Counting people and pay: The ministry with one senior Asian manager

By Gill Bonnett of RNZ

Almost a quarter of the 6430 staff at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) are Asian – but only one is in a tier 1-3 leadership position.

And none of the more than 600 Asian people at the 5000-strong Ministry of Justice are managers.

The numbers appear in ministries' annual reports, which also show how much less Asian public sector workers are paid than their colleagues.

Almost a quarter of new recruits to the public sector last year were Asian and they make up 16% of staff. But only 3.3% were in tier 1-3 leadership roles.

“Although recruitment in 2023/24 was lower than the previous five years, Asians made up 23.2% of those recruits, the highest proportion since records began in 2000,” said the Public Service Commission’s annual report, published this month.

“The increase in Asian staff is particularly pronounced in Auckland where Asian staff are 30.2% of public service employees in 2024.”

Ministry of Social Development figures show almost one in five staff members are Asian, but they accounted for only 4% of managers.

The Ministry of Justice workforce includes 13.1% of Asian staff, but 0% in leadership positions.

Department of Conservation results were a stand-out – although Asian staff only accounted for 5% of its workforce, they represented 4% of its tier two and three managers.

“Pacific and Asian senior managers continue to increase slowly but remain under-represented,” said a Public Service Commission report last year on workforce data.

“This under-representation is most notable for Asian staff, and is taking time and deliberate effort to increase, as they are also under-represented at lower levels of management.”

Not all departments and agencies reported the data – some gave information on ethnic pay gaps. And pay gaps for Asian staff compared to their colleagues across the public sector last year rose to 13%, the highest level recorded.

At MBIE, which has almost 2300 of its staff at Immigration New Zealand, the Asian pay gap stood at 18.7% – for Pacific people it was 20%.

“The Asian pay gap has risen, from 12.4% in 2022 to 13.0% in 2023, the highest it has even been since measurement began,” said the Commission report.

“Asian representation in the public service has been growing strongly in recent years and this means an increasing number, and proportion, of Asian employees are new recruits than in the past. This is likely to be counteracting improvements in pay gaps.”

Corrections – which did not report the ethnicity breakdown of its managers – noted that it had lower pay gaps compared with the public service average.

“In 2023/24, the Ministry began hosting Te Kaitaki New Leader of Leaders, an online programme delivered in collaboration with Ara Poutama – Department of Corrections.

This is an eight-month, cross-agency programme designed to develop leadership skills such as strategic and systems thinking, as well as Māori-Crown capability and a unified and inclusive leadership mindset.

In addition, 23 ministry people attended other formal leadership programmes, focusing on emerging Māori and Pacific leaders, and women’s leadership development.

“Pay gaps for Māori, Pacific peoples and Asian people at the ministry are all lower than pay gaps for these groups across the public service: Māori 2.5% for the ministry vs 5.4% for the public service, Pacific peoples 14.2% vs 16.6%, and Asian people 10.4% vs 13%, respectively.”

The Ministry of Health annual report noted: “Pay gaps for European, Māori and Pacific staff have continued to close. However, the Asian pay gap has increased considerably.”

The Public Service Commission does not report an ethnic breakdown of its own managers, but its annual report shows the pay gap for Asian staff there was over 25% last year, coming down to below 20% this year.

Actions being taken

Kia Toipoto is a Public Service Commission plan to reduce gender, Māori, Pacific and ethnic pay gaps in the public service.

From 2021 to 2024, it had three goals:

• Make substantial progress toward closing gender, Māori, Pacific, Asian, Middle Eastern, Latin American, and African and other ethnic pay gaps.
• Accelerate progress for wāhine Māori, Pacific women, and women from ethnic communities.
• Create fairer workplaces for all, including disabled people and members of rainbow communities.

Individual ministries also have their own plans – MBIE’s runs from 2022 to 2027. “We aim to improve ethnicity representation throughout our people leadership cohort, with an emphasis on Māori, Pacific and Asian employees... with a specific target of 5% year on year improvement (at a minimum) until people leadership representation reflects the communities we serve.”

In a statement, Public Service Commission spokesperson Grahame Armstrong said the number of Asian public servants in senior leadership roles had increased since 2018 from 2.2% to 3.3% in 2024.

“The proportion of Asian public servants overall has increased rapidly, from 10.1% in 2018 to 15.9%. This is only slightly short of the 17.3% representation for the population. Our goal is to ensure the public service workforce reflects the makeup of the society we serve.

“The increase in Asian public servants has been primarily those who are early in their careers. With lower salaries, this has had an impact on the efforts to close the Asian pay gap. As these public servants progress in their careers, we would expect this to improve over time.”

He said the public service had stepped up efforts to close ethnic pay gaps through Pou Mātāwaka: the Māori, Pacific, and Ethnic Work Programme.

“This programme focuses on targeted actions aimed at reducing pay gaps and increasing leadership representation, with a focus on enhancing cultural competence, career development and progress for Pacific and ethnic communities.”