A LABOUR government will aim to close the gender pay gap by 2030, the party will announce today.

Today is Equal Pay Day, when women effectively stop getting paid for the rest of the year in comparison with their male counterparts.

Next year marks 50 years of the Equal Pay Act, but the mean gender pay gap for full-time work stands at 13.1 per cent.

Shadow employment rights secretary Laura Pidcock and shadow women and equalities secretary Dawn Butler will today launch Labour policies to help close the gap by the end of the next decade.

These include a £10 per hour living wage and a new workers’ protection agency, which in partnership with HMRC would have powers to fine employers that fail to report or tackle their gender pay gap.

At the current rate, the gap will take 60 more years to close according to the feminist campaign group the Fawcett Society.

Out of 1,000 women surveyed by the group, three out of five didn’t know what their male colleagues earn, or believed that they are paid less for doing the same job as their male counterparts.

Two thirds of women said finding out they were paid less had a detrimental impact on how they feel about their employer, with some wanting to look for another job.

Fawcett Society chief executive Sam Smethers said: “Women have told us they felt furious, devastated, exploited and undervalued.”

Under Labour’s plans, national pay scales would also be introduced to boost the pay of female-majority workforces, such as childcare and school support staff.

Statutory maternity pay would be increased from nine to 12 months and free childcare for all two to four-year-olds would be introduced.

Large organisations would also be required to introduce a menopause policy with flexible working provided for.

Sectoral collective bargaining to raise pay across sectors would be rolled out, low-paid privatised public sector jobs would be brought back in-house and the public-sector pay cap ended.

Protections against unfair dismissal and redundancies, with extra rights for pregnant women, would also be implemented under Labour’s plans.

Ms Pidcock said ahead of the launch: “Labour in government will be uncompromising in tackling the structural barriers that are holding so many women back.”

And public-sector union Unison said pay-gap proposals are needed to force bosses to act. General secretary Dave Prentis said: “Public shaming hasn’t proved enough to curtail unequal pay so far.”