Nowadays, it doesn’t seem like a week goes by without an
article about the gender pay gap. I saw earlier this week that the Fair Work
Commission has engaged researchers to prepare an equal
remuneration report. Apart from discussing the concept of undervaluation
(of labour), part of the intended scope of this report is to identify the
usefulness of the various materials parties could bring to equal remunerations
proceedings, and direct parties to key resources which may be relevant to an
equal remuneration case. This report is intended to build on previous research
for the Commission on this topic.
This all sounds pretty useful. As I’ve said before,
determining whether or not specific groups of women and men are ‘undervalued’
in terms of their remuneration is not easy. This research will hopefully have a
significant impact in terms of giving parties a base of knowledge and evidence
to draw upon for future equal remuneration cases. Regardless of what decisions are made for
such cases in future, this should help in strengthening the claims that
underlie such decisions.
What this report will probably not do though is expand the
set of resources that are available. In the short-term, that is primarily being
left to the Commission’s Australian Workplace Relations Survey. As I said last
time I wrote on this topic, I’m not sure that as much of the Commission’s
resources are specifically going towards expanding the resources relating to
pay equity as originally envisioned by the (former) Government. However, in terms
of better using the available information, this latest equal remuneration
report looks like it will make a positive contribution.
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