Equal pay cases start in the DfT

30 Apr 2009 12:39 PM

Tomorrow (29 April) sees the start of a major equal pay case brought by PCS in the Department for Transport (DfT) where there is a 21% gender pay gap.

Just days after the government published its Equalities Bill, the London Central Employment Tribunal will hear how women working in the predominantly female workforce of the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) earn over £5,000 less than their male colleagues doing similar jobs in the Driving Standards Agency (DSA).

Both the DVLA and the DSA are executive agencies of the DfT.

The landmark case being pursued by PCS on behalf of 38 women follows the refusal of the DfT to investigate pay inequalities and the link between gender and pay in the DVLA and the rest of the department and its agencies.

Starting salaries in the DVLA are approximately £12,500 and the union estimates that workers in the DVLA are underpaid to the tune of £17.5 million a year compared to colleagues on the same grade elsewhere in the DfT.

PCS successfully fought a similar equal pay case in the Prison Service in 2006, which cost the employer £50 million to introduce equal pay.

It is a bitter irony that in the same week the government publishes that Equalities Bill we are forced to once again take a government department to tribunal over equal pay.

 

Commenting Mark Serwotka, PCS general secretary, said: "It is a bitter irony that in the same week the government publishes that Equalities Bill we are forced to once again take a government department to tribunal over equal pay.

"It is scandalous that the DfT should go to the lengths it has to avoid its gender duty obligations and defend pay inequality.

"The department and the government need to face up to the culture of low pay and pay inequality they have created in the DfT with pay gaps of around £5,000 for people doing similar jobs.

"With pay inequality rife across the civil service, the government should start practising what it preaches by eradicating pay inequality in its own workforce and by paying a fair and just wage."