Promoting a culture of ethics and compliance
Our Code of Ethical Conduct is built on six main pillars: equity, transparency, dedication to health, integrity, compliance and speaking up.
These exacting standards guide all our work from research and development through to marketing, and ensure our patients remain our central focus.
Find all the most recent Gender Pay Gap Reports for all of Ipsen UK here.
Gender Pay Gap Report 2022
Click here to view our latest Gender Pay Gap Report
Gender Pay Gap Report 2021
Click here to view our latest Gender Pay Gap Report
Gender Pay Gap Report 2020
Click here to view our latest Gender Pay Gap Report
IPSEN UK TAX STRATEGY AND GOVERNANCE STATEMENT
FOR THE FINANCIAL YEAR ENDING 31 DECEMBER 2022
Ipsen UK comprises the UK subsidiary companies of the Ipsen SA group (“the Group”), which is based in France; namely Ipsen Developments Limited and its subsidiaries, Ipsen Biopharm Limited, Ipsen Bioinnovation Limited and Sterix Limited, and Ipsen Limited, a fellow UK subsidiary of the Group. In making this tax strategy available, Ipsen UK is fulfilling its responsibilities under paragraph 16(2) of Schedule 19 FA2016 for the year ended 31 December 2022.
The tax affairs of Ipsen UK are managed in a manner that is consistent with the Group’s policy, to conduct business lawfully and ethically. The Ipsen SA group’s Code for Ethical conduct requires the maintenance of accurate and reliable financial records, and the tax approach aligns to that code.
How we manage tax risk
The tax affairs of Ipsen UK are managed in accordance with the Ipsen Group’s Internal control and Tax Management Policies. The UK Head of Tax has overall control and responsibility for the UK tax position and reports directly to the Group’s Vice President of Tax, who in turn reports directly to the Ipsen Group CFO.
Tax issues and risks are closely monitored at both UK level and Group level, and an annual report on the management of the Group’s tax affairs, including any UK issues arising, is prepared for the Group’s Audit Committee. In addition, external tax advisers provide specific tax advice and regular updates regarding upcoming changes to UK tax legislation to enable the UK companies to anticipate and plan for any potential impact on the tax risks.
Our attitude to tax planning
Ipsen UK’s approach is to pay the correct and fair amount of tax to minimise the risk of uncertainty or disputes. Where available, legitimate tax incentives (for example, R&D tax credits) or exemptions provided by HMRC are implemented to support the development of the UK businesses and any tax planning is based on commercial business activity. Transactions between group companies are on an arm’s-length basis and in accordance with OECD principles. Ipsen UK does not engage in artificial tax arrangements.
Our tax risks
Ipsen UK seeks to comply fully with the UK tax regulations and actively manages its affairs to minimise the risk of non-compliance by ensuring that tax returns and payments are made on time with proper disclosure made to the tax authorities. For areas of uncertainty, Ipsen UK will seek specific tax advice from external tax advisers or will seek clearance from HMRC, where necessary.
Our relationship with the tax authorities
Ipsen UK works with the support of its tax advisers to ensure that all compliance obligations are met and the correct amount of tax paid. Aligned to the Code for Ethical Conduct, we seek to operate an honest and transparent relationship with HMRC, providing the necessary disclosure required to allow HMRC to understand the operations and tax risk profile of Ipsen UK.
FOR IPSEN UK COMPANIES: IPSEN LIMITED (COMPANY NUMBER 06751069) AND IPSEN BIOPHARM LIMITED (COMPANY NUMBER 01653765)
1. OVERVIEW
The board of directors of the Company, both individually and collectively, believe they have acted in good faith, in a way that would most likely promote the success of the company for the benefit of its shareholders as a whole, whilst having regard to the stakeholders and matters set out in section 172(1)(a-f) of the Act for all decisions taken during the year ended 31 December 2021.
The board fulfils their duties partly through a governance framework that delegates day-to-day decision making to employees who make up committees of the company. Tasks were assigned to the UK & Ireland Sites Steering Committee, Leadership Teams, Chairman of the Board, the Directors, Finance Director and Company Secretary as appropriate to their functions.
Our mission, strategy and consideration of the consequences of long-term sustainability of the business
As a dynamic and growing global specialty-driven biopharmaceutical company committed to improving people’s lives through innovative medicines in oncology, neuroscience and rare diseases. Our strong position in Specialty Care provides the scale, expertise and stability to make a sustainable difference for people in a quickly evolving healthcare environment.
2.EMPLOYEE AND STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT
EMPLOYEE ENGAGMENT
Our mission is to attract, retain, and develop our people to ensure we have the right talents for the right roles now and in the future. We are committed to creating and supporting a collaborative, diverse, and inclusive work environment to drive innovation and achieve our company’s core mission of improving patients’ lives. We are dedicated to fostering a culture of trust and feedback based on our Ipsen Way of Being and Code of Conduct to empower employees to act in the best interests of the Company and its stakeholders.
