FCA Diversity consultation

[Nojobforoldmums]

Not sure if anyone has seen this
www.fca.org.uk/publications/consultation-papers/cp21-24-diversity-inclusion-company-boards-executive-committees

References to gender, may or may not be intended to mean sex. Is this on the radar of the usual groups to ensure monitoring sex doesn't get dropped in favour of gender identity?

Apologies for a plop and run thread.

A quick search shows the follow number of mentions for the words:

Gender = 53
Sex = 0

Worth noting this:

www.fca.org.uk/news/press-releases/new-executive-appointments-financial-conduct-authority

Stonewall is a lobbying organisation. There is something circular about the Chair of Trustees of a lobbying organisation holding a senior position in an organisation responsible for supervising possibly our major industry, and then that organisation putting out a consultation which might effectively deliver some of the the lobbying organisations objectives.

My own guess is that the disproportionate influence lobbyists have, is what will bring down this Government. This is a prime example.

Now waiting for the opposition to speak up…..

Excellent Marpling @Needmoresleep. It's quite insidious really. Stonewall is like The Blob. Gobbling up everything in its path and getting bigger and bigger as a result.

I wish I had trained in employment law. I would love to know where we stand in terms of staff being tracked on the basis of the legally undefined concept of gender, rather than sex. The latter being the one that employers have some legal obligations on. How fs employers would defend themselves against sex discrimination claims when they have only looked at gender. I'd also love to know how this fits in with GDPR

Interestingly I had heard that the FSA was quite a family (ie mother) unfriendly employer (poor mat leave pay compared to industry norm, lack of flexible working and other accommodating factors). It may have changed since my source worked there.

Gender is often used as a synonym for sex, personally I have no issue with this, but it needs to be clearly defined with no potential for scope creep.

I also have no issue if they additionally want to monitor gender identity representation ( though not sure if there is data to baseline against population).

I work in insurance and we have had CBT rolled out for staff - I did mine yesterday - and its all about pronouns (its a ridiculous short little video and question - pointless)

Lots of managers and staff have started putting pronouns in their email sigs - the CBT says its voluntary.

I also got selected to do a survey on inclusion culture in our workplace so I made sure I let them know that this kind of thing should not be in the workplace and that they should be looking at the bigger picture especially around SW as they are diversity champions

The insidious part of it is that the intro to the CBT says that they are getting our managers to discuss this with us shortly

I'm going to make sure I let my TM know that I am not on board with this especially if it starts to creep into compelled speech

The consultation is actually about diversity, in particular women and those from ethnic minority backgrounds. They are proposing comply or explain targets for both. Ethnicity is not "legally defined". It's just a commonly used term, as is gender. Do you think ethnicity needs to be legally defined KevinBacon, prior to being recorded? It a bit late for that as we already do record it.

If this regulation (listing rules) is agreed then are you still going to protest its not legal/GDPR etc to use the words we use?

It's already legal for employees and board members to change their id from male to female so what exactly are the sex discrimination claims you are referring to?

Non binary identity is irrelevant for equal pay claims and if someone's ID is female then they are female for pay comparator purposes.

Can you be more specific about the sex discrimination claims you can see in this consultation document?

It's already legal for employees and board members to change their id from male to female so what exactly are the sex discrimination claims you are referring to?

I am not sure if I understand this. There is a legal process involving obtaining a GRC, but the numbers involved are vanishingly small. The ability to use Self-ID was considered by Theresa May's Government and there was a consultation, but not action to date and it looks as if this has been dropped.

Sex and gender identity are two different things. The consultation needs to be clear what it is interested in, for results to have any meaning.

It is clear what they are interested in. It's made clear in the documents. And it's made clear what the results mean too. Have you read it?

The GRC isn't relevant to this consultation. It's already possible to change your passport and employment records without a GRC.

Yes, but is this not an issue for women.

If anyone can change at any time, what is the point of data. What are you trying to record. Sex inequality or gender inequality. If the latter, and anyone can be anything, then hey, an all male board can declare themselves Pips Bunce for the day.

If anyone can change at any time, what is the point of data.

It's an annual report. So that's once a year. The point is having sight of annual change over time.
There's four options in the gender question. It's not actually mandatory in the questions being consulted on to state a gender or ethnicity. Which is the usual approach to this as people don't legally have to declare an ethnicity or gender.

If the latter, and anyone can be anything, then hey, an all male board can declare themselves Pips Bunce for the day

I think it's a rather silly over exaggeration to assert that board members are irresponsibly going to lie in order to mislead in this Financial Conduct Authority reporting, out with their legal entitlement to not declare a gender or ethnicity. The FCA has strict expectations of conduct in regulated roles. It might make an amusing Private Eye cartoon but that's not the actual world of FCA regulation.

But as you said, the consultation is about diversity. So why no mention of sex. Surely counting the number of senior women in senior positions is relevant. Not just the number of people who feel like women, but who have benefitted from male advantage.

It is as if the FCA only care about some sorts of diversity.

