04 MAY 2017

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The Times Higher Education Pay Survey 2017 published today, revealing that the gender pay gap for full-time university staff in the UK is closing at a slow pace for all academics, and has stagnated for professors.

Sam Smethers, Fawcett Society Chief Executive, says:

“The gender pay gap among academics is slowly diminishing. But at this rate it will take 29 years to close the gap, and progress has flatlined for professors.

“The new ethnicity pay gap data is also worrying, and it is likely to mean that BAME women- who remain highly under-represented in academia- face a double disadvantage.

“The radical steps taken by the University of Essex, which introduced a one-off pay rise for female professors to bring their pay in line with male counterparts, show that a faster pace of change is possible. Universities need to take action, quickly, to promote and justly reward women and also ensure that women are promoted into those higher paid roles.”

The report details how analysis shows average male pay for professors is higher than average female pay at 79 out of 94 institutions. It adds:

‘Focusing on professors, some of those with the highest pay gaps appear to be heading in the wrong direction. For instance, the pay gap at City, University of London, rose 1.5 percentage points to 10.5 per cent in 2015-16. At Swansea University it went up 1.3 percentage points to 13.1 per cent and, at Royal Holloway, University of London, it went up a percentage point to 10 per cent.’

According to new Gender Pay Gap reporting rules, which came into force last month, universities will be required to publish their gender pay gap data by April 2018. 

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Read more

Read The Times Higher Education Pay Survey 2017 report here.

Read The Fawcett Society's work on Gender Pay Gap Reporting here.