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		</div><p><a href="http://londonglossy.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/gender-pay-audits-to-be-voluntary.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-full" title="Lib Dem MP Lynne Featherstone said firms would be expected to voluntarily do gender pay audits" src="http://londonglossy.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/min-gender-pay-audits-to-be-voluntary.jpg" alt="Lib Dem MP Lynne Featherstone said firms would be expected to voluntarily do gender pay audits"/></a></p>
<p>Businesses will not be required to publish the pay gap between male and female employees, it has been announced.</p>
<p>Instead, companies will be expected to reduce the gap by voluntary means, revealed equalities minister Lynne Featherstone in an interview with The Guardian.</p>
<p>The move forms part of a strategy which will see the Government Equalities Office lose its independence and become part of the Home Office.</p>
<p>The Equalities Act introduced by the previous Labour administration gave companies until 2013 to face possible mandatory disclosure of pay differences. And the Liberal Democrat manifesto promised fair pay audits for every company with more than 100 employees.</p>
<p>Lib Dem MP Ms Featherstone two years ago described a voluntary pay audit system as &#8220;hardly worth the paper it&#8217;s printed on&#8221;. But she told The Guardian on Thursday: &#8220;Right at this moment of financial peril to the nation is perhaps not the moment to introduce mandatory pay audits.</p>
<p>&#8220;It was a different world two years ago &#8211; financially and in terms of pressures on business. We are in a completely new landscape now&#8230; Much more of partnership working, no longer government dictates, this is absolutely the time to make voluntary pay-reporting work.&#8221;</p>
<p>Ms Featherstone said Government would check annually whether changes are being made. She added: &#8220;We expect them to do it voluntarily because it&#8217;s the right thing to do and a good thing to do and it will improve business.&#8221;</p>
<p>She insisted that bringing equalities into the Home Office did not represent a downgrading of the issue. &#8220;I&#8217;m hoping that it&#8217;s an upgrading, in that it&#8217;s being brought into the heart of government,&#8221; she said. &#8220;It will be mainstream, not added on to departments.&#8221;</p>
<p>Shadow equalities minister Yvette Cooper said: &#8220;Whatever happened to the Lib Dem pledge to introduce mandatory pay audits? Scrapping Labour&#8217;s plan to increase transparency in pay is a backwards step for women&#8217;s equality.&#8221;</p>
<p>And Ceri Goddard, chief executive of gender equality campaign the Fawcett Society, said: &#8220;The Government has today consigned another generation of women to lower pay. Their proposal to rely only on voluntary business action on pay isn&#8217;t just naive, it sends a dangerous signal that tackling discrimination against women is a choice, not a requirement.&#8221;</p>
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