that there is a post that would be around £70,000 a year, what other kind of support is there for I WILL? Is there a staff member that is doing admin support for it?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

A lot of the work that I WILL did last year is supported through People Services, through my team which is the Organisational Development and Learning team. For instance, all the work on the mentoring and shadowing was done in partnership with I WILL through my team and we put the resources in and we have also funded the mentor training. So it is not from the I WILL budget.

Because we have common goals and the mentoring was something, for instance, that is an example of something that we had planned to do but we accelerated because I WILL provided extra support to help us launch that. So I think it is fair to say that although we are looking at bringing a post in it does not mean that there are not resources working alongside I WILL from the team to support those particular aims that they have or we have, because I am also a member of the steering group.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Who is administering the mentoring scheme? Did you say it was 60 people because that seems like quite a big piece of work?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

It is my team that is doing that on behalf of I WILL but working with I WILL, to be fair, because I WILL Steering Group is volunteers from across government and so they support us in doing that. We do not do it on our own but we do the kind of administration piece but, for instance, mentoring has a broad but for instance, looked at people who had applied and made sure that the partnerships were appropriate. So although that was administrated by us  it was volunteers from across government who, as part of the steering group and other volunteers, supported the decision making.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Volunteers from across government, I mean it is great that there are people across the organisation focusing on this but it does seem to me that perhaps there needs to be more dedicated staff working on this. Would you agree with that, Assistant Chief Minister?

Assistant Chief Minister:

Absolutely. This is one of the reasons why we held the meeting. We want to make sure that they are getting the resource that they need. There is a balance to be struck because clearly we have volunteers working there and the best person to have doing anything like this is a volunteer because they are doing it because they want to. What I am keen not to do is for Government to be seen stamping all over this with our size 10s saying: "You must do this and you must do it by then." It has got to be nurtured so that it grows rather than forced and I am keen that we support rather than demand. That is really the tone of my discussions with them. We want them to grow and blossom and give us the ideas, as well as feeding our own ideas and thoughts into it so that it becomes a really meaningful organisation.

The Chief Minister:

I am not sighted on the real detail but I am assuming that some of this comes out of normal training budgets and things like that anyway, does it not?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

Certainly the mentoring and training has; we have done that. We funded it from the normal training budget.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

Could I just ask: continuing with the findings and recommendations, one of the findings of our report was about the fact that the director general level in the civil service is dominated by men, 7 men to one woman. One of the reasons given for this was that a number of women pulled out because of complications moving from the U.K. to Jersey because of their family situation. Another aspect was current tax practises in Jersey. Now the tax practises, because it has been driven by people like Deputy Perchard, are being dealt with. But outside of that can I ask what work is being done within Government to try to ensure that when women are offered jobs they live outside the Island, they are being asked to come to Jersey to take up these posts, what work is being done to make sure that the same obstacles are not in their way?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

One of the things we are doing around the headhunting, for example, which is the first stage of that, is that we are requiring head hunters to say how they would attract more women to get more balance in terms of the applications. So that is the first stage because one of the things we found, I think, the Jersey Appointments Commission mentioned this in their last year's report, is we have a small number of women who come forward and then they drop out. So the first stage is requiring or getting agencies who have diversity as a key part of their attraction strategy. The second thing is being more supportive about bringing people on-Island. So we are in conversations, for example, where people are coming on to Island and they want to look at schools but schools do not consider them until they are on-Island and appointed. So we are looking at all those potential barriers to people being attracted. But there is another part to this which is about our internal talent strategy, which I know is not part of the question, but where we have got women in senior roles how we can look at succession planning and development of them.

Senator K.L. Moore :

The gender pay gap report of the Government of Jersey was published last year. Do you intend to publish another one this year?

The Chief Minister: Yes.

Senator K.L. Moore :

So it will be an annual event?

Assistant Chief Minister: Yes.

Senator K.L. Moore :

Excellent. What in your mind was the reaction from the Council of Ministers when the pay gap report was published last year?

Assistant Chief Minister:

I hope, and I got the feeling from the meeting, was very supportive. They support what we are doing. They support the work that we are trying to do to close it and they are encouraging S.E.B. to continue publishing the gender pay gap report every year and to continue the work to close it.

Senator K.L. Moore :

What did you see as the public's view to the report and its findings?

Assistant Chief Minister:

It depends which medium you look on. I think generally it was welcomed. I am not sure a lot of people understood what gender pay gap meant and we have gone to great trouble to explain that to them. But I think one of the things we intend to do is to keep publicity up during the year and keeping it in the forefront of people's minds.

Senator K.L. Moore :

How do you intend to do that?

Assistant Chief Minister:

Press releases, supporting various groups that are promoting where they work and generally engaging with groups like Chamber of Commerce and the Institute of Directors to make it a subject that they are interested in and try and get it on their agenda.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :  

Do you think that people were shocked to see that figure of 18 per cent as in women are being paid 18 per cent less than men on average?

