The Minister of State, Office for Equality and Opportunity (Baroness Smith of Malvern) (Lab)

My Lords, like my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti, I am also an occasional visitor to this Committee, but I am very pleased to be here this evening to address her Amendment 275. I thank her for recognising the engagement there has been with the Government and others on this up to this point. Certainly, the Government want to make very clear that we share the broad aims behind this amendment. Over 50 years after the Equal Pay Act 1970 and 15 years after the Equality Act 2010, it is clear that equal pay has not yet been achieved. That is why the Government have committed to strengthen the equal pay regime and end pay discrimination. I share the concerns of my noble friend in identifying the challenge of enforcement in this case. There is more we can do to ensure that the onus does not fall only on women to find out whether they are receiving the same pay as their male colleagues for equal work and to take enforcement action against employers in the case of a breach. It is possible to envisage, in relation to the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, a system in which you have both the contractual arrangement and the ability to take individual action as is the case now and an enforcement body that supports people doing that in general terms and identifies thematic or consistent ways in which equal pay is being breached. That is why the Government are committed to establishing an equal pay regulatory and enforcement unit with the involvement of trade unions. As part of this, we will carefully consider how we can improve the enforcement of the equal pay scheme. On 7 April we launched a call for evidence on this issue and wider equality law to ensure that any steps we take will lead to a meaningful strengthening of protections against pay discrimination—an objective that I am sure my noble friend will share. It is important that the Government are able to develop these changes in partnership with business, trade unions and civil society to ensure that the law works for everybody. For that reason, I hope my noble friend will recognise that this will be a more appropriate process through which to address these issues. As she suggests, we will give these areas very close consideration in advance of the equality, race and disability Bill. In relation to some of the specific points my noble friend raises about the way this might operate, we certainly recognise the benefits that can arise from government departments, including HMRC, working together. HMRC already has a number of joint working and data-sharing arrangements with departments and agencies. The Government are therefore not closed in principle to establishing new data-sharing arrangements with regulatory authorities where this can support their regulatory functions. My noble friend made a very interesting point about the use of AI. It would not be sufficient simply to compare the pay of different people working within a workplace unless you could also have some analysis of how that applied to the nature of the work and whether that was work of equal value. It may well be that advances in technology, including AI, would be a way in which we could support that monitoring. Policy is at a very formative stage. My officials will explore a wide range of options to improve the enforcement of equal pay rights. While taking great care to ensure that safeguards are put in place in relation to personal data, particularly where that relates to discrimination and protected characteristics, I suspect the sort of description that she gave of the contribution of AI is very much part of what, across government, we are wanting to see in terms of its use in future. We are sympathetic to the ultimate objectives of my noble friend’s amendment. I hope she recognises that and the progress that we intend to make on that pledge to deliver stronger enforcement mechanisms and, in particular, an equal pay regulatory and enforcement unit. With that assurance, I hope she feels able to withdraw her amendment.