Sandi Toksvig, the television presenter, has revealed she is paid less than half of Stephen Fry’s fee for chairing the BBC’s quiz show QI.

The performer, who also presents Channel 4’s Great British Bake Off, was answering a question about her pay from one of the delegates at the Women’s Equality party conference on Saturday in Kettering during a session on economics.

Toksvig, who founded the party with Catherine Mayer in 2015, replied that she believes she is paid 40% of the fee paid to Fry, her predecessor, receiving a figure only equal to regular panellist Alan Davies.

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Mayer said the revelation was greeted with a “huge gasp” from delegates. “People just did not know,” said Mayer. “Sandi has always been clear that this is not about her pay, but she had to answer the question given that the issue of equal pay is at the centre of our party’s policy.”

Toksvig said later that while she loved QI and its “brilliant team” who “champion women”, she had felt obliged to answer the question “because the issues with equal pay and the gender pay gap cut right across the media and all industries and all areas of life”.

She added: “Until now I had held back from talking about this because this is not about me. However, the lack of transparency around pay is a big part of the problem and I hope that being open, I can support women whose work is undervalued.”

Catherine Mayer (@catherine_mayer) HUGE GASP in room at @WEP_UK conference as @sanditoksvig reveals she gets just 40% of what Stephen Fry got for hosting #QI and only the same as Alan Davies. #WE2018 pic.twitter.com/qtZAaDgMHY

In the past the British-Danish star told the Radio Times it would be “absurd” if she did not receive the same salary as Fry for hosting QI. But Toksvig has also argued her pay is not an issue. In an interview on BBC 5 Live in 2016, she said: “I wasn’t concerned about that because it is done through an agent and I am paid by an independent production company, and not the BBC, anyway.”

Toksvig added that only women get asked this question, because of the wider context of women generally being underpaid. She said she suspected Miles Jupp would not have been asked about his pay when he took over hosting BBC radio’s News Quiz, a job Toksvig did for nine years.

Meanwhile, Mayer has revealed that she has settled an age and gender discrimination case against a former employer, Time Inc.

Her lawsuit had pitted one of Britain’s most prominent journalists, who wrote a controversial biography of Prince Charles and was shortlisted for the Orwell prize, against one of America’s most famous magazines. This weekend, as she chaired the panel on inequality in the media, Mayer told the Observer she had reached an “amicable resolution”.

Although she said she couldn’t comment further on the case, Mayer added: “I have never regretted taking action and would like to encourage others who feel they may be the victims of discrimination at least to take legal advice. My case encouraged others to come forward with their stories … We too often suffer in silence when, in fact, other women are going through the same things.”

Filed in a New York court last summer, and first reported by the Observer, Mayer’s lawsuit came at a time of intense focus on inequality in the media on both sides of the Atlantic. In Britain, the publication of BBC salaries unleashed outrage at both gender and race gaps in pay, while in the US, TV giant Fox News was reeling from a series of sexual harassment cases.