Gender pay gap report 2020-2021
Message from DCC Trevor Rodenhurst
This is the fifth year of reporting our gender pay gap for the Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire police forces (BCH). Legislation requires each of the three forces to report the gender pay gap separately, but we work jointly as a tri-force to identify and address actions to improve equality, diversity and inclusion, in addition to local activity within each force.
Our pay points and awards remain in line with nationally agreed pay arrangements for police officers. This report includes summary analysis breakdown looking at Police Staff and Officer roles. We are committed to pay policies and guidance that actively encourages gender parity.
The Gender Pay Gap reports are shared with Chief Officer teams as well as the Tri Force Equality Board and the data and insight from these reports inform both Local Force Equality actions and the Tri-Force Equality delivery plan, with the intention to encourage and support development of female colleagues.
This year we have started to include a review of the officer promotions data to look at number of female colleagues that were eligible to apply for promotion and did, as well the number that were successful, to better understand any barriers to applying for promotion and how we can provide better support and development in readiness for promotion. One action taken is that we have recently run a development programme for women of colour in Policing called the Becoming Career Ready Programme that has focussed on exploring the barriers to promotion that are experienced or perceived by this group and had a focus on personal development and support to realise their potential.
We continue to run a range of Supervisory Leadership Workshops open that focus on developing inclusive leadership including 2 specific inclusivity workshops, namely Becoming an Inclusive Manager and Valuing Differences.
For International Women’s Day each force worked with their women’s network to develop a range of events that helped raise visibility of different career opportunities and advice and guidance on the life stages that female colleagues experience including a focus on the menopause and support available through working lives.
Whilst the summary position on Cambridgeshire Constabulary’s gender pay gap is 17.87%, which is up from the 2019/20 median of 14.96%, the rate of new joiners who are female is up 14.43% and rising every month, this means that the proportion of female officers in early stages of their career is greater than ever before, which accounts for the statistical gap. At a senior level, Chief Inspector and staff equivalent or above, female colleagues comprise 23.53%.
The three forces are dedicated to reduce the gender pay gap and I am confident that we continue to make positive steps in better supporting all officers and staff in their development and career opportunities, for the benefit of all.
Deputy Chief Constable Trevor Rodenhurst
Head of the Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Board and Deputy Chief Constable of Bedfordshire Police.
Gender representation
The breakdown in gender demographics for police officers and police staff shows that we continue to have a higher proportion of female police staff to males. There has been an increase in officer numbers in 2020/21 which has seen a 14.43% increase in the number of female officers employed in the Force. Although females still represent a lower proportion this increase is a step in the right direction to bridge this gap.
|
- |
2020-2021 |
2019-2020 |
|
Female Officers |
533 |
492 |
|
Male Officers |
1100 |
1068 |
|
Female Staff |
605 |
603 |
|
Male Staff |
362 |
356 |
|
Officer Female proportion |
32.64% |
|
Officer Male proportion |
67.36% |
|
Staff Female proportion |
62.56% |
|
Staff Male proportion |
37.44% |
Breakdown of workforce
Looking at the female and male split at each officer rank, we have seen a consistent increase in the percentage of female Constables in the last three years. In 2017/18 31.95% of all Constables were female. This increased to 32.07% in 2018/19 and had increased further in 2019/20 to 32.78%. The 2020/21 figures show a further increase, females represent 34.65% of the Constable population. Within the Senior Rank proportion (Chief Inspector and above) females make up 23.53% of the population.
|
Officer Head Count |
2020-2021 |
2020-2021 |
2019-2020 |
2019-2020 |
|
- |
Females |
Males |
Females |
Males |
|
Constable |
440 |
830 |
397 |
814 |
|
Sergeant |
63 |
174 |
67 |
170 |
|
Inspector |
18 |
57 |
15 |
40 |
|
Senior ranks |
12 |
39 |
10 |
35 |
Senior officer – promotion progress
At our Chief Officers levels our female Deputy Chief Constable (DCC Jane Gyford) and Assistant Chief Constable (ACC Vicki Evans) have remained in post. Chief Superintendent (Chief Supt Rebecca Tipping) and Superintendent (Supt Laura Hunt) also form part of our Senior Leadership Team. We are pleased to say that this continues the trend of being able to have a positive female representation at the most senior ranks within our Force.
