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ITN reveals BAME staff typically get four-fifths pay of white colleagues

Trevor MacDonald, then 33, joins ITN in 1973.
Trevor MacDonald, then 33, joins ITN in 1973. Photograph: Keystone/Getty

ITN, the maker of news for ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5, has revealed that staff from a black, asian or other minority ethnic background typically get paid a fifth less than their white colleagues.

The median hourly pay for an ITN employee from a BAME background was 20.8% lower than that for white colleagues. The median is the mid-point pay gap when all wage rates are lined up from the biggest to smallest, which reduces the effect of one-off outliers with high and low salaries. The median bonus gap is 50%.

The inequality in pay for BAME staff is worse than that for women at ITN, where there is a median gender pay gap of 18.2% and bonus gap of 50%. Channel 4 News presenter Cathy Newman tweeted that the gender gap was “staggering”, saying the figures demonstrate “just how pervasive inequality is”, when ITN revealed those figures in March.

ITN has voluntarily published the BAME pay gap figures – by law companies are only obliged to report gender pay figures – and has disclosed a range of targets and initiatives to tackle the inequality.

Targets include a 50% reduction in the BAME pay gap by 2022, with BAME employees making up 20% of the top 20 earners. And the proportion of BAME staff will rise from 15% to 20% within the same period.

ITN, which currently has no BAME members on its seven-strong board or nine-strong top executive team, has also pledged that at least one BAME candidate must be interviewed for every role.

“To close this pay gap we must work harder to increase the proportion of BAME at every level of ITN, particularly in the senior decision-making management roles,” said John Hardie, the chief executive of ITN. “ITN is committed to being a diverse and inclusive place to work.”

Hardie, who is due to leave ITN after nine years, has said that senior management will not receive bonus payments regardless of the financial performance of the business if he fails to hit the gender and diversity targets.

Last month, the BBC announced a range of actions to tackle the lack of diversity at the top of the corporation, including that shortlists for all senior roles at the BBC will have to include at least one BAME member.