Assistant Chief Minister:

I do not think so. I think people understand that there is a gender pay gap but they also understand that society generally is changing and as we move forward that pay gap will reduce. It does not stop us as Government doing everything we can to get it down quicker.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

If people were not shocked to see that why do you think there has not been more action in the past to address the problem?

Assistant Chief Minister:

I think it is only in the last 3 or 4 years that that has come to people's minds as an issue. Obviously the work of what you are doing through the gender pay gap panel brought it to people's minds and I think in the U.K. it is the same thing. It is a changing society.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Can I put it to you though that that change and that conversation has come about as a direct result of the legislation in the U.K.?

Assistant Chief Minister:

Yes, but I think the legislation was driven by the need to change people's attitudes.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Can I put it to you, Constable, that a year ago in the Chamber you said I will just read it to you so that I am accurate: "I would just ask the " This is following Deputy Doublet 's statement following the publication of our report: "I would just ask the panel to reconsider their position on this ["this" being bringing the legislation of reporting] and push hard to get this into legislation."

Assistant Chief Minister:

We are pushing hard and we recognise your efforts.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

But you have just said the Government should be doing everything it can do and a year ago you made a public statement in the Chamber in favour of legislation. Why are we waiting another year for it?

Assistant Chief Minister:

I am not a great believer in rushing to legislation immediately.

Deputy J.H. Perchard: It has been a year.

Assistant Chief Minister:

A year is not that long, if I am honest. It seems to go very quickly anyway. I accept what you are saying but I think we have made the commitment now that we will wait and see whether we have published our gender pay gap, we will wait and see whether the rest of the industry follows suit. If they do not we will take action.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Will it not be a better decision to take to say that: "We will be proposing legislation in a year's time. Businesses, you now have a year of grace to get yourself sorted so that you are able to comply with that as and when it comes"?

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet : That would be clearer, I think.

Deputy J.H. Perchard: That would be much clearer.

The Chief Minister:

What size of business would you recommend?

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

You have just told us that you thought 50 would be perhaps reasonable but of course that is your decision, not ours as a panel.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

I think we also had submissions that mentioned 50. In terms of the evidence we gathered, 50 was the number that came up as being appropriate.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

The Government has the resource to do the work required to specify.

Assistant Chief Minister:

I accept that but we have not yet done the work. We will, I think, be starting to look at the work as we move through the year.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

But that does not affect your position on legislation. You could have the position without necessarily having done all the ground work you need to do. Your position could be: "We will bring legislation" and the next step for you would be to assess which size of company this will apply to.

Assistant Chief Minister:

It is just interesting that you are playing back to me something that I will take back to Deputy Doublet , which is I was hoping she was going to bring the legislation.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

You are in Government, Minister.

Assistant Chief Minister:

I realise that, yes. We accept that.

Deputy J.H. Perchard: Leading in fact, Chief Minister.

The Chief Minister:

I think the point is that usually on all these type of things one tries to go down the voluntary route, it is better to encourage people to do this. That is the usual stance.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

You said that a year ago, I think we understood it.

The Chief Minister:

Well, step one is that we have published our gender pay gap so we have demonstrated we put our money where our mouth is, if you see what I mean.

Deputy J.H. Perchard: Which we greatly appreciate.

The Chief Minister:

Thank you. Then we turn round and say to business: "We have done it. You need to be doing it this year. If you do not do it this year then there will be legislation come through next year." But what I am trying to say is there is a set process and usually this is about encouraging people, particularly in the context of some of the U.K. organisations who are doing this already. So that is what we are saying we are going to do. But on all these type of things it is around taking people with you rather than just saying: "Do it." It does depend what it is but there is quite a lot of legislation. I know I have had some responses back from Chamber, for example, on the amounts of legislation that are directly affecting business and the cost of business. So therefore it is better to try and get them to do it voluntarily but if not, yes, we will come back and say: "Actually now we will legislate it."

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

In our report, and has been stated already this morning, we did receive evidence to the effect the businesses that we heard from expressed the view that it would be better for them for it to be in legislation because it is a fairer footing because everyone is publishing. No business wants to trailblaze because inevitably many places will inevitably be publishing a gender pay gap and businesses would prefer to publish alongside each other to make the playing field level. I wonder why that evidence is not factored into your decision to wait a year and ask them to do it voluntarily when we know it is not a popular view.

The Chief Minister:

If it would help resolve the sort of circle that we are going round at the moment, I can happily commit to writing to Chamber and to I.o.D. directly to say: "This is the choice. We can either go voluntarily and you can feed that back to your members and we can consult on who should be doing it or would you prefer us to go just direct to legislation?"

Deputy J.H. Perchard: Thank you.

The Chief Minister: Would that be sufficient?

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

That is helpful, thank you. Also just to point out on your own gender pay gap report, which was the figures at 30th June 2019, so if you add 12 months on to that, that perhaps is a more logical date at which to be considering looking at whether other companies have published and perhaps introduced the legislation from the middle of this year. So just if you would consider cutting down the 12 months perhaps to around 6 months.

