For the first time in nearly 10 years, the gender pay gap in Australia has remained stagnant, according to the Australian Government’s Workplace Gender Equality Agency, which conducts a biennial report on gender equality indicators.

In its 10-year reporting history from 2013, agency director Mary Wooldridge said there has been steady progress on all general equality indicators. However, in the past two years, progress has slowed, and for the first time, the gender pay gap has remained stagnant at 22.8%.

The agency measures the gender pay gap through data collected from 4,795 reporting organisations, covering almost 4.5 million employees.

The report covers the period from 1 June 2020 to 31 December 2022, most of which are notable pandemic years. During this time period, the data shows a 21.9% increase of employers offered flexible working arrangements between 2020-2021, and a further 4.6 increase in 2021-2022.

By contrast, however, the dataset does not show significant shifts in workplace gender equality in the years following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the findings, women remained at approximately 51% of the workforce and the number of women working full-time remained at around 21%.

The agency highlighted that while many employers recognise gender equality in the workplace, they are not necessarily prioritising it through action. Progress has slowed on gender composition, women’s representation on governing bodies, proportion of employers setting targets to increase board representation, proportion of employers conducting a gender pay gap analysis and taking action on that analysis, and the proportion of employers consulting employees on issues of gender equality.