Young’s pub group comes under fire for gender pay gap

Pub group Young’s has been criticised for a tweet about International Women’s Day after an account highlighted the company’s gender pay gap.

As highlighted by Gender Pay Gap App, on the date Young’s reported its results, 5 April 2020, its mean gender pay gap and median gender pay gaps were 60.8% and 73.2% respectively.

Young’s said the figures were distorted by the fact that more than 99% of its workforce were furloughed at the time, and the numbers were based on its board of directors and 34 head office employees – 39 people in total, 22 of which were female.

In its gender pay gap report, the business’ ‘furlough-adjusted’ results based on 4,624 employees (1,956 female and 2,668 male) reported a mean gender pay gap of 10.9%, with a median pay gap of 5.6%. The national average mean gender pay gap is 15.5%.

The proportion of men and women at Young’s receiving a bonus was 32.9% and 29.7%, respectively. The mean bonus gap was 43.3% and the median bonus gap was 23.1%.

The report said the bonus gender pay gap reflected the gender composition of its workforce, with more males at senior levels and a high proportion of females in entry level roles, “where flexible working is more prevalent and we currently see more women than men wishing to work part-time”.

A statement from chief executive Patrick Dardis and people director Tracy Dodd said: "The gender pay gap figures referred to in the media and social media are very misleading and in no way are a true reflection of the Young’s business and our people. This was due to a mandatory change in reporting due to furlough.

"Covid-19 forced us to close all of our pubs and in order to protect our business, we had to furlough the vast majority of our staff. These staff received 80% of their salaries under the furlough scheme. Given these staff were on furlough, they were considered not to be working and were therefore not included in our Gender Pay Gap Report. This meant our gender pay gap figures were significantly distorted as the sample size taken for the report was only c.40 people compared to c.4,600 staff we employ.

"Our figures adjusted for furlough are a more accurate reflection of our business, which shows our median gender pay gap is 5.6% and our mean is 10.9%, substantially better than the national median of 14.9%. This is more in line with the figures we achieved in 2018 and 2019.

"Treating our staff fairly and with respect has been key to the success of Young’s since we began trading in 1831. We work closely with our staff to bring in changes that they want to see implemented such as flexible working. We have introduced the Ram Agency, offering flexible shifts across all levels of workers at our pubs to give our staff more control over the hours they work.

"People will always remain the heart of Young’s and we are proud of our work in promoting and developing staff, regardless of gender or other factors. We are fully transparent about our gender pay gap and remain committed to reducing it.

"We do not consider the press interpretation of our gender pay gap figures to be a fair interpretation of our business."