Introduction

At Your Homes Newcastle (YHN), we are committed to equality, diversity and inclusion in the workplace. We believe that by having an inclusive and representative workforce, which reflects our customer base, we can better understand the needs of our customers, make living easier for our customers and enable our staff to reach their full potential, delivering our vision to be ‘First for Housing’. 

From April 2018 Gender Pay Gap Reporting has been compulsory for organisations with 250 or more employees.  

Our current results show that we have a greater proportion of females to males in our organisation, unlike many other organisations. 

It is important to understand the difference between equal pay and gender pay. Equal pay looks at the pay differences between men and women who are doing the same jobs, similar jobs or work of equal value. The gender pay gap is an equality measure that shows the difference in average earnings between men and women. 

YHN Workforce

Currently YHN has 754 employees. 61.77% are female and 38.23% are male.

How is the gender pay gap calculated?

The mean pay gap is calculated by adding up the hourly pay for all women at YHN and dividing the total by the total number of women and then repeating for men. Mean averages are helpful in providing an overall indication of the gender pay gap, however they can be skewed by very high or very low pay rates.

The median pay gap can be worked out by lining up all the women and all the men at YHN and calculating the difference between the hourly pay rate for the middle woman compared to that of the man in the middle. Median averages show the ‘typical’ situation because they are not distorted by very high or very low pay rates.

Our gender pay gap:

Bonus gender pay gap information

Our pay structure does not include bonuses.

The proportion of men and women in each quartile:

• Top quartile (highest paid) – 40.22% men, 59.78% women
• Upper Middle –35.91% men, 64.09% women
• Lower Middle –26.52% men, 73.48% women
• Lower quartile (lowest paid) –50.28% men, 49.72% women

By splitting our workforce into four equal groups or quartiles, based on hourly pay rate, we can compare men and women are distributed across the organisation. 

The data shows that:

• At the most senior levels of the organisation, our gender balance is closer to the workforce, with women slightly over-represented
• There are more women than men in the middle and lower middle quartiles
• Men are slightly over-represented in the lower pay quartile. This is because this quartile includes roles which have historically been undertaken by men such as caretaking and gardening services.

Understanding our results

Our results show that YHN is doing well at attracting and retaining women at the most senior levels of the organisation. More than half of our roles at Assistant Director level and above, including our Managing Director, are undertaken by women.

This is also indicative of our commitment to building a culture of total inclusivity in the workplace. We:

• have a job evaluation process that ensures we have a fair pay system in place
• provide diversity training for all staff
• use a gender balanced interview panel where possible
• have a wide range of flexible working options to enable our employees to achieve a balance between their home and working life
• have an active staff health and wellbeing group which promotes men’s and women’s health issues.
• support well-developed and active staff diversity network groups – Proud@YHN, the Multi-Cultural Staff Network Group and vis-Able
• are also a Level two ‘disability confident’ employer and a signatory to a signatory to the ‘Mindful Employer’ charter
• actively recruit people living in the homes we manage through our ‘Your Homes Your Jobs’ and apprenticeships.

We are pleased with our record so far on equality, diversity and inclusion in the workplace but know there is more to do. As an organisation, we will continue to explore how we can take action to support and increase under-represented groups in YHN’s workforce.

This report is only a snapshot, a full report will be completed later in the year, when we will compare ourselves against National Statistics.