Promotions processes across our three collaborated Forces are the same for male and female officers. In 2020/21 the tri-force promotions resulted in the following female promotions taking place:
Chief Superintendent:
There was no promotions process run for the Chief Superintendent rank in this year.
Superintendent:
At this rank there was 1 female applicant out of a total of 9 Cambridgeshire applicants. This represented 11% of those who applied in Cambridgeshire Constabulary. This female was not successful in the boards. 3 people, 33% of those who applied, did not provide their gender information and one of them was successful in the process.
Chief Inspector:
There were 4 female applicants in the Chief Inspector process out of a total of 16 Cambridgeshire applicants. 2 female applicants passed of which represented 25% of those who passed the boards from the constabulary. In this process, 50% of the applicants did not provide their gender information, this represented 8 candidates. Out of this group, 3 of them passed the boards and were successful in the process.
The gender pay gap
Median: The mid-point in the range
Mean: The whole range expressed as an average
Police Staff and Police Officers combined (includes all staff and officer levels)
The median gender pay gap is 17.87%
The mean gender pay gap is 8.22%
Compared to the 2019/20 data, the mean pay gap has widened by 1.34% and the median gender pay gap has also increased by 2.91%
Police Staff and Police Officers separated
When we split out the data for staff and officers we can see that this does change our Forces dynamic:
The median pay gap for police staff is 7.60% and for police officers is 0%.
The mean pay gap for staff is 6.47% and for officers it is 5.64 %.
Compared to the 2019/20 data, the Staff mean and meidian pay gaps have remained relatively the same with minor changes. The Officer only mean gender pay gap has increased by 2.74% and the mean gender pay gap has remained at 0%.
Employee Quartiles (Staff and Officers Combined)
|
- |
Quartile 1 |
Quartile 2 |
Quartile 3 |
Quartile 4 |
|
Male Proportion |
52.00% |
45.69% |
58.77% |
68.46% |
|
Female Proportion |
48.00% |
54.31% |
41.23% |
31.54% |
In this year there are no significant changes in the quartiles breakdowns, but they are starting to show a change in our profiling. The key changes are the small increases in the Q1, Q2 and Q3 profiles which are continuing to show an increase in the number of female constables joining Cambridgeshire and an increase in female promotion at the middle ranks.
The bonus gender pay gap
As has been stated before there is not a traditional bonus scheme for the police officer ranks, but there is Home Office national guidance introduced in 2003 that allows Forces to make one-off bonus payments of between £50 and £500 when an officer has carried out work of an outstandingly demanding, unpleasant or important nature. For the Firearms unit, there is also a national agreement for bonus payments to be made as an agreed retention incentive. Though paid as a bonus payment in previous years these are now being paid as a temporary targeted variable payment which has been introduced since 2017. This scheme allows Forces to recognise specialist skills and to assist with retaining officers in these types of roles. For the purpose of reporting, they are still included in the gender pay gap figures. The value of these payments in this unit remains higher and can be up to a maximum total of £2,000 per officer annually. The situation remains unchanged that the majority of firearm officers tend to be male, and this continues to affect the bonus gender pay gap data.
Police staff are eligible to receive honoraria payments for work that is over and above their normal duties and/or of particular importance or quality and payments require formal sign off to review the reason for such payments.
Staff and officers combined
The median bonus gender pay gap remains the same as the last reporting year at 0%
The mean bonus gender pay gap has increased significantly from -27.13% in 2019/20 to 39.87% this reporting year – showing a difference of 67%.
|
- |
Number of Recipients |
% of males and females who received a bonus |
Median Payment |
Mean Payment |
|
Male |
76 |
5.19% |
£500 |
£958.20 |
|
Female |
42 |
3.69% |
£500 |
£576.19 |
Officer Bonuses
The officer bonus median pay gap remains at 90% and the mean bonus officer pay gap is 89.28%.
