Incoming pay transparency rules are an unnecessary burden, according to one in five Irish employers in a new survey.
The research, which was carried out on behalf of Mason Hayes and Curran, found only 31 per cent thought there would be a positive effect from the new rules that require employers to disclose salary ranges and strengthen equal pay enforcement to reduce gender pay gaps.
Ireland faces delays in transposing the European Union (EU) Pay Transparency Directive by its 7th June deadline. Up to 16 of the 27 EU member states have published no implementing legislation.
Ireland is expected to adopt a phased approach to the introduction of the directive, beginning with salary disclosure in job advertisements and other pre-employment disclosures.
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“Pay transparency is fundamentally different from our existing gender pay gap reporting framework, which captures the average difference between male and female earnings across an organisation,” said Ger Connolly, employment law partner at Mason Hayes & Curran.
“Pay transparency goes further. It requires employers to classify workers and show that employees doing equal work or work of equal value receive equal pay based on gender-neutral criteria. We are helping clients build these frameworks now, so they are not trying to retrofit them once the rules take effect. Employers who wait to act will find the heavy lifting has been deferred, not avoided.”
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Half of employers have yet to review retirement policies, ahead of the implementation of new laws that will allow employees to request to remain in work beyond a company retirement age, where that age falls below the State pension age. Employers will have one month to respond in writing with detailed reasons.
Remote working is also proving an obstacle, with 44 per cent of employers feeling the current framework is falling short. That is despite a Government review that found it was working as intended, with 94 per cent of remote working requests approved or partly approved.
Connolly said there is a persistent misunderstanding around remote working laws.
“The law gives employees the right to ask to work remotely. It does not give them the right to demand it. The Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) can only assess whether an employer followed the correct procedural steps when refusing a request; it cannot overturn a refusal on its merits,” he said.
“With the WRC Code of Practice now being updated, employers whose policies are more than two years old should revisit them.”
The findings were based on a poll of 500 employers at the firm’s Employment Law Top Tips webinar.