The Chief Minister:

Let us go first step, which is right. Do not forget some of them may tie into their financial year end and although some that can be 31st December or it can be 31st March. There are lots of 30th June. Let us just see what fits in. Most people are 31st December year end so they usually spend the first 3 months, depending on the size of the organisation, getting the accounts finished, audited and published and whatever. So if you then go and add in something new that they may or may not have been thinking about, some of them are thinking about it, you have just got to allow it is not 6 months, it is then 3 months, if you see what I mean. Let us do the first step which is all right.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Will you update the panel on that correspondence?

The Chief Minister: Yes.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet : Thank you.

[10:45]

Deputy K.F. Morel :

The Government's gender pay gap report details the pay gap by department however as a follow up, are you able to provide further breakdowns for those kind of typically considered as gender segregated areas such as teaching or nursing? So not the department, sort of Children, Young People, Education and Skills but teaching specifically. Are you able to provide an update on the gender pay gap within occupational areas such as teaching or nursing?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: It would be possible to do that.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

Are you able to now or is this something you have to go off and do?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: I do not have it now, sorry no, off the top of my head.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Uniformed services I think was the other one we are interested in.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

I was going to get to that.

Deputy J.H. Perchard: My apologies.

Deputy K.F. Morel : It was over the page.

The Chief Minister:

So to be clear, what you are asking for is could we provide

Deputy K.F. Morel :

Occupational areas which are typically segregated.

The Chief Minister:

So that is nursing, teaching and uniformed services.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

And any others that you may identify as being segregated by gender in that list. I mean the level of detail was very helpful but just that further breakdown for those.

Assistant Chief Minister:

Are you asking this for a breakdown in the next report or you want that breakdown now?

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

As soon as possible please. If the figures are available then we would like them as soon as possible.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

The only thing I would say is unformed services, we would probably put all uniformed services together because otherwise in some of our groups there would be small numbers. It would be fair to do it with all uniformed services together but we can pull out the professions that you are particularly, I suspect you are talking about, which is police, fire, those type.

Senator K.L. Moore :

We have talked already about the I WILL initiative but alongside that last year WomenEd came into being in Jersey. Were you aware of that initiative before it started?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

Because I am on the I WILL steering group I went to their inaugural meeting and did a presentation as one of the groups on gender pay. So we were aware. They contacted me

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

What date was that that it launched?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

That was after Deputy Perchard did your turn at the I WILL network, the chair of WomenEd asked a question about their network and then we made the connection directly with them.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

Yes, so it was in about, I want to say September time, because it was before we published.

Senator K.L. Moore :

It was good to hear that you were in attendance at that event. Do you accept that it is that kind of encouragement that is needed, particularly in those areas where we see that gender segregation such as education, in order to improve the statistics so plainly?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

Yes, I do accept but it is more complex than that because it is about representation of both genders in those areas. That is the issue that causes the pay gap, so it is also about encouraging, for instance teaching assistants, encouraging men to apply for those roles. So it is more than just looking at talent strategy particularly in those areas, but we are working with women in education to ensure that everything, for instance, we do, including supporting I WILL, also is encouraged across those areas of the organisation.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

You have committed to providing funding and staff support for the I WILL initiative. Will similar staff support and funding be provided for the WomenEd group as well?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

We have not had that discussion with them, to be honest but I would see them as being an extension of I WILL and we probably need to talk to them about how they work with them in a more formal way. We are doing it informally at the moment.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Okay, so is that a commitment you can make to approach that group and ask them what resources they need and ensure that they have those resources?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: Yes.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Okay, thank you. In our report we found that there is a glass ceiling in education and we do appreciate that the initial ministerial response reflected that the finding was not factually incorrect. We do appreciate the reissue from the ministerial response to acknowledge the glass ceiling within education. We just wanted to explore that. Minister, can you define what you understand the term "glass ceiling" to mean and how you think that is impacting on education in Jersey?

The Chief Minister:

I think what you are implying is that effectively women cannot progress, there is a point above which women find it very difficult to progress in the organisational structures and in the career structures. I think what I will say just before I hand over to Sean is one has to be slightly careful with the numbers because when I say they are on the margins a swing of a couple of people will change the results, if that makes sense, if I have understood correctly.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Change the results to? Are you thinking 50:50?

The Chief Minister:

Yes. Well, what I was about to say is that what I have understood, and certainly Denise and Sean and Mark can elucidate somewhat more than that, is that about somewhere between 2, 3 and 5 years ago a number of promotions were made that took people out of the heads positions and promoted them to positions within the department as a whole, and the majority of them were women. Because women were taken out of there they were not promoted, and that has skewed the results if you are just looking at heads and deputy heads. Sean may need to come in on that.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Are you saying that there is not a problem for women progressing?