Staff Honoraria
The staff honoraria median pay gap is 0% and the mean bonus staff pay gap is -123.56% (in favour of females)
Summary and key activities
Cambridgeshire continues with the work already established to achieve a diverse workforce but recognises that there is always more that can be done. Our Corporate Plan 2022/23 and Ethics, Diversity, Equality and Inclusion (EDEI) Statement of Intent aims to create a workforce that is truly representative of the diverse communities we serve, utilising positive action initiatives to better understand the barriers to developing an equal and representative workforce at all levels. Future activity that we will be focusing on in the forthcoming years in relation to better representation and fair pay activity include:
- Dedicated Positive Action Team whose main aim and purpose is to help create a more diverse workforce. To achieve this, the teams work is focused on attraction, recruitment, retention and progression of Black, Asian, Minority Ethnic and female staff. This includes providing support to those applicants from under-represented groups through the force ‘Buddy Scheme’. We have seen an increase in the number of females who joined as police officers with 49.2% of new police officer recruits being female in this reporting year. This is well above the national average of 32.3%.
- Continued implementation of national to local talent management programmes to support Black, Asian Minority Ethnic and female staff lateral development and progression to first and senior management positions supported by Chief Officer Reverse Mentoring Programme.
- ‘Becoming Career Ready’ pilot programme which successfully concluded its pilot phase now subject of full launch with 3 further cohorts planned this year.
The aim of this programme is to:
- Support Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic Women to apply for promotion or lateral career moves and be successful
- Explore any perceived blockages and/or barriers to promotion
- Honour the experience and stories of the women participating in the programme in a way that is productive for their future career
- Cambridgeshire active engagement with Women of Colour in Policing (WoCiP) initiative which elevates and champions all women from ethnic minority backgrounds and their allies, whether they are officers, staff, volunteers or retired. It is open to all women of colour and works to increase knowledge and understanding of the lived experiences of women from ethnic minority communities and also addresses issues regarding intersectionality.
- Women’s force network called ‘Fusion’ whose main aim is to support women to achieve their potential and the organisation to develop a truly inclusive organisation that supports and encourages difference.
The objectives of the network are to:
- To significantly raise the profile and accessibility of senior women in policing
- To ensure that there is equality of opportunity for all employees including opportunities for promotion / lateral development
- To encourage the organisation to use the workforce innovatively
- Continued work to champion female development, progression and achievement including activity co-ordinated through the women’s tri-force network including an annual conference in March each year to mark International Women’s Day and force nomination and attendance at British Association for Women in Policing Annual Award Ceremony.
- To continue understanding reasons for under representation in certain units and how we can encourage and support more female officers in this teams. Particular areas continue to include specialist policing teams such as Dog and Firearms units. Female representation in these areas is a national issue and work continues to support an increase.
- Activity to ensure delivery against our new force culture statement which sets out the behaviours we believe are key to creating an inclusive working environment, namely;
- Ensuring all voices are respected and heard
- Being a progressive organisation, which encourages innovation and enterprise
- Investing in all our people and ensuring they have the right support in place to flourish
- Creating an environment where people feel happy, and everyone feels part of the team
Recent activity includes;
- Inclusion of the force culture statement into our Corporate Plan 2022/23 to ensure external and internal awareness
- Deputy Chief Constable culture roadshows at police stations across the force area discussing culture work directly with staff, what it means to them and how they can influence and shape delivery
- Development of the force ‘Leadership Pathway’ providing one single hub detailing leadership and continuous professional development opportunities for all from a local to national level
- Development and delivery of force Leadership, Culture and Inclusion workshop for all first and second line police officers and staff supervisors, in order to develop a more inclusive workplace where all staff feel valued and supported and an environment which embraces difference and recognises that diverse perspectives are the best way of solving many of the complex and challenging issues facing policing.
Through our force culture work we aim to build trust and confidence in one another and our communities, ensuring our behaviours reflect our force values of Fairness, Integrity, Diligence and Impartiality. Values + Behaviours = Culture
- Through better data collection we will also understand the composition of gender pay in relation to ethnicity and the 9 protected characteristics.
For more information you can contact us via [email protected]