Make the Apprenticeship Levy more flexible, says REC

The All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Women and Work has proposed new measures to improve opportunities for women to progress in the labour market.

The toolkit, entitled ‘How to Recruit Women for the 21st Century‘, builds on the recommendations of the Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC) to broaden the Apprenticeship Levy in the hopes of creating a more inclusive Training and Skills Levy.

According to REC, a more flexible Levy would allow thousands more temporary workers to benefit from training. To ensure fairness in the recruitment of candidates and provide more job opportunities for women, the APPG has also highlighted the importance of using recruitment agencies affiliated with trade associations such as REC.

“Diversity in the workplace has been proven to lead to better performance for organisations and reducing the pay gap would generate real benefits for the UK economy,” said Sophie Wingfield, REC Head of Policy. “Despite this, often unwittingly, organisations are reducing the likelihood of women getting jobs because of outdated recruitment processes.

“To ensure a step-change in diversity, employers need to take action to mitigate against bias. Key to this is reviewing hiring procedures and updating each stage of the recruitment process. Amending job adverts to avoiding gendered language, and ensuring you’ve considered flexible working from the outset are just two examples that can help employers increase the number of women at application stage.”

Jess Phillips, MP for Birmingham Yardley and Co-Chair of the Women and Work APPG, added: “If employers are to successfully hire and attract the best, diverse talent, they need to take recruitment seriously and review their processes. This toolkit encourages employers and policy-makers to make those changes, giving practical steps that will go some way in shifting persistent obstacles that women face when entering and re-entering the labour market.”

REC is now urging employers and public sector decision makers to take note of their recommendations, many of which expand upon those found in their recent report – ‘Increasing Opportunity, Supporting Growth‘ – to improve job prospects and career progression for all women.

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