Gender pay gap: women paid less by universities

The UK’s leading universities have been dragged into the growing row over gender pay gaps, as figures show the majority of institutions pay women less than men on average.

Private and public sector bodies with more than 250 employees, including universities, had to reveal the difference between the average pay of men and women by 4 April. Not all institutions’ data was immediately available via the government’s portal, but more than 100 of the UK’s 162 higher education institutions have reported paying men more than women.

Many institutions reported a median pay gap significantly higher than the 10 per cent national average for companies. The average for the 21 Russell Group universities for which data was available was 17 per cent.