The Chief Minister:

I am just saying one has to analyse the figures quite carefully, but there should not be a problem.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

I want to question you on that, because we have analysed those figures quite carefully and we found that there was a glass ceiling, so are you saying you agree with that, or you disagree with that?

The Chief Minister:

I think what I am saying so your interpretation I am assuming is based on the fact that there were 16 female against 18 male for heads within the Government of Jersey schools, and that therefore would be taken to demonstrate that, because there are a lot more women in the overall teaching profession, but what I was indicating is because it depends on what point of time you take it as I have understood it, and that is why I am looking at Sean and Denise to add some more to this. Is that 2 or 3 years before those figures, before now, a number of women who were heads or deputy heads were taken out and promoted to positions in the department so they were promoted but therefore that skews the figures that you might now be looking at. So I am just saying we need to understand those figures quite carefully before I jump in and say: "Yes, there is a glass ceiling." I think we know, we are all coming from the same angle, there should not be any inhibition to who ends up in what job.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

I just want to press you further, so in terms of looking at the data and the evidence, which of course is what Scrutiny does, so the most recent data shows that 73.2 per cent of teachers in Jersey are women. Are you saying that if you took the leadership within schools and added it up with the leadership in the department you would find 73 per cent of that as a total are women? Is that what you are telling us?

The Chief Minister:

No, sorry, I was looking purely at the heads position and I do recall at one point one of the discussions has been around the fact that there were more male heads than female heads. The comment I was trying to make is at a point of time one of the reasons for that particular statistic is because certain females were promoted.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

What Deputy Doublet I think is asking, which I think is a reasonable follow-on, is that you are saying that because at the point of time in which the statistics were taken it may skew the fact that there is not a proportional number of females across the structure of education. We are saying approximately 70 per cent of teachers are women, however just under 50 per cent of heads are women, whereas we would hope to see a more proportional spread. We would want 50 per cent all the way through, ideally, at all levels, but if you have got 70 per cent in an organisation of one gender you would expect that to be reflected at the top level as well. Are you suggesting that that is not the case because people have been promoted out?

The Chief Minister:

What I was trying to say is the fact that we have more male heads than female heads at present is partially because certain women were promoted above where they were previously.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Could we have the figures on how many women are within the Department for Education? Is that something you have to hand?

Group Director, Education:

I have 6 direct reports. Of the 2, below me 5 are women and one is a man.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

But how many of those are the promoted individuals?

Group Director, Education:

None of those. Separate to that, because we have had a very high turnover of heads in recent years, in 2017 we advertised to the cadre of Jersey head teachers for secondment opportunities to come into the department to help with the induction of training and development. We had expressions  of  interest,  that  was  the methodology  of  applying, from men  and  women.   We interviewed 5 people, all women, and we appointed 4 people, all women. Three of those 4 have now got substantive posts and those were re-advertised. As a result, one of these experienced heads is leading on the Jersey Premium initiative and that was open competition because the secondment should not just automatically become a permanent post. Three people were short- listed, 3 people were interviewed, all women, and the secondee got the job.

Senator K.L. Moore :

We hear what you are saying, but I think the point is that 73 per cent of teachers in the Island are women, therefore it should read through naturally that there was succession planning within all of those schools where the women head teachers were promoted, and more women should have risen to the top. The excuse that because those women had been promoted above allows for the fact that there are fewer women head teachers now in Jersey really does not make any sense and only serves to suggest that there is a

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

A denial of the issue, it seems.

Assistant Chief Minister:

I cannot accept that, sorry. There is not a denial of the issue and we accept what you are saying is a reasonable observation, but what we are trying to work on, across all Government departments, is a structure that allows both sexes to progress equally without distinction.

Senator K.L. Moore :

It is a particularly interesting area, is it not? When you have so many women doing the boots on the ground work and so few of them achieving the higher-ranking positions, it is very hard to understand. I think it is an excellent example of the gender pay issues and the segregation that we have seen historically when women are not coming up through the ranks and taking on the leadership roles in a proportionate way to those that are engaged in that area of employment.

Assistant Chief Minister:

Well, this is why we published the gender pay gap review and we accept the figures that are contained in it. It does not mean to say that we are sitting back accepting that. Part of our ethos is to do something about it.

The Chief Minister:

We are not disagreeing that there is not a problem.

Senator K.L. Moore :

So our question is an opportunity to ask you all to reconsider your answer, I think, because we do not feel that it is a reasonable answer to suggest that some of those head teachers were promoted, therefore that excuses the fact that they were not replaced in a proportionate way with a diverse balance.

