Gender pay gap statement

West Kent provides housing and community services across Kent and Medway. We are committed to promoting equality, valuing diversity, and treating everyone fairly.

As West Kent employs more than 250 people it is required by the government to publish details of its gender pay gap, specifically the difference in average female earnings compared to average male earnings.

In April 2023 we had 350 full pay relevant employees (331 in 2022). Of these 66% of employees were female (65% in 2022) and 34% of employees were male (35% in 2022).

We pay individual spot salaries for each of our job roles and all roles are independently benchmarked. Men and women are paid equally in the same roles, irrespective of their length of service. Pay progression (through payment above spot salary) is linked to professional development, where there is continued exceptional performance or as part of our talent path and succession planning.

Our analysis continues to indicate that the pay gap in West Kent reflects the wide range of job roles available and the changes in number and mix of staff.

The average female employee at West Kent earns 15.4% less than the average male employee. Although there has been a 5.11% increase in the gender pay gap this year, this is due to the number of female staff being recruited into roles that traditionally fall in the lower two quartiles.

Our gender pay gap is slightly higher than the national average for all employees (14.9% mean in 2022).

I declare that the information contained in this report is accurate.

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