Diversity and Inclusion

First Bus

First Rail

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At FirstGroup, we recognise that the success of our business depends on our people. To better understand and meet the needs of the diverse customers and communities we serve, we are committed to increasing the diversity of our workforce.

Creating a culture where everyone can be themselves, thrive, and grow

We value diversity in capabilities, experiences, perspectives, and approaches and are committed to creating a diverse workforce and inclusive culture that is important for both our people and our business to thrive.

We recognise that attracting and retaining people with different backgrounds and experience requires an inclusive culture where everyone feels valued and respected. While we are proud of the progress being made in many areas, we acknowledge there is still more to do to in order to create an inclusive workplace for everyone.

Here, you will discover how our FirstGroup businesses demonstrate their commitment to equity, diversity, and inclusion and how they are working to create an inclusive culture that actively welcomes, promotes, and celebrates diversity.

Our policies

All FirstGroup businesses are committed to a working environment where everyone is treated with dignity and respect, and where a culture of equal opportunity is fostered and nurtured. Our Group Dignity at Work and Group Equal Opportunities and Diversity policies explain our position clearly.

FirstGroup Dignity at Work Policy

FirstGroup Equal Opportunity and Diversity Policy

How we support creating an inclusive workplace

To better understand and meet the needs of the diverse customers and communities we serve, we are committed to increasing the diversity of our workforce. We are proud to have committed to various standards from established external bodies, in order to benchmark ourselves against best practice and challenge ourselves to improve.

FirstGroup is proud to be "Disability Confident Committed" which is a government scheme supporting employers in ensuring disabled people, and those with long term health conditions, can fulfil their potential and realise their aspirations. The Disability Confident scheme supports employers to make the most of the talents disabled people can bring to the workplace. The scheme aims to help employers to successfully recruit and retain disabled people and those with health conditions.

Clear Assured has awarded FirstGroup ‘Bronze’ accreditation status. Clear Assured Bronze Standard is awarded to businesses that have shown that diversity and inclusion are reflected across all policies and processes. It also marks a move beyond compliance towards a cultural shift where diversity and inclusion is well on the way to becoming embedded in the day-to-day experiences of colleagues.

Avanti West Coast, Great Western Railway, South Western Railway, and Lumo have signed the Women in Rail and The Railway Industry Association’s Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Charter. Signatories are committed to championing equality, diversity and inclusion in the rail industry, in order to produce a more balanced and fairer high-performing sector.

Great Western Railway holds the highly sought after Investors in People Gold status. It is granted to organisations that demonstrate a clear commitment to the people who make up an organisation. This external standard reflects the very latest workplace trends and confirms what we believe - GWR is a great place to work.

We pay a fair wage reflecting local market demands and conditions. Avanti, GWR, SWR, and First Tram Operations pay the Real Living Wage to employees in accordance with the Living Wage Foundation rates of pay, and similarly all First Bus employees are paid at or over the Real Living Wage. In addition, First Tram Operations is an accredited Living Wage Employer, paying third party contractors working directly for them Living Wage Foundation rates of pay.

South Western Railway has been awarded a silver accreditation in the Inclusive Employers Standard. Inclusive Employers is the leading membership organisation for prioritising inclusion in the workplace. The accreditation recognises the progress made since the launch of SWR’s first inclusion and diversity strategy in 2021.

Governance

We have established two separate bodies to help us drive our equality, diversity and inclusion (ED&I) agenda. Internally we have an ED&I working group where we share learnings across the business and develop strategy. Within this group we are also setting ED&I targets, for all of our operating companies, and are using strategic workforce planning to help us achieve them. Our aspiration is to have half of all the roles we recruit for, to be filled by women. We also aspire to be representative of the communities we serve from an ethnicity perspective, including within our senior management populations. We are also reviewing additional internal targets around specific roles to help us make positive progress against our respective pay gaps.

Gender and Ethnicity Pay Gap

We recognise the importance data brings in driving progress on our ED&I programmes and we are working hard to encourage our employees to share their personal information with us. First Bus have been conducting a census that is enabling them to get a more accurate view of their workforce. Across the whole of FirstGroup, at the end of FY 2023 we now have over 70% of our employees who have shared their ethnicity with us, compared to 51% two years ago. We have also started to ask for more detailed disability information from our colleagues to better understand their requirements and to be able to better accommodate their needs.

Transparency in our approach is important to us. We are already signatories to Change the Race Ratio, First Bus are now signatories to the Business in the Community Race at Work Charter, and we voluntarily publish our ethnicity pay gap annually.

FirstGroup Gender and Ethnicity Pay Gap Report

Development programmes

‘Step Up’/’Step Forward’ and ‘Reach Up’/ ‘Reach Forward’ programmes continue to make a significant contribution in our drive to promote better gender and ethnic minority representation across our senior and middle management populations. You can learn more about this and our other development programmes on our careers website:

FirstGroup Development

Attraction and recruitment

We have been making steady progress on attracting and hiring more women and employees from ethnically diverse backgrounds into the business. For the roles advertised over FY 2023, we have again increased the proportion of applications from women and ethnic diverse backgrounds and from those hired, 21.6% were women and 20.6% were from an ethnically diverse background.

Employee directors

FirstGroup has had an Employee Director on its Board since 1996 and on the majority of its UK operating companies’ boards since the founding of the Company. The Group Employee Director (GED) is also a member of the Responsible Business Committee and regularly attends the meetings of the Remuneration Committee and the Audit Committee.

The role and responsibilities of the Group Employee Director are described in our Annual Report. The GED chairs the Employee Directors’ forum which currently comprises 14 Employee Directors, all of whom have been nominated through employee elections in their respective operating companies.

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