Surprise finding reverses last year’s statistics
19 November 2008
Black women in the UK are being paid more than their white female counterparts, figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show.
The figures, taken from the ONS Labour Force Survey, reveal that women defining themselves as black Caribbean took home an average of £462 a week, 6 per cent more than those women defined as white, in the three months to October this year.
The surprise finding was a reversal of the equivalent statistics from last year, when white women earned 7 per cent more.
But the Equality and Human Rights Commission said the figures had to be treated with some caution. “Black women are more likely to live in London, where wages are higher, and work in the public sector, where the pay gap for women generally is lower,” a spokesman said. Fifty per cent of the black female population live in London.
Colleen Harris, the first black press officer at Downing Street and founder of the Dignity management consultancy, told a national newspaper she was “cynical about the figures”. But she added: “Black women do work very hard, and often they are the single earner in a household and have the whole weight of a family on their shoulders.”
The finding could be some reflection of the growing educational achievement of many black pupils at school. Last year 49 per cent of black Caribbean pupils achieved five GCSEs at C grade or above, up from 44 per cent the following year. Black females fared even better, with 56 per cent.