Listed firm DWF has published its ethnicity pay gap for the first time, admitting it is ‘not where it needs to be’ in terms of black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) representation at senior levels.

According to the firm’s annual pay gap report, BAME employees and partners earn 23% less on average than their white colleagues. The combined ethnicity bonus gap is 22% in mean terms.

DWF office

DWF ‘not where it needs to be’ in terms of BAME representation at senior levels

DWF also announced that its combined gender pay gap - which includes pay data for all UK employees and partners - has narrowed slightly from 39% in 2019 to 37% in 2020, in mean terms. For employees only, the mean gender pay gap decreased from 22% to 21%, while for partners it fell from 15% to 13%.

Helen Hill, HR director at DWF, said: ‘It is important to acknowledge that across the DWF Group, we know we are not where we need to be in terms of female and BAME representation at senior levels. We recognise that reducing our gender and ethnicity pay gaps requires a sustained effort at every level of our business, and at every point in the employee life cycle, from attraction and recruitment through to development, succession planning and promotion.’

She added that the gender pay gap is ‘largely the result of having more men at senior levels in higher paid roles and a higher proportion of women relative to men in roles that fall within our lower pay quartiles’.

DWF hopes to achieve 30% female representation and at least 10% BAME representation across senior leadership positions by 2022.