UK government to make employers state salaries in all job adverts

What the government announced

Prime Minister Andy Burnham said on Thursday, 5 November, that employers will be made to state the pay for a role in job adverts. His office said a bill would be put before Parliament soon, but it gave no timetable. The move is part of a wider push to cut the number of young people who are not in education, employment or training, known as NEET. Figures cited in the reporting put that group at nearly one million people aged 16 to 24, or 13% of the age group, one of the highest shares in Europe. One industry group said that setting pay is a complex process and that regulating adverts is not always suitable.

Why ministers say it matters

Burnham's office said the requirement would help people applying for a first job and could make unjustified pay differences easier to challenge. In a statement, Burnham made the case directly to jobseekers:

“you should know what a job pays before spending your time and effort applying for it”

Bridget Phillipson, described in the reporting as education secretary and as minister for women and equalities, told LBC that vague phrases such as 'competitive salary' can deter women from applying:

“People can't plan on the basis of no information.”

The gender pay gap between men and women working full time stood at 6.8% in the latest figures from April. The improvement has slowed in recent years, and among the highest earners the gap has widened since the Covid-19 pandemic. The government argues that upfront pay details could expose unjustified differences and prevent pay disputes from escalating.

Campaigners, employers and open questions

Paul Nowak, general secretary of the Trades Union Congress, called the phrase 'competitive salary' a 'disrespectful' practice. Penny East, chief executive of the Fawcett Society, described mandatory salary transparency as 'a great first step' that would end a situation where litigation was often the only way for women to learn whether they were treated equally. East said the requirement must cover all employers, including small businesses, which have argued that publishing salaries could leave them at a disadvantage or open to claims from existing staff. The effect of the policy depends on details the government has not yet set out, including the scope of the requirement and how it will be enforced. Pay transparency laws have had mixed effects when introduced in other countries.

How common salary disclosure is today

Adzuna, a UK jobs website, said 51% of adverts on its site in September had salary information, though the share has been falling in recent years. Its co-founder, Andrew Hunter, said being open about pay should be the norm, and that employers who include a salary attract more applicants and better-suited ones. A 2023 CIPD survey of 832 decision-makers found that 41% of employers always included salary information and 27% never did. The CIPD has also found that public sector bodies and charities are more likely than private firms to reveal pay, and that pay ranges are more common than exact salaries.

Adzuna, UK adverts, September51%

CIPD 2023, employers always including pay41%

Indeed, Irish postings, March 202639%

Adzuna, UK adverts, September

51 %

CIPD 2023, employers always including pay

41 %

Indeed, Irish postings, March 2026

39 %

Data from the article text

Ireland, the EU and what comes next

Ireland's government plans to require a salary range in job advertisements, going beyond the EU minimum, which only requires pay to be disclosed before interviews. The Department of Equality said the legislation would be enacted as soon as possible in 2027, and that obligations on employers would be phased in. Irish workers should already have had these rights for four months, but the government failed to implement an EU directive on time. The EU Pay Transparency Directive 2023/970 requires employers to state a starting salary or pay range before an interview, and Germany has not yet transposed it, with a German law possibly arriving in early 2027. In the UK, the final report of the Milburn Review into youth inactivity is due in the weeks after 5 November, while the Burnham bill still has no set date.