APG, which administers the giant Dutch civil service pension fund ABP,  is to increase the pay of 125 female workers to bring them into line with their male colleagues.

‘We support the principle of equal pay for equal work and we are dealing with it today,’ HR director Marloes Sengers said. ‘In addition, we are taking measures to rule out unequal pay in the future, both financially and as a matter of policy.’

APG has a workforce of some 3,000, of whom around one third are female. The women who will get a pay rise were earning some 2.2% less than their male colleagues with the same jobs and length of service.

There was no difference in the pay rates of the remaining female staff.