Gender pay gap widens at government department run by the women and equalities minister

The gender pay gap has significantly widened at the Department of International Trade (DIT) run by women and equalities minister Liz Truss, new figures reveal.

Labour said the growing divide “raises serious questions” about the Government’s commitment to close the gender pay gap when Truss’s department was “clearly going backwards”.

The gap in the DIT, which Truss took over in July last year, has widened every year since the first report in 2017, when the mean stood at 3.6%.

Under Truss, the mean rose to 6.5% in 2020, while the median increased to 15.9% from 2.7% three years earlier.

The mean bonus pay gap has also gone from 14.4% in favour of women in 2017 to 7.3% in favour of men in 2020.

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Labour’s shadow women and equalities secretary Marsha de Cordova said: “It raises serious questions about the Government’s commitment to closing the gender pay gap when the department run by the minister for women and equalities is so clearly going backwards when it comes to average pay and bonuses.

“She also suspended gender pay gap reporting earlier this year and has yet to give any indication of when it will restart.”