Our Gender Pay Gap Report 2021

At Swim England, our vision of a nation swimming is wholly-inclusive. We believe all of our people deserve to be treated fairly and consistently whatever their background or protected characteristic. As such, we are committed to ensuring equal and fair pay for comparable roles and we will always strive to continuously ensure there is equality.

In preparing this annual report, we’ve assessed the reward received by everyone who worked with and provided services for us personally (employees, casual workers and self-employed contractors) in the April 2021 pay month.

In the reporting month, Swim England had 168 workers who received full pay. This number was significantly lower than the numbers we’ve previously reported, which was due to the impacts of the pandemic. Pools were closed meaning we were not able to deliver as much activity as we usually would and a large proportion of our employees were on furlough, and are therefore excluded from this report.

Of the pay assessed for our 168 workers, we had an average (mean) gender pay gap of 11 per cent, significantly lower than the national average of 15.4 per cent. We had a mid-point (median) gender pay gap of 8 per cent.

Download a PDF of our 2021 report.

Gender pay gap

Pay quartiles

During the April 2021 pay period, of the workers’ pay, there was an overall gender split of 49 per cent female and 51 per cent male. These quartile graphs demonstrate the proportion of females and males in each pay quartile, with all four quartiles containing 42 workers.

In 2021 we continued to abide by our pay principles to ensure pay rates are fairly applied across comparable roles for our employed, casual and contracted workers. In this reporting period Swim England made no bonus payments.

How we will make a difference

As holders of the Advanced level of the Equality Standard for Sport, we will always strive to attract and retain the very best people for our sport, from all sectors of the community. Our activities are driven by our diversity and inclusion action plan which promotes inclusion in everything we do. We constantly review our pay grades to ensure fairness for all, reviewing gender pay and all other protected characteristics.

We have several ambitious projects for the year ahead, for example; we are embarking on the largest research project we’ve ever conducted. Through the ‘Swimming and Me’ project we will work with Sporting Equals and other stakeholders to conduct research within the non-aquatic community, that will help us to better understand the barriers to inclusion in aquatics for people from diverse ethnic communities.

Our ‘Ripple Effect’ project will see us working in partnership with National Disability Sports Organisations (NDSOs) to increase inclusion and accessibility across our volunteering structure. This project, which has been funded through the Spirit of 2012 legacy funding, will see us gather feedback from volunteers with disabilities in order to remove any existing barriers within our volunteering pathway, bringing about a positive change to our volunteering environment that is welcoming and encourages engagement of people with disabilities.

With these projects and our other ambitions, we can ensure that our strategic intent sees us take aim at tackling inequalities across all of our work areas, to progress towards our aim of ‘A Nation Swimming’.

• Download a PDF of our 2020 report.
• Download a PDF of our 2019 report.
• Download a PDF of our 2018 report.
• Download a PDF of our 2017 report.