Minister Foley urges employers to publish their gender pay gap reports ahead of this week’s deadline for reporting
- Published on: 25 November 2025
- Last updated on: 25 November 2025
The Minister for Children, Disability and Equality, Norma Foley, has urged employers to publish their gender pay gap reports ahead of this week’s deadline for reporting.
Since 2024, all employers with over 150 employees have been legally obliged to report on their gender pay gap. This has now been extended to all employers with over 50 staff, who will need to report for the first time this year, before the end of this week.
However, up to this point, only 50% of relevant employers have complied with their legal obligation to publish a statement outlining the size of their gender pay gap, the reasons for it, and what measures are being taken to eliminate or reduce it.
Minister Foley urged all relevant employers to publish their gender pay gap reports before the November 30 deadline as required under the Gender Pay Gap Information Act 2021.
“The gender pay gap is a critical measure of inequality faced by women. Measuring this gap and seeing who is most affected by it will show us what we need to do to close it,” she said.
In Ireland, the estimated unadjusted gender pay gap in 2023 stands at 8.6 per cent according to Eurostat. This means that women's gross hourly earnings were on average 8.6 per cent below those of men.
The 8.6 per cent gender pay gap in Ireland is below the EU average of 12 per cent and has dropped from over 16 per cent back in 2007 when measurement began.
Around 6,000 employers with 50 staff or more are legally required to publish their gender pay gap reports before the deadline of November 30 on their websites. If they do not have a website, they are legally required to make it publicly available in some other manner such as providing printed copies of the report in their reception area.
Minister Foley has urged relevant employers to also publish their reports voluntarily on the Gender Pay Gap Portal which she launched last week on the same day as the new National Women and Girls Strategy 2025-2030.
While employers are not yet legally obliged to upload their reports to the Gender Pay Gap Portal this year, any reports submitted will become accessible for the public to see, compare and review in the coming months.
Minister Foley said:
“I encourage all relevant employers to take part in the voluntary launch of the portal, which will show their commitment to tackling the gender pay gap. This centralised Gender Pay Gap Portal will help our understanding of the gender pay gap in Ireland and how it might be eliminated.
From next year, reporting on the portal will become mandatory for employers covered by the legislation. This will enable us to see where the pay gap is reducing, what employers are doing to reduce it, and where more action will be needed.”
The Gender Pay Gap Portal is accessible via the Department of Children, Disability and Equality’s webpage at gov.ie/genderpaygap.
117 employers have voluntarily registered with the Gender Pay Gap Portal since it was launched last week, and have begun submitting their reports. These reports will be published on the Gender Pay Gap Portal in the coming months.
The Gender Pay Gap Information Act 2021 is being amended to make it a legislative requirement for all employers in scope of the legislation to submit their reports to the Gender Pay Gap portal for the 2026 reporting cycle.
Gender Pay Gap reports that are submitted on a voluntary basis will remain on the portal when mandatory reporting begins in 2026.
The Department of Children, Disability and Equality published its own Gender Pay Gap Report on 20 November 2025. It is available to view on the Department’s website: Department of Children, Disability and Equality’s Gender Pay Gap Report 2025.
ENDS
Notes for Editors
Gender Pay Gap Information Act 2021
The Gender Pay Gap Information Act 2021 introduced the legislative basis for annual gender pay gap reporting in Ireland. Employers are obliged to publish their Gender Pay Gap Report on their website within 5 months of their “snapshot” date in June or make it available to the public in some other manner where they do not have a website.
This obligation will remain in place when reporting via the Gender Pay Gap Portal becomes mandatory in 2026.
The Regulations under the Act require organisations with over 50 employees to report on their gender pay gap across a range of metrics and publish a statement setting out, in the employers’ opinion, the reasons for the gender pay gap in their company and what measures are being taken, or proposed to be taken, to eliminate or reduce that pay gap.
Since the introduction of reporting, the proportion of employers meeting their gender pay gap reporting obligations has steadily risen and now stands at 50%. This figure is expected to rise further the introduction of mandatory reporting on the Gender Pay Gap Portal next year.
The Gender Pay Gap Portal
The Gender Pay Gap Portal opened on 18 November 2025, for employers to register and upload their Gender Pay Gap Reports on a voluntary basis. The link is available on the Department’s webpage [gov.ie/genderpaygap] for employers in scope of the legislation who wish to report on their gender pay gaps through the Portal on a voluntary basis.
Gender Pay Gap reports that are submitted on a voluntary basis will be published and will become accessible for the public to see, compare and review in the coming months.
Relevant employers are already required to publish their Gender Pay Gap Information on their websites in 2025, or to make it available to the public in some other manner where they do not have a website.