Group Director, Education:

If I might, seeking to answer Deputy Doublet 's direct question about the direct reports I have, the structural issue is a real challenge. If we have 73 per cent of the workforce we should have more than 55 per cent of our workforce who are heads and deputies. That is the current figure, 55 per cent. It has gone up slightly since the Minister for Education with the Chief Minister briefed his panel in our September meeting. One head teacher has left but not been replaced, but it should be higher than 55 per cent and at the top level it should be higher than the under 50 per cent. I think we are answering a different point by saying 4 very experienced head teachers brought their prowess to a higher level at a school level leadership to department level leadership. If there were in a narrow sense a glass ceiling in operation we would not expect all of the successful candidates to be women. I think the structural issue you allude to is when I look at that information it is by no means an excuse about why the top leadership of education at the school level and the departmental does not reflect our workforce. I think we are talking to different points and we have given you confused data and apologies again for that about the proportionality. As I say, some of our highest performing head teachers put their hand up, elected to put themselves up for secondment and have fulfilled those important roles to the benefit of the whole sector, I would say.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

I think we are clear on the data and what it shows. What I am not clear on is your aim. Are you aiming to have the 50:50 gender balance leadership within education or are you aiming to have a leadership that reflects the wider pool of employees within education?

I think the objective absolutely has to be the best people for the job, and we do that through encouraging talent. If too few women apply for promotion it is on us to put in all the enablers and support, both in terms of training development, of course, and confidence and structure and appropriate workplace conditions that allow that balance to be achieved. The department is very alive to that and if you look at the appointments we make that it goes down in structure because a lot of those promotions obviously at school level or department level

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Can I just pick up on that? So you said you want the best people for the job and your own data that you have given us shows that girls are outperforming boys at all levels of education and you have more women than men as teachers, so there must be something that is preventing the best people for the job getting above a certain level, which is where the glass ceiling comes in. Would you admit that you are not getting the best people for those jobs at the moment and what will you change within the system to ensure that the best people do come through regardless of their gender?

[11:00]

Group Director, Education:

If I may give an example, when we anticipated it relating to the last question that we had quite a bulge of retirements coming, 5 years ago looking at the data, looking at encouraging people for leadership roles, we engaged with a teaching school in London, the Swiss Cottage School and got some Jersey aspiring deputies on an aspiring leadership course. We sent twice as many women as men. They got jobs, we were looking at talent spotting where for a year they would go and have a day, a month, in London, paired up with outstanding head teachers as a mentoring role to put it more broadly.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

So two-thirds of that cohort was women and one-third was men?

Group Director, Education: Yes.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

So that is slightly different, is it not, the percentage? That is 66 per cent versus 33 per cent, as opposed to 73 per cent. At that point was there something that you could have done to make sure that the cohort reflected the distribution of male and female in the workforce?

Again, the selection process was based on objective criteria of those who went forward. Of the 4 women in that first cohort, there were 4 women and 2 men, 3 swiftly became head teachers in Jersey. One took a senior position off-Island, which was within her gift. Some of our turnover have been people leaving the profession before retirement age and they do it for different reasons, to take employment off-Island, family reasons, to develop other areas of work. I do not think there was a flaw in the identification of that training programme. I think the individuals themselves would say it accelerated their progress.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

What does hiring the best person for the job in a recruitment process look like? This is a phrase we hear consistently, in the Chamber and again here, and it is a principle with which I agree, based on certain conditions, but to you, what is the process of assessing whether or not the person in front of you is the best person for the job?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

The Government have role profiles where they state the criteria we are looking for, both essential and desirable. A lot of those have been rewritten recently and against that and the competencies that we are looking for we assess candidates based on predetermined questions. That gives a level playing field. At the same point, though, there are some areas where we do assessment centres and those assessment centres are designed to reflect the needs of that job and how candidates respond to those.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Who writes the essential and desirable criteria and the predetermined questions?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

The line manager has the principal responsibility for drafting the duties of the role. We have a specified approach for doing that to ensure consistency. We have a very small team centrally who do consistency checks to make sure that we get it across the board.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Is that the same with the competencies, like have that separate delivery?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

Yes, so particularly in the latest round of tier 1 to 3 leadership we had the leadership competencies that we were looking for, and they are both behavioural and technical.

Okay, and what is the diversity of all your line managers who are involved in this process?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

All line managers are involved in this process, so it would be the same representation. One of the things that we have started to look at, though, is job families and more generic roles to determine that we are not putting barriers in place. So, for example, removing the requirement for X amount of experience or certain qualifications when there are other demonstrable skills that people have. We know that when people return back from a period of having a family, for example, that they would not necessarily have had those years of experience, so we are looking at pulling those out.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

What is the diversity of your line managers?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services: I do not have that information.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Would you mind getting it to us?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services: Of course.

Deputy J.H. Perchard: Thank you.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: It is effectively included in the pay gap report.

Group Director, People and Corporate Services: It is.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Could you give me a reference?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

If you look at the salary levels, effectively, our line managers, from a management point of view you are probably starting around the £50,000 mark and above. It depends what level of line management you are talking about.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Anyone who is involved in defining criteria competencies.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: Obviously not everybody in those figures will be line managers.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Would you be able to get that to us?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: We have around about 1,000 line managers currently across government.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

It would be interesting to know the diversity of those.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services: I will find it out for you.

