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Equal Remuneration Convention, 1951 (No. 100) - Georgia (RATIFICATION: 1993)

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Articles 1 and 2 of the Convention. Gender wage gap. The Committee notes that according to the statistical data provided by the government, the average monthly nominal earnings of employees is significantly higher for men in 18 of the 19 economic activities reported on, for example the “Professional, scientific and technical activities”; and in several, the average salary of men is almost twice as much as for women, such as in “Water supply, sewerage, waste management and remediation activities”, “Wholesale and retail trade, repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles” and “Financial and insurance activities”. It notes that across all economic activities women earn 69 per cent of the average male salary. The Committee requests the Government to continue to provide detailed and up-to-date statistics on monthly and hourly wages and additional allowances of women and men, disaggregated by sector and occupational level to keep track of the progress achieved.

Article 2 of the Convention. Promotion of the principle set out in the Convention in the public service. Legislation and application in practice. The Government indicates that the Civil Service Bureau adopted its first-ever internal Gender Equality Strategy and Action Plan in 2022, with technical assistance from UN Women. The Gender Equality Strategy provides for the undertaking of a gender impact assessment of the Public Service Law which will focus, inter alia, on identifying barriers to women’s career advancement and professional development that includes the component of pay gap analysis in low and mid-level positions in civil service. The Committee notes the statistics provided by the Government on the distribution of men and women in the civil service, and that the share of women in the civil service has remained steady at around a third of employees since 2019, and that women are concentrated in the lower ranks, while men dominate in the upper management level and that this has remained relatively steady over the years. Noting the continued absence of information provided in this regard, the Committee is once again bound to request the Government to clarify whether the new Law on Remuneration in Public Institutions provides for equal remuneration for men and women for work of equal value, or merely equal remuneration for equal work. The Government is further requested to continue to provide statistics disaggregated by sex on the distribution of men and women in the various grades and occupations to allow the Committee to assess how the principle of the Convention is applied in practice.

Article 3. Objective job evaluation. The Committee notes the information provided by the Government on the responsibilities and competencies of different job classifications in the public service but observes that it does not provide any information on the method for establishing job rankings, and therefore does not allow the Committee to assess the application of the Convention in practice. It wishes to recall that methods used for objective job evaluation must take particular care to ensure that they are free from gender bias: it is important to ensure that the selection of factors for comparison, the weighting of such factors and the actual comparison carried out are not discriminatory, either directly or indirectly. Often skills considered to be “female”, such as manual dexterity and those required in the caring professions, are undervalued or even overlooked, in comparison with traditionally “male” skills, such as heavy lifting (2012 General Survey on the fundamental Conventions, paragraph 701). It further notes that the Ministry of Internally Displaced Persons from the Occupied Territories, Labour, Health and Social Affairs of Georgia developed a methodology and guidelines on job evaluation and determination of relevant remuneration which will be used by employers as well as by labour inspectors. In the absence of information in this regard,the Committee reiterates its request to the Government to provide information on the method used for the elaboration of the new remuneration system in the public service, including on how the coefficients and calculations were elaborated by the Ministry of Finance, and how it is ensured that this job classification system is free from gender bias. It finally asks the Government to provide information on the concrete steps taken to promote the use of objective job evaluation or to develop such a method in the private sector, including training for those who undertake job evaluations and the results obtained.

Article 4. Cooperation with workers’ and employers’ organizations. For several years, the Committee has been asking the Government to provide detailed information on the specific activities undertaken by the Tripartite Commission for Social Partnership to promote the principle of the Convention, and in particular under the 2018-19 Action Plan. The Committee notes the Government’s indication that the 2019 Amendments to the Labour Code, the Law on Public Service and the Law on Gender Equality and the introduction of the Law on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination were a part of the planned activities of the Tripartite Commission in order to transpose European Union (EU) Directives as determined by the EU-Georgia Association Agreement; and that the 2020 Amendments to the Labour Code which introduced the concept of equal pay for equal work was done in close cooperation with the social partners, i.e. the Georgian Trade Union Confederation and Georgian Employers Association. Once again, the Committee points out that the recent legal amendments provide for a concept of equal pay for equal work which is narrower than the principle in the Convention of equal pay for women and men for work of equal “value” (see the Committee’s pending observation on the application of the Convention by Georgia). The Committee requests the Government to provide information on the activities undertaken by the Tripartite Commission for Social Partnership to promote the principle enshrined in the Convention; and on any other steps taken in collaboration with workers’ and employers’ organizations to give full effect to the Convention.