I emailed the FCA previously when they produced their own gender pay gap report to point out they were confusing gender and sex. They eventually came back to me and said they were updating their report to ensure they had the correct language. I am not confident that they know the difference and this will filter down to my workplace which is regulated by the FCA. FCA are Stonewalled Diversity Champions

Surely counting the number of senior women in senior positions is relevant. Not just the number of people who feel like women, but who have benefitted from male advantage.

Just?

Read the consultation, instead of speculating on what they are doing you can actually read what they are consulting on.

Non binary identity is irrelevant for equal pay claims and if someone's ID is female then they are female for pay comparator purposes.

This is not the case - if their sex is male then they are male regardless of ID for pay comparator purposes. That is a big issue with adopting self ID (which hasn't happened yet) - women can no longer compare themselves to men undermining any sex discrimination case. Employers may choose to recruit men or knowing they won't get pregnant, or sack women from the team for the same reason but as long as a few men self id as women...

I emailed the FCA previously when they produced their own gender pay gap report to point out they were confusing gender and sex.

Gender pay gap reports do include people who have changed the sex or gender field on identity documents and employment records in the changed gender. So the word makes no difference.

There's a perception that this will make a dramatic difference to the median gap but it's not going to. If you understand that the median is the middle data point or median employee, and not the average of all employees, then you will also understand that each person that has gone from one to the other has only moved the median person up or down one person. As the median person is generally in the most populous grade then there are many people on the median salary meaning this minimal movement up or down does not change the gap at all.

The problem is vastly overstated.

There's a lot of sex exemption issues to challenge but this really isn't one

The consultation is actually about diversity, in particular women and those from ethnic minority backgrounds. They are proposing comply or explain targets for both.

I am still confused. How can the FCA achieve this aim, for the sector as a whole, if they do not refer to sex in their consultation. Gender is not a synonym for sex.

If the FCA has strict codes of conduct, they should also be able to be
employ precise language. Unless they are aiming for deliberate obfuscation.

That is a big issue with adopting self ID (which hasn't happened yet) - women can no longer compare themselves to men undermining any sex discrimination case.

This is nonsense really isn't it? Google sex discrimination cases and you will find plenty of cases of women comparing themselves to men.
I'm dealing with several at the moment.

Have you read the documents @Needmoresleep? Or are you just waffling?

This is nonsense really isn't it?

What. The fact that many many women want to retain the word sex, rather than gender, and to be seen as Adult Human Females, and to enjoy the protection of the relevant legislation.

You may disagree and think such women are silly. However it is very important for a large section of society, and it is not for organisations such as the FCA to decide whether their views are nonsense.

The blurring of language is dangerous for those who need protection because of discrimination resulting from their sex.

@Pretaxanger

Have you read the documents *@Needmoresleep*? Or are you just waffling?

In the consultation document it says "at least 40% of the board should be women (including those self-identifying as women)". So if for example the CEO (male) self-identifies as a woman a la Pip Bunce they are included as a "woman" for this purpose? So a board made up of 60% males and 40% men self-identifying as woman is diverse?

Screen shots of what they are consulting on.

It does appear to be based on self identification. No wonder the FCA allegedly sees no reason to treat working mums well. It can meet any targets without worrying about the pesky reproducing type of woman.

@Pretaxanger

That is a big issue with adopting self ID (which hasn't happened yet) - women can no longer compare themselves to men undermining any sex discrimination case.

This is nonsense really isn't it? Google sex discrimination cases and you will find plenty of cases of women comparing themselves to men.
I'm dealing with several at the moment.

You miss the point. When those men they are being compared to ID as women then what?

@Needmoresleep

This is nonsense really isn't it?

What. The fact that many many women want to retain the word sex, rather than gender, and to be seen as Adult Human Females, and to enjoy the protection of the relevant legislation.

You may disagree and think such women are silly. However it is very important for a large section of society, and it is not for organisations such as the FCA to decide whether their views are nonsense.

The blurring of language is dangerous for those who need protection because of discrimination resulting from their sex.

The assertion made that women can no longer compare themselves to men undermining any sex discrimination case is nonsense.

The suggestion that boards will identify wholesale as women to manipulate their company reports to the FCA (which will also be published in financial reports where there's invariably photos of board members) is silly.

What exactly is the purpose of you making false claims about what I have written when it's in the posts right above yours?

There's Equality Act protected exemptions issues that make a difference to women. Making far fetched exaggerated claims like the one's here I've challenged, does nothing for those issues.

You miss the point. When those men they are being compared to ID as women then what?

Are you suggesting that an employer is going to search the organisation for someone out as trans and wedge them into every sex discrimination case whether involved or not as proof of.....well proof of what, that the woman's male manager didn't discriminate in opportunities or promotion because there's someone trans in another department?

It may be silly to think companies would all self-identify as women but according to the language in the consultation document they wouldn't be doing anything wrong if they did. Surely the FCA should be precise in its use of language to avoid any doubt.