Pay transparency project begins online

One of the most important texts secured in the previous mandate, the pay transparency directive enshrines the concept of equal pay for work of equal value in European law, and looks to reduce to dramatic wage inequality seen across Europe.

Curbing the disparity in pay must be a political priority, with the gender pay gap only reducing by 1% over the last eight years. This would see women in the EU achieving equal pay by 2104.

Thankfully, we now have a directive, which provides unions with a clear role in delivering for workers. As with all successful European negotiations, now comes the hardest part – transposition and implementation across 27 Member States. Eurocadres, in a two-year project co-funded by the European Union, will look at the best ways to deliver these victories to our workplaces.

The first event of this project was on December 10^th with an online webinar focused on academic research and panel discussions. Kicking off by detailing the scale of the challenge was Gender5+’s Barbara Helfferich. With over 20 years of experience in European policymaking positions through the Commission and NGOs and one of the five co-founders at Gender5+, Barbara and colleagues Valentina Maglietta and Victoire Olcak, presented their report Implementing Equality – Delivering Pay Transparency for Professionals and Managers which focuses on the situation in seven Member States – Belgium, Germany, Finland, France, Hungary, Italy and Spain.

The report in full can be found here with the presentation and report available below.

OECD data has shown that the gender pay gap within companies is 17% in countries without pay transparency laws, compared to 14% for countries that have transparency measures, with the political rationale behind ending pay inequality seeming like an obvious choice. This was not the case in the fight for the directive, and is not the current reality as we approach transposition. Our panel debate “Victories won and next steps”, discussed the path to, content in, and delivery of the pay transparency directive, as we were joined by:

• Rapporteur for the file and Green MEP Kira Marie Peter-Hansen,
• Lotta Savinko – Manager of Gender Equality and Health & Safety at Akava, Finland,
• Emmanuelle Lavignac - National Secretary for Gender Equality at UGICT-CGT, France
• Paola Panzeri, Deputy General Secretary and Equality lead for EPSU – the European Public Service Union

We would like to thank all participants for their excellent contributions, with the report and debate available in full below.

This marks the first step in our project, and with multiple opportunities identified throughout this kick-off event, we have plenty of work ahead of us in the coming months and years.