9 Protected Characteristics

In the UK, it is illegal to discriminate against someone on the basis of ‘diverse’ characteristics.

The Equality Act 2010 prohibits less favourable treatment on the basis of nine ‘protected characteristics’. These are:

Age
Disability
Ethnicity
Marriage and Civil Partnership
Religion or Belief
Sex
Sexual Orientation
Gender Reassignment
Pregnancy and Maternity

Our survey gathered information on the nine protected characteristics for accredited professional pension trustees at the largest professional pension trustee firms in the UK.

We used this information to provide an average across the professional pension trustee firms (which can be used by individual firms to benchmark themselves against).

We also compared information gathered for professional pension trustees against data provided by TPR on its own workforce, published as part of its Diversity, Equity & Inclusion strategy – which sets out how TPR plans to create: “…a fairer and more inclusive culture across the pensions industry, and work with others to address inequality among savers…"

Other Characteristics →

Other Characteristics

Rather than defining ‘diversity’ itself, TPR adopted the definition used by the PLSA in its 2020 Guide – which encompasses the nine protected characteristics under the Equality Act 2010, but also extends to other individual differences such as socio-economic background.

“…‘diversity’ captures differences which may not be immediately apparent upon meeting someone, for instance, sexual orientation, religion or belief, neurodiversity, socio-economic background and many forms of disability, including mental health conditions...”

PLSA’s 2020 Guide

Whilst in this year’s BWD DE&I survey, we’ve only gathered information on the nine protected characteristics, in future surveys we intend to gather more diversity data to provide a broader picture of diversity across the UK professional pension trustee industry.

What other characteristics should be measured?

Neurodiversity
Socio-economic background
Type of school (comprehension, grammar, private school, etc.)
University attended (e.g. Cambridge, Oxford, etc.)
Geographical location
Diversity Pay Gap
Other (please specify)