Legal & General and Amicus hold a joint Equality and Diversity Committee on a monthly basis. The operation of this Committee has recently been reviewed, and in 2007 it will report to the CSR Committee. Legal & General is a member of the Employers Forum on Age, the Employers Forum on Disability, and Business in the Community’s Opportunity Now and Race for Opportunity organisations. Legal & General and Amicus continue to be members of the Dignity at Work Steering Group, a DTI and Amicus funded project aimed at preventing bullying in the workplace on which Legal & General sits to share best practice
We worked with Amicus to communicate the impact of Age Discrimination Legislation to employees and successfully implemented the legislation. As a result of the legislation the Company’s default retirement age is now 65. However, employees retain the option of retiring earlier according to their pension retirement date.
The Equality and Diversity Committee has focused on training initiatives and, as a result, a training module exclusively covering Equality and Diversity is now available to managers as part of the Institute of Leadership and Management Diploma course.
We have conducted an Equal Pay Audit since 2001 to determine whether a pay gap exists in terms of gender. There was found to be no significant gap. This year, for the first time, we also conducted the audit on the basis of any ethnicity or age bias and the results have been shared with Amicus and presented to senior management to inform the future direction of HR policy.
Legal & General signed the Amicus Equal Pay Charter to demonstrate our ongoing commitment to maintaining the principle and practice of equal pay.
All our employees are eligible to request flexible working and requests are given equal consideration regardless of whether an employee has the statutory right to request flexible working. In 2006 a job-sharing policy was incorporated within our flexible working policy. Approximately 12% of our employees work on a part-time basis.
To further demonstrate our commitment to being a family-friendly employer, Childcare Vouchers were introduced in 2006. This is a government sponsored scheme which works via a salary sacrifice and offers tax benefits for childcare. Approximately 300 employees are participating in the scheme.
“I chose to use
Legal & General’s childcare voucher scheme because it provides a considerable saving on childcare costs. The enrolment process was very easy and, given the costs that can be saved, I would certainly recommend the scheme.”
Dave Burrows, Cardiff (above)
“I am very please that
Legal & General has put this scheme in place. I’ve found it really easy to use and the savings are significant.”
Nicola Orpin, Kingswood