Organisations with 250 or more employees are mandated by the government to report annually on their gender pay gap. The requirements of the mandate within the Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017, are to publish information relating to pay for six specific measures as detailed in this report.

The report is based on the Government’s methodology for calculating difference in pay between female and male employees, considering full pay relevant employees of NHS Lancashire and South Cumbria ICB (LSC ICB). 

It is recognised that the ICB’s 2024 Gender Pay Gap is being published towards the end of the 2024/25 financial year which provides little time to operationalise actions to address the gender pay gap ahead of the 2025 Gender Pay Gap snapshot date (31 March 2025). Therefore, some of the actions outlined below are likely to feature in the upcoming 2025 Gender Pay Gap Report which will be published much earlier within the 2025/26 financial year.

For future reports it is intended to understand the gender pay gap, along with ethnicity and disability pay gaps to better understand the most vulnerable parts of our workforce and ensure we place our focus on addressing these inequalities as and where identified with corrective improvement activities.

The LSC ICB staff population has grown significantly over the past year. On the 31 March 2024, the ICB employed 811 full-pay relevant employees (compared to 535 in 2023). The breakdown of staff by sex is shown in the chart below:

full-pay relevant employees (compared to 535 in 2023). The breakdown of staff by sex is shown in the chart below:

On 31 March 2024, 77.9% of the ICB workforce were female and 22.1% were male. The proportion of male employees has decreased by around 3% compared to 2023.

The table below illustrates the differences in average (mean) and median (middle) hourly pay rates for male and female ICB employees.

Across the organisation, as of 31 March 2024, the mean gender pay gap was 30.88%. Male employees were being paid an average of £11.26 more per hour than female employees.

The median gender pay gap (which demonstrates the difference between the midpoints in the ranges of hourly earnings) was 14.15% meaning that male employees were paid £3.69 more per hour than female employees.

Pay gap data for 2024 shows that there is a gender pay gap within LSC ICB. However, it is important to note that while there is a gender pay gap within our organisation, this is not the same as saying female and male employees are being paid differently for doing the same job (which would be an equal pay issue).

The pay gap for both the average hourly rate and the median hourly rate has decreased compared to data for 2023.

NHS Lancashire and South Cumbria ICB does not have a bonus gender pay gap.  Since its statutory establishment, the ICB has not paid bonuses to its employees. There is no scope for bonus payments within the Agenda for Change terms and conditions of service.

The table below illustrates the headcount of male and female employees who fell within the four pay quartiles (where quartile 1 is the 25% lowest paid staff and quartile 4 is the 25% highest paid staff):

Overall, females occupy 62% of the highest paid jobs and 83% of the lowest paid jobs in LSC ICB. Males occupy 38% of the highest paid jobs and 17% of the lowest paid jobs.

Census 2021 data tells us that 51% of the population of England are female; LSC ICB has a significantly higher female workforce, at 77.9%. Furthermore, 62% of LSC ICB employees in the upper pay quartile of employees are female.

The proportion of female employees in the highest pay quartile has increased by around 10% compared to last year’s gender pay gap report. There has been a slight decrease (approx. 1.5%) in the proportion of female employees in the lowest pay quartile.

It is recognised that there are smaller proportions of male employees in each of the four pay quartiles compared to population data. However, this is reflected nationally across the NHS as a whole where approximately 74% of NHS staff are female. On balance, the ICB currently employs a slightly higher-than-average number of female staff (77.9%) compared to the overall NHS workforce.

To address the ICB’s gender pay gap, it is important to recognise that the overall gender pay gap is primarily caused by the disproportionate number of males in the highest pay quartile (compared to quartiles 1 to 3), some of which are occupying the very highest paid roles in the ICB. The table below outlines the average hourly rate for males and females and the associated gender pay gap at each pay quartile.

While the gender pay gap for the overall workforce sits at 30.88%, the gender pay gap at quartiles 1 to 3 is significantly lower, and females in quartiles 1 and 3 are paid slightly more than their male counterparts on average. Conversely, males in pay quartile 4 are paid 20.86% more than their female counterparts on average.

This means that effective reduction of our gender pay gap is likely to require an increase in the proportion of female employees occupying the most senior roles (quartile 4) by building confidence, resilience and skills within our female workforce to enable them to progress to Very Senior Manager roles within the ICB.

The ICB recommends the following actions to address its gender pay gap:

• Data analysis
  • Scrutinise our workforce data more closely to understand the drivers of our gender pay gap at each pay band across the ICB, paying particular attention to senior levels, including VSM.
  • Disaggregate our data in various ways to include the differences in terms of age, disability and ethnicity to explore whether there are further insights to be drawn on addressing inequalities.
  • Analysis of our staff survey data, focusing on the experiences of women to support our action planning and improvements.
• Recruitment, promotion and career progression
  • Provide inclusive recruitment training to all hiring managers and assessors
  • When shortlisting for VSM roles ensure that there is an even gender split of men/women in applications
  • Sponsorship, coaching and mentoring for female workforce in senior level roles to support progression to VSM level
  • Support our Women’s Staff Network and encourage membership uptake to ensure the voice of our female workforce is heard and seen
• Maternity and paternity parental leave policies
  • Review our maternity and paternity policies to include shared parental leave.
  • Encourage the uptake of shared parental leave by informing our workforce about their legal right to request shared parental leave.
  • Share and promote examples of senior leaders who have taken shared parental leave in our ICB.
• Wellbeing and retention
  • Promote flexible working options for all staff. Encourage men to work flexibly, so that it is not perceived as a female centric benefit and it supports both men and women to undertake childcare and wider caring responsibilities.
  • Encourage our senior leaders to role model working flexible and to champion flexible working.
  • Support our workforce to better understand impacts of perimenopause and menopause and ensure our female workforce have access to support offers when experiencing menopause.

Appendix 1: Comparison of 2023 and 2024 gender pay gap data sets

LSC ICB average hourly pay rate by sex:

LSC ICB median hourly pay rate by sex:

Percentage of staff in each pay quartile in 2023 and 2024:

Appendix 2: Reporting assumptions and scope

All employee data contained in this report is extracted from LSC ICB Electronic Staff System (ESR) snapshot as of 31 March 2024. The reporting period covers: 01 April 2023 to 31 March 2024. 

Hourly rate is calculated by using base pay.

Appendix 3: Gender pay gap reporting definitions