GWENT Police has vowed to reduce its gender pay gap “as quickly as possible,” after data revealed women in the force earn 21 per cent less per hour on average than men.

According to Gwent Police’s 2021/22 gender pay gap report, the average hourly pay for female staff is 21.5 per cent lower than men - with female staff earning on average 78p for every £1 earned by their male equivalents.

This is the largest pay gap of Wales' four police forces, and 16th largest in England and Wales.

The report also revealed that, despite the presence of a female Chief Constable and Deputy Chief Constable, women occupied only 27.7 per cent of the highest-paid jobs in the force, compared to 57.3 per cent of the lowest paid jobs.

The figures are calculated using a median average of the hourly pay of all staff employed by Gwent Police. They don’t suggest that women and men are paid different rates for the same jobs, but instead that there are more men in high-paying roles within the force.

“We want to reduce our gender pay gap as quickly as possible and we’re committed to achieving this,” said Deputy Chief Constable Amanda Blakeman.

“While female and male officers are not paid unequally, we’re working against a historic trend of men working as frontline police officers and women working in police staff roles which pay less highly.”

According to the report, Gwent Police employs nearly twice as many men than women as police officers. Conversely, the force employed more women than men in lower-paying staff roles.

These figures reflect the wider national picture. The recent Strategic Review of Policing in England and Wales, published in March, found that women were still under-represented within police workforces, especially as police officers.

The report concluded that despite improvements over the past decade, at current progress it would take another 20 years for police forces in England and Wales to become truly representative.

“Our aim is to encourage more women into policing, and we’ve already welcomed new female officers into the force as part of our national and local recruitment campaigns,” said DCC Blakeman.

“Our senior management team has a high proportion of women in leadership positions, who act as role models to junior staff members and indicate that gender is not a barrier to achievement in our force.”

Gwent Police has vowed to improve diversity within their workforce. It recently adopted an eight-point ‘Four Welsh Force’ Equality Pledge to improve gender representation and their sexual harassment response process.

The report says Gwent Police has made other changes to improve representation, including adjusting gun sizes “to make gun handling easier for females with smaller hands.”