Deputy J.H. Perchard: Thank you.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

I think we did have some data on that, because the original question I asked, and I think from within your report it does show that above a certain level, did you say £50,000 a year, it switches to there being more men than women.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

It is around about £70,000 that the switch happens, but that is if you are talking about a 50:50 switch, but obviously the make-up of our organisation is not that proportion. That happens at a lower level, but you cannot say everybody in those levels are line managers. We have got about 1,000 line managers and I do not know the breakdown by gender but I can find out for you.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

How do you assess and evaluate the bias or not that may or may not exist within the process, so within these competency lists, the predetermined questions, essential and desirable criteria, how do you basically carry out a gender audit of the language that you use in those things?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

That is not done systemically at the moment. What we do have, though, are balance panels, so short-listing panels and interview panels who are all trained on unconscious bias.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Thank you and they have all had that training?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services: In the main, yes.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

Can I look a little bit further at the education system, if that is okay? Just a couple of statistics first. You have talked about teachers and the gender balance of teaching as a whole, but if you break that down into primary and secondary schools what proportion of primary school teachers are female and what proportion are male?

Group Director, Education:

I do not have those figures to hand but predominantly female.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

Predominantly female? I am just wondering if it might be above the 70 per cent, the 73 per cent. Do you think it is quite likely?

Group Director, Education:

Yes, I do, and the younger you go to the early years, within primary and that sector absolutely. That is mirroring training and the people who are applying.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

Yes, and so secondary schools, in order to bring that balance down to 73 per cent, it has got to be likely to be perhaps closer to 50:50 male and female?

Group Director, Education:

It would be closer. I apologise, I do not have that data.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

It would be great to get those statistics if possible.

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

Again it is the issue about being able to recruit and encourage men into the teaching profession, because even in the U.K. the Department for Education I think they have reported recently that they have got 74 per cent of all teachers registered or who work for the Department for Education are females. So it is again that occupational segregation that you were talking about.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

That is right. My question really is are you concerned as director general for the Department for Education that the Department for Education itself reinforces gender stereotypes through the proportion of people working? In that younger age group you have got a vastly greater number of women than men teaching and as it goes later on to the kind of harder academic subjects as you go through suddenly you get more men appearing. Do you think, whether it is intentional or not, that the Department for Education reinforces the gender stereotypes?

Group Director, Education:

I think they are subject to that wider societal and professional training option. It is very rare to find, and I think we discussed this in the September meeting, male teachers or teaching assistants working with the younger student. If you offer a head teacher in a primary school male teachers or teachers in any sectors who, for example, have Portuguese in their linguistic skill set they would prove very popular, partially because it meets an objective need in the school sector, a balance or a linguistic diversity, in those 2 examples, but it is very rare.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

What work are you going to do to try to encourage more men to enter into primary school teaching? I am going back a long time but I have a cousin who was a primary school teacher, a male cousin, and yes, when he applied for jobs they would say he was like gold dust, a male primary school teacher, and that is incredibly sad, in my view. What work are you doing as the Department for Education to try to change that?

Group Director, Education:

Through our career, and I have had an experience, I was a male nursery infant teacher, remarkably rare when I was looking for jobs both here in Jersey and I started my career in London and on return, so very aware that the flow-on has not really shifted. There are strong economic factors at play, as you have seen through the recent work that we have done alongside People Services colleagues on the structure of education. You mentioned a high preponderance of male teachers in the secondary sector. Median pay is higher in the secondary sector. There are more responsibility allowances, and they tend to be in larger structures. There are fewer but bigger secondary schools than primary. There are wider social and economic factors that even entering the teaching workforce male teachers are more likely to gravitate to that sector, which is better paid. It is a wider societal question.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

It is interesting that we tend to think of those most important formative years as being the early years and yet we pay them, those teachers, the least. They also happen to be female. It is an interesting set of circumstances.

Group Director, Education:

To be clear, the nursery teacher, the year 2 teacher, the teacher of mathematics, if they are at the same grade are paid the same amount of money. It is not a lower pay but there are just more promotional opportunities and more responsibility points in the secondary sector, which is something we are addressing now with the professional associations, unions and school leaders. That has been the subject of a major educational review that has been going on to equalise that. Equally, which is due to report shortly, the independent school funding review that the Minister for Education commissioned that has been working at pace is actively asking the Minister, the report is still in draft and is an iterative process, to really look at the weighting of funding to get the best outcomes for all children. That is the focus but it will directly impact the workforce. That is work that is in hand.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

So taking it a bit further but moving away from teachers - it is more to Constable Buchanan - when we met with you to discuss the ministerial response unfortunately the Minister for Education was not able to attend, but you did commit to discussing with her how gender stereotyping and culture in schools is contributing to the gender pay gap. Have those conversations been held yet?

Assistant Chief Minister:

No, they have not, but they will be.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

Do you still intend to hold those discussions?

