Lloyd’s of London said it is making progress in increasing gender and ethnic diversity in the insurance market.
The insurance marketplace, which plays a major role in the marine sector, established a Culture Dashboard to monitor its performance on gender and ethnic employment last year.
Lloyd’s said it has now set a target for the recruitment of ethnic minorities to one-third of new employees.
There is currently 8% ethnic minority representation in the Lloyd’s market, and 22% in Lloyd’s Corp, the company that oversees the marketplace.
“We must be strong in our resolve to address this issue in a meaningful way,” Lloyd’s said in a statement.
Lloyd’s has established Accelerate, a leadership development programme for ethnic minorities. However, Lloyd’s has yet to set an overall target for ethnic diversity in executive positions.
The market said 74% of its insurance firms are now able to provide data on ethnicity, compared to just 43% in 2020.
Beazley, a major marine insurer at Lloyd's, said it had set the target of at least 25% of employees as people of colour, and for 25% of that group to be black.
“A specific target that recognises the serious under representation of black people in insurance,” Beazley said.
The insurer said it wanted to see ethnic diversity equally spread across all of its insurance divisions.
Gender representation
In terms of gender, Lloyd’s said its target of 35% representation at board and executive level had now been met by 28% of firms.
Tokio Marine Kiln, which was hit by sexual harassment allegations in 2019, said it had made significant progress in “improving our culture”, as it tackled diversity through the workplace environment.
The company said there were “historical problem areas”, which some staff believed management were reluctant to take on.
In a separate development, Lloyd's said it has seen a significant upturn in profitability.
In the first half of 2021 Lloyd’s said it made a £1.4bn ($1.9bn) profit, compared to a £400m loss in the same period in the Covid-19-hit market of last year.
Chief executive John Neal said Lloyd's is making progress on profits and cultural diversity.
“Alongside performance, we are making great strides on all our strategic priorities which focus on improving the culture in the market, the Future at Lloyd’s digital transformation, and sustainability, climate and inclusion which underpin our purpose,” he said.
