As I wrote yesterday, the Conservative Party has opted to voluntarily publish its own gender pay gap figures, though it wasn’t required to by law.

So here it is: ConservativeHome can exclusively reveal that the gender pay gap at CCHQ is 15.7 per cent – in favour of women.

This is calculated using the standard measure – the median difference in hourly pay.

When CCHQ let it be know that it would voluntarily publish this figure, some wondered why it was doing so a day later than the official deadline. Now we know: the number is one they are proud of, in that they believe tells a positive story about putting the Prime Minister’s rhetoric into practice, and therefore they didn’t want it swamped by news of corporate statistics which lean, on average, rather heavily towards men.

**Update**

I originally wrote that regional or area employees of the Party aren’t counted in this number, on the basis that the figure was described as follows: “These figures refer to the Conservative Campaign Headquarters, rather than the Conservative Party as a whole.”

However, I now gather this is incorrect – this figure in fact includes all field and regional staff employed by the Conservative Party, and those in Wales and Scotland. All it excludes is people employed directly by local associations (and Parliamentary staff, who of course work for Parliament, not for a party). This is good news, in that it means the Party is being as transparent and complete in its data as possible.