Assistant Chief Minister: I do, yes.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

It is also noted, and this is following on this concept, that the Department for Education might be - unintentionally I do hasten to add - one of the drivers of a lot of unconscious bias and a lot of gender stereotyping through the recruitment of teachers and where the teachers work. Secondly, one of the things we recommended is that an audit should be taken of the school materials, books that are available in schools, et cetera, to understand whether they are promoting gender stereotypes.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Sorry to interrupt, but in a similar way the Government is going to be doing work on their job advertisements to ensure that there are male nurses, female doctors, pictured and we are aware that some of the resources within schools are quite dated and might not be reflecting the more modern views.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

The classic cases are Bob is a builder, Sarah is a nurse. You find that in literature throughout schools and still available in schools. One of our recommendations was that an audit should be undertaken. Is this still going to be undertaken? Is the Department for Education seriously going to look at the idea and does it promote gender stereotyping?

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

It was not accepted, was it?

Deputy K.F. Morel : No, it was not accepted.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

I think what we are asking is: can you reconsider?

Deputy K.F. Morel :

I am going to press the point even further because I disagree with your non-acceptance of it.

Group Director, Education:

The Minister did not accept. He partially accepted. You are absolutely right about keeping under review the materials in school. In the first weekend of this academic year working with Liberate we welcomed a children's book author who published a canon of books that showed the great diversity on family settings, we presented a set, personally did it, to every head teacher in the Island and launched it at the children's library. We have an ongoing primary curriculum review where we are looking at all aspects of the curriculum. I think the Minister in her submissions at the September meeting made reference to the fact as it is now live the Jersey schools review framework, talked

with children, female, male children - our schools are single sex, of course - about their perceptions. I think the big picture piece we showed you is that female students at all levels do better, so how it all makes the link about enabling, over 4 out of 5 board exclusions are of boys from schools, not girls. There are lots of ways in which we are not meeting the needs across the piece.

[11:15]

Outcomes for boys in a certain section of boys when you break down by linguistic background or by ethnicity are deeply worrying. It is not to negate the presentation quality. The work of our careers service will talk to boys and girls about how brilliant teaching is.

Deputy K.F. Morel :

Educational intake of schools is absolutely something you need to look at and how that breaks down gender discrepancies. I am asking for something slightly different here which is just about how the perceptions we create in the youngest children through the literature and so on that we expose them to go on to then help define the choices they make as adults later on in their lives. The Department for Education providing a lot of that material, I am asking is this something you are going to monitor and is this something that you are willing to continue on and to possibly reconsider accepting that? I am not specifically asking about education attainment.

Group Director, Education:

I am very happy to take that back to our Minister.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

We would be happy to assist with that and give research and evidence that we have collected in that area.

Senator K.L. Moore :

Another one of our recommendations, recommendation 10, was that the Government of Jersey with the support of Statistics Jersey should collect data on the economic value of work done in the home. That recommendation received a response and it was to be reviewed once the Government had engaged with Statistics Jersey about how that could be done. Has that discussion with Statistics Jersey happened yet?

Assistant Chief Minister: Yes, it has.

Senator K.L. Moore :

Will it be driven forward?

Assistant Chief Minister:

Yes, it will be. It is quite a complex piece of work, as you can imagine.

Senator K.L. Moore :

Is there a timeline for that, please?

Head of Organisational Development and Learning, People Services:

We are due to meet with the chief statistician in the coming 2 weeks. We are just trying to work out a date in order to see his conclusions as to where he thinks to take this piece of work.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Mark, we had a discussion about the people strategy in a separate meeting, my vice-chair and myself. Thank you for the information that you provided. To bring out some of those discussions, you mentioned earlier that there would be a new person in post, I think you said it was a £70,000 a year post. Can you give some more detail on that please and how it relates to the people strategy?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

Sure. That post includes all the on-costs as well, so there was a recommendation from this panel that a very senior role was established. As I explained to you I think there is leadership within the organisation starting with the chief executive, me who is responsible for employment practices and people management. That is where I think the responsibility and accountability sits. This particular post which is within my talent team, and it is intentionally there and not in a policy team where you would normally find it, is because the key to our talent strategy will be about improving opportunities and diversity across the Government. So that is why it sits within that team. We are to recruit to that role, so there is no one internally allocated to that role at the moment and we will recruit to that role come this March, when we go live with the operating model.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

To clarify, is that role to focus on H.R. diversity issues or will that role be focusing on diversity, equality inclusion and making sure those things are considered in wider policy formation?

Group Director, People and Corporate Services:

This is entirely about us as an employer and across the piece of an employer within the S.P.P.P. (Strategic Policy, Performance and Population) and I forget which way all those go around. In that department we have Dr. Megan Mathias, who is the group director and she is putting together approaches to policy development that also includes consideration around the impact on different groups.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Chief Minister, where would you say the leadership within the Council of Ministers in this area comes from? Is that yourself or would it be another member of the council?

