Gender Wage Gap In UK: Finance Bonuses Should Be Linked To Representation In Senior Roles, Report Says

United Kingdom financial executives’ bonuses should be tied to the number of women employed in the companies’ top positions, a government-commissioned review recommended Wednesday. The government launched a review in July as part of its efforts to raise economic productivity, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The recommendation is one of several contained in the preliminary report headed by Jayne-Anne Gadhia, chief executive of a U.K. bank called Virgin Money. Gadhia also said finance companies should publish their records on gender diversity and appoint executives to be responsible for gender, inclusion and diversity.

“It should be a wake-up call to everyone in financial services that fewer women progress to senior levels than in any other industry in the U.K.,” Gadhia said in a statement. “My report proposes addressing the issue in a way that the city will recognize. Make it public, measure it and report on it. What gets published gets done.”

Gadhia is presenting the report’s findings Wednesday at a meeting with Harriet Baldwin, economic secretary to the treasury, and several fellow female finance executives regarding ways to boost the amount of women in senior roles throughout the city. Gadhia’s recommendations come less than a week after a separate government-commissioned study found at least one-third of U.K. firms’ boardroom positions should be occupied by women, although the report stopped short of recommending gender quotas be imposed.

The government said Gadhia will consult on her report’s findings before a final version is published in the spring -- ahead of next year’s budget.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has previously linked women’s education and increased numbers of women in the labor force to economic growth. An equal gender ratio in countries’ labor markets could boost GDP by an average of 12 percent by 2030 across its member countries, the OECD estimated.