Targets to eliminate the gender pay gap must be set by all companies, Britain’s equality watchdog has suggested.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission called for a new law obliging employers to publish plans for tackling wage disparities, after finding only one in five had drawn any up.

Currently, legislation requires organisations with more than 250 employees to report details of its gender pay gap once a year - but not the action being taken to address it.

It is feared without additional legal clout the reporting laws will not help narrow the gulf between men and women.

A study of 440 employers was carried out by the EHRC, including 40 FTSE 350 organisations and others from sectors such as finance, manufacturing and the arts.

Just 11% had set pay gap targets for themselves each year, which would allow them to measure progress over time, it was found.

Goals for one company included increasing the number of female staff earning more than £40,000 a year to at least 25% by 2025.

Around half of the employers examined produced an accompanying narrative to their figures, but many of these “contained very little detail or clear commitments to future action”, said the EHRC.