Burnet continues to reduce gender pay gap in 2024-2025
Reducing the gender pay gap has been a long-term focus for Burnet Institute. View our progress below.
2024–2025 progress
3 March 2026. Our full 2025–25 progress report is now available on the WGEA website. View Burnet's results, or read a summary below.
23 February 2026. The results from the 2024–25 reporting year show steady progress. It reflects our sustained effort and growing capability to understand and address pay equity across the organisation.
This is a summary of our results. Our full report will be available from 3 March 2026 on the WGEA website.
What the data shows
Burnet’s 2024–25 gender pay gap results for our Australian, Melbourne-based workforce show continued improvement across all key measures.
Since 2022–23, the average total remuneration gender pay gap has reduced from 17.5% to 10.6%. This was a reduction of almost seven percentage points over three years.
Over the same period, the median total remuneration gap has shifted from 11.5% in favour of men to –2.4%. This means women now earn slightly more than men for total remuneration.
There has also been progress in base salaries. The average base salary gap narrowed from 13.8% in 2022–23 to 10.8% in 2024–25. The median base salary gap has remained low, reducing from 4.4% to 3.5% over the same period.
Overall, these results show a clear downward trend across all gender pay gap measures and mark an important milestone.
What has driven change at Burnet
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Clear policy and ongoing action
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Better pay gap analysis
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Building capability across the Institute
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Stronger diversity data and trust
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Process and structural improvements
Together, these steps help improve consistency and reduce unintended inequities.
We recognise that closing the gender pay gap takes time and ongoing effort, and progress is not always linear.
We remain committed to transparent reporting, strong governance and continuous improvement, recognising that building equitable systems is essential to achieving fair outcomes for all staff.
2023–2024 progress
24 February 2025. We are proud of the progress we have made in reducing our median total remuneration gender pay gap in the past year, from 11.5% in 2022‐23, to 2% in 2023‐24.
But we recognise that further work is needed to close this gap entirely.
In 2024, we undertook our first comprehensive intersectional pay gap analysis to gain deeper insights into disparities beyond gender. This analysis explored a range of factors, including gender identities beyond the binary, tenure, seniority disability and more. This comprehensive analysis will be conducted every two years. We are also developing our first Gender Equity Action Plan, which will identify practical steps to improve equity and inclusion.
The action plan is designed to tackle a broad range of factors, ensuring our interventions are as effective and inclusive as possible.
It demonstrates our long‐term commitment to creating a fair, equitable and inclusive workplace.
Through continuous monitoring, refinement, and innovation, we strive to address pay disparities and ensure all staff feel valued and supported.
Read Burnet’s full Gender Pay Gap report on the WGEA website by searching for ‘The Macfarlane Burnet Institute’ under organisation results.
2022–2023 progress
20 February 2024. The 2022‐23 total remuneration gender pay gap in Australia was 21.7 per cent.
Burnet’s 2022‐23 median gender pay gap was 3.6 per for base salary, and 11.5 per cent for total remuneration.
Base salary refers to an employee’s annual earnings before tax in full‐time and full year equivalent amounts. Total remuneration includes base salary, superannuation, loadings and other allowances.
The gender pay gap reflects the difference between the remuneration of women and men across the organisation. It does not represent differences in pay between women and men in the same roles.
We recognise that gender equity is something employers need to improve. Transparency in reporting gender pay gaps is a crucial first step. Research on the impact of reporting gender pay gaps in the UK, where employer pay gaps have been published since 2017, shows it has motivated companies to discuss and prioritise gender equality and to take actions that have narrowed the pay gap between men and women.
At Burnet, we recognise we have some way to go to close our gender pay gap and have developed several policies and initiatives to achieve this, including the creation of a dedicated Gender Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (GEDI) Committee, chaired by Burnet Institute Deputy Director Professor Caroline Homer AO.
Our GEDI Committee is helping drive initiatives across Burnet to address factors contributing to our gender pay gap.
Burnet is committed to continuously evaluating our policies and processes to close the gender pay gap. Progress so far has included:
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Increasing the proportion of women in leadership roles from 41 per cent in 2019 to 55 per cent in 2023
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Increasing the proportion of women at executive level from 38 per cent in 2019 to 45 per cent in 2023
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Increasing superannuation contributions to cover the entire parental leave period (not just the paid portion)
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Removing the primary and secondary carer labels from our parental leave, so that either parent is entitled to 14 weeks of paid parental leave
Our commitment to gender equity
We're committed to meaningful and sustainable progress in gender equity, and to closing the gender pay gap.
As part of this commitment, we publicly report on our gender pay gap and progress every year to the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) in line with the Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012.
While this reporting requirement applies only to our Australian staff, our dedication to improving gender equity for our staff applies across the Institute, including in Myanmar and Papua New Guinea. We are actively working to align practices across all our offices, ensuring a consistent and comprehensive approach to addressing the gender pay gap globally.
We acknowledge that the WGEA gender pay gap report is binary and therefore does not accommodate everyone's identity, particularly those who identify as gender non‐conforming, non‐binary, transgender or genderqueer.
Gender equity, diversity and inclusion
We are committed to creating a workplace and research environment that is inclusive and respectful of all people – regardless of gender, ethnicity, age, ability or sexuality.