Slaughter and May has announced its partner gender pay gap and ethnicity pay gap for the first time.

Male partners at the firm are paid on average 8.9 percent more than their female counterparts, based on figures for the 12 months to the end of April, 2018, the firm announced.

When including all employees, the mean and median pay gap at the elite outfit has remained flat at 14.4 percent and 38.7 percent respectively, compared with 14.3 percent (mean) and 38.5 percent (median) last year.

Meanwhile, the firm's mean ethnicity pay gap for employees stands at 9.7 percent and median at 20.4 percent.

When partners are included in the ethnicity figures, that gap jumps to 51.1 percent (mean) and 19.4 percent (median.)

It is the first year the firm has revealed its data for just partners. Last year, the firm released combined figures for partners and employees and did not announce an ethnicity pay gap.

Slaughter and May executive partner Paul Stacey said in a statement: "We are working hard to maintain and enhance an inclusive culture at the firm, including leading from the top, and continue to look at ways to address our gender pay gap, recognising that it will take time for some of these benefits to come through.

"We have also published information on our ethnicity pay gap for the first time. We see this as an important step in opening up conversations about race in the workplace and working towards businesses reflecting society at large."

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, meanwhile, has also reported its gender and ethnicity pay gaps.

The magic circle firm said 4.2 per cent of its partnership identifies as BAME and registered a 33.4 percent mean ethnicity pay gap for its partners. For the whole firm, including partners, the average ethnicity pay gap stands at 58.3 percent and the median average is 12.2 percent.

The firm says in its report that the gap is due to a lack of senior BAME employees.

The firm's mean gender pay gap, which includes those at partner level, is 57.6 percent, down from 60.4 percent in 2017. The median pay gap has also improved to 18.4 percent, down from 34.1 percent.

For partners alone, the mean pay gap has dropped marginally to 18.3 percent and has risen by 3 percent on last year to 20.6 percent. The firm's partnership is 23 percent female.

The pair are the last of the magic circle firms to announce their figures for the most recent financial year. Linklaters reported a 30.3 percent ethnicity pay gap on a mean basis for the whole firm, including equity partners, for 2018. Of the 83 percent of Linklaters staff that disclosed their ethnicity, 21 percent come from a BAME background.

Allen & Overy, meanwhile, has a 14 percent BAME workforce and reported a 21.6 percent pay gap.

Clifford Chance's mean partnership gender pay gap is 25.9 percent – down from 27.3 percent last year – while the median pay gap dropped to 30.5 percent.

CC's mean ethnicity pay gap is 52 percent, with 8.1 percent of its partners identifying as BAME. About 20 per cent of the firm's total employees identify as such. In the U.K., 2.7 percent of the partnership identifies as LGBT. While no partners reported having a disability, 1.6 percent of all firm employees did so.