New Zealand Businesses Join Forces To Make Pay Gap Reporting Mandatory

Thirteen New Zealand businesses have joined forces to publish an Open Letter imploring the Government to take action to address the pay gap.

The businesses are asking the “Government to even up the playing field and require larger businesses to report their pay gaps publicly.”

The Businesses are: Skycity, Westpac, Frucor Suntory, AIA, Lion, DB Breweries, Coca Cola, Xero, Kiwibank, Meridian, Chorus, Z Energy and Auckland Transport.

The New Zealand businesses are all ‘Gender Tick,’ accredited, a programme that assesses organisations and companies against a framework giving employees assurances they’ll work in a safe and inclusive environment irrespective of their gender.

“We value Aoteoroa’s diverse workforce and are committed to the kiwi value of fairness for all,” the letter says. “That is why we’ve taken steps to provide a place to work that is equal for all genders in becoming Gender Tick accredited. In doing so, we have measured our pay gaps, and reported them publicly. Now we’re working to fix the gaps.

CEO AIA New Zealand Nick Stanhope says AIA NZ opted to publish their gender pay gap publicly in March this year.

“We did this to encourage the gender pay conversation, as well as to ensure that as an organisation we hold ourselves accountable for addressing our current pay gap and commit to making improvements. We proudly support MindTheGap in the campaign to have more businesses publicly report their gaps.”

Chorus Chief People Officer, Shaun Philp says Chorus is committed to championing diversity, equity, and inclusion for our people – including taking sustained action to eliminate pay gaps at a company and career level.

“We believe awareness and transparency are crucial to help achieve our targets and advocate for pay equity across Aotearoa. As part of our commitment, we continue to measure and publish our current gender pay gaps in our annual reporting and will publish any ethnicity pay gaps once a consistent methodology is determined in Aotearoa.”

SkyCity Chief People & Culture Officer Claire Walker says “SkyCity is proud to be reporting both our gender and ethnic pay gaps. Requiring public reporting will help increase accountability for businesses and also provide a common framework for tracking progress.”

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