The Chief Minister:

Sorry, are you talking about within the organisation?

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

I am talking about with the States as a Parliament producing policies and legislation that take into account and promote diversity and equality for Islanders.

The Chief Minister:

I think as we said, there is no one Minister who directly takes responsibility because it cuts across all areas of Government, which is why I was saying it will all come through from the policy development side of things in the specific areas under each relevant Minister.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

I do see that as being a bit of a problem because despite the fact that it was a theme within the Strategic Plan I did not see that there was a lot of underpinning of that theme and it seemed to me a bit of an afterthought. What can you do within the Council of Ministers to ensure that that is a priority and it is considered as a matter of course? In every conversation there should be somebody there saying: "Hang on, how is this going to affect this group of people?" Disabled people, men and women, and different elements like that?

The Chief Minister:

Let us give a practical example, because there is a press release that has gone out today on the Scrutiny Panel for the hospital and they have re-advertised because they have not had enough young people coming forward.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

So who pointed that out at ministerial level?

The Chief Minister:

Well, do not forget that is being handled very carefully in terms of anonymising everybody, so it is the independent selector, as it were, who is going through that process. I do not know who the individuals are at all, to keep it anonymous, but the point is that it was identified within that process. What I am trying to say is that it is certainly occurring.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Is it occurring as a matter of course within every conversation, every meeting of the Council of the Ministers?

The Chief Minister:

I think it depends on what the policies are that are coming through, if that makes sense. So for the sake of argument you have got, I do not know, a criminal justice policy around sentencing. It is probably not that relevant to that.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Yes, it would be. I would argue that there is an element

The Chief Minister:

You are not going to be sentencing somebody differently because of what their gender diversity is. You are going to sentence them because of the crime they have done, I am saying.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Okay, but you have to make sure that you are not treating people differently. That is the point that I am trying to make, that you have to make sure that you are treating people fairly when you create policies and legislation.

The Chief Minister:

Yes, but that would be discrimination. We have already got the discrimination laws in place, so in other words it would be against the law to discriminate. The point is we put it through as a theme in the organisation, therefore at the policy level in terms of officers who are advising policy they should be raising it at the relevant point when that policy is coming together and then that should be incorporated into items as they come up to the Council of Ministers.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

You are relying on policy officers to bring these issues up for you?

The Chief Minister:

I am saying that will be part of the process. That should be making sure then that Ministers are raising it if they are not already.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

I think what the Deputy is already driving at is that having a political face to something is helpful because while it is very pleasing that it cuts across all areas of Government in that every Minister is expected to have responsibility for ensuring that their policy in respect of their departments are taking into account equality and diversity issues, having a figurehead is a useful tool for, say, Back- Benchers who wish to propose legislation, such as gender pay gap reporting or anything else where a Back-Bencher may want to engage with Government on a diversity issue. I think that is really the point. We completely commend the fact that it is a theme that runs throughout, but having a figurehead is not a contradiction, to do both.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

In a similar way in that we now have a Minister for Children and Housing, whereas before we were falling down in certain areas because we were not considering children as a matter of course.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

Because of the nature of the issue, because as you say there is legislation that means that if you discriminate on sex you are breaking the law, yet we still see an endemic problem of women not progressing, just as an example of one diversity issue, to senior levels and there is no clear proof or existence of evidence of the law being broken, the discrimination law being broken, but there is a problem there that we all acknowledge. Having a figurehead to be able to represent the fact that we have these endemic less tangible problems is perhaps really helpful.

The Chief Minister:

Can I respond 2 ways? One is the latter point first, because I think we have accepted in the past that it is a societal issue, therefore it is going to take longer to change. Therefore we have already made the point that at the tier 2 level, for example, we know that that balance is a lot better than at the tier 1, and there are all sorts of reasons around that. In other words, if you like, the bow on the oil tanker is starting to shift, but it is going to take a while to turn 180 degrees. The other point in there is that in terms of gender pay gap the tiers 1 and 2 are negative, which means they are in favour of women, that is in terms of the average. What I am trying to say is depending on how you look at it there are positive stories in there as well. Then in terms of the political side as to who do you go to, well if it is a States Employment Board matter because they command and run the H.R. in the organisation, as one of us do, and if it is in the wider sense, I thought I had appointed the Deputy of Grouville to work on a number of those with the body that was set up as part of P.P.C. (Privileges and Procedures Committee). So to an extent I would say those are probably your points straight away.

Deputy J.H. Perchard:

That is helpful, thank you.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

So you are saying there are 2 champions really, your 2 Assistant Chief Ministers are the diversity champions?

The Chief Minister:

Yes, and it does depend on which area, obviously, if that helps.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Okay, that is helpful, thank you. Any further questions from the panel? Is there anything you would like to add, Minister?

The Chief Minister:

No, thank you very much.

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet :

Okay, thank you for your time and we look forward to receiving the data.

[11:25]