The creative industries were notably absent from this year’s Social Mobility Employer Index, making up only a tiny proportion of private sector entrants.
While law firms and banks dominated entry to the index, PR, marketing, publishing and broadcasting firms accounted for less than 5%.
The statistics come from 143 organisations entered in the index this year, representing over one million employees within the UK.
Out of those figures, only one or two in each of the marketing, PR, publishing and broadcasting sectors attempted to achieve the benchmark, and not one in marketing, PR or publishing made the top 75 list.
ITV was the only private company from the creative industries that appeared in the top 75, and was placed in the 61st position for social mobility.
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The BBC – which is categorised as a public sector organisation rather than within the creative industries – was ranked joint 31st while communications regulator Ofcom came joint 44th.
Yet, in contrast to the creative industries, more than 50 law firms both participated and dominated the Index’s top 75,
Spurred on by the Solicitors Regulation Authority – which requires firms to collect and publish socioeconomic background data at least every two years – the sector demonstrated its commitment to, social mobility, widening its talent pool and making work fairer.
The data from the Index follows in the wake of government research that creative industries still use unpaid internships, unpaid overtime, hire through social connection, have low pay at the start of a career and fail to measure social mobility progress.
“With the Government announcing this summer that it plans to grow the creative industries by £50bn and support a million more jobs by 2030, the industry needs to attract new talent,” Social Mobility Foundation CEO Sarah Atkinson.
“It must start by ending the practice of unpaid internships and hiring people for what they know not who they know.”
“If the creative industries don’t prioritise class inclusivity they’ll lose out on exceptional talent,” added WEIGHT. Films founder and freelance director, Michael J Diamond.
“Content still lacks authentic voices; audiences don’t feel represented and there’s less understanding of what the public wants to see because decision-makers aren’t from diverse backgrounds.
“The creative industries need to step up by supporting young working-class people early on in their journeys instead of expecting marginalised talent to work for free.”
Last year, the social mobility foundation released a Halloween campaign to raise awareness of the ‘horrors’ or workplace classism.
