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THE BBC’s pay practices are being investigated by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) over alleged discrimination against women.
The watchdog’s investigators will look at sample salaries dating back to 2016 to assess whether pay differences at the BBC are “because of sex,” “direct sex discrimination” or “indirect sex discrimination.”
A statement on the EHRC website states: “Following complaints that female employees were not being paid the same as men for equal work, the BBC has voluntarily provided us with a large amount of information about its pay policies and practices.
“After looking at all of the information, we suspect that some women at the organisation have not received equal pay for equal work.”
The EHRC hopes to complete its probe by the end of the year.
A BBC spokesman said: “Some of the criticism levelled at us over this period was very fair as change was overdue. We believe our pay structures are now fair, transparent to staff and stand very positive comparison with other organisations.
“As we have already acknowledged, we have some historic equal pay cases. We are profoundly sorry for this. We regret the time it has taken to resolve all of the questions, but some of these are complex and have not been straightforward to resolve. We are determined to make progress on the remaining ones.”
Chief executive of equality campaign group the Fawcett Society Sam Smethers welcomed the investigation.
“Pay discrimination should have no place in modern workplaces, yet we know from our equal-pay advice service that it is all too common,” she said.
“We hope this results in lasting change at the BBC and acts as a warning to other employers too.”
MPs on the digital, culture, media & sport (DCMS) select committee have previously accused the BBC of suffering “an invidious culture of discrimination” against women on the payroll in the wake of the resignation of former China editor Carrie Gracie.
A DCMS committee report in January warned the BBC over failure to act over alleged pay discrimination. It said: “This is unacceptable: the BBC is failing to live up to its duty to advance equality of opportunity.”