We operate an annual objective setting process, annual talent reviews and an annual year end performance review process. We also ensure each employee has a robust development plan in place to ensure ongoing personal and professional development.
MEETINGS
We hold three cycle meetings each year with Company employees as well as regular Town Hall and “join the chat” events where employees had the opportunity to understand local and Group performance, engage with senior leaders and collaborate cross functionally. We also hold “Ipsen Live” events each quarter, which are hosted by our CEO and Executive Leadership Team. All Ipsen employees globally are invited to attend to hear more about company updates, strategic plans and have the opportunity to ask questions.
EMPLOYEE ENGAGMENT SURVEY
In 2021, all employees were invited to take part in an Employee Engagement Survey, with the aim of ensuring each employee had an opportunity to provide feedback via an anonymized survey and to offer line managers a clear understanding of the level of engagement across the company and also for their specific division. An action plan is now underway in response to the results and six-monthly pulse surveys will continue to monitor progress.
GREAT PLACE TO WORK (GPTW)
In 2021, our Slough, Milton Park and Wrexham sites all individually entered the GPTW assessment to gain insights into levels of employee engagement against other accredited Great Workplaces and to build a greater understanding of our culture at Ipsen. Slough and Milton Park were certified as Great Places to Work in 2021, with Slough being awarded two additional certifications:
- Best Workplace for 2022
- Best Workplace for Wellbeing for 2022
Each site has signed up to enter the GPTW assessment again for 2022, 2023 and 2024.
COVID-19
Ipsen operates a COVID safe environment at all our sites. We comply with regulations, but also protect our staff so far as reasonably practicable to prevent exposure to COVID. In order to support colleagues throughout the pandemic Ipsen offered online resources such as mind gym webinars, virtual yoga, meditation, employee assistant programme and Doctor at Hand. All employees were encouraged to take time out and book annual leave. Employees were encouraged to have shorter calls and breaks in between the calls. Ipsen also promoted keeping fit through the Ipsen in Motion programme and the United Heroes App. Ipsen offered flexible working hours to accommodate domestic requirements. Post-
pandemic, we now have a Hybrid Work Model in place to enable employees to work together in person on-site, at customer meetings, team meetings, congresses, etc for part of the week, and then work from home for the remainder of their working week. We have a Hybrid Work policy in place to provide guidance and ensure that each employee has opportunities to collaborate, learn from others and innovate together.
MENTAL HEALTH AND WELLBEING
Since 2020, we have ensured that each of our UK and Ireland sites have a team of Mental Health Ambassadors, which is complemented by our 24/7 Employee Assistance Programme, Private Medical Insurance, a Wellbeing hub within our online benefits portal and Doctor at Hand. In 2021, we introduced a new monthly Wellbeing Allowance, which is paid to all Ipsen employees across the UK and Ireland in their monthly pay, so that each person can invest in their physical and mental health. We also offer on-site yoga, reiki, wellbeing days, etc, which are all funded by Ipsen.
LEARNING & DEVELOPMENT
Ipsen fosters a culture of learning and development, through our corporate values (“We Learn and Share Everyday”) and by implementing the 70:20:10 model of development: each employee is encouraged to have an annual Development discussion and create a plan with their line manager, which is then documented in our HRIS system. In 2022, we have encouraged and enabled greater internal mobility, provided new short term assignment opportunities, re-launched our mentoring programme and continued to offer a broad range of training programmes, which covered topics such as product training, remote customer engagement, Insights Discovery profiling and workshops focused on creating high performing teams. At a division and country level, succession planning and talent management discussions are held throughout the organisation to maximise development and internal mobility. During May and June, we also head a “Career Month”, to support personal and professional career growth.
PEOPLE POLICIES
At Ipsen, we care about our people and want to support our employees when they need it most, including helping our managers to support their teams with issues that may affect their work. Our People Policies are one of the most important ways in which we do this and we have implemented the following changes:
- In 2019, Paternity leave was increased from 2 weeks to up to 6 weeks full pay
- In January 2022, we introduced a new Wellness Allowance policy
- In May 2022, we introduced a new Holiday Trading policy
- In June 2022, we introduced a New Menopause policy
- We have a Volunteering policy, allowing each employee to take one day per year to work with a charity of their choice, whilst receiving full pay
- All parental leave policies have been updated to ensure they are fully LGBTQ+ inclusive
- By the end of the year, we will have reviewed all of our other HR policies to ensure the same
Throughout 2022, we will continue to review and update our People Policies to make sure they are inclusive, promote well-being, are in line with external developments and properly support our employees and our business to focus together for patients and society.
WHISTLEBLOWING POLICY
The Company is committed to the highest ethical culture and compliance standards, consequently, the business expects employees to act according to the same standards. The Company has a whistleblowing policy encouraging employees to speak up and report behaviour that does not comply with the Company’s Code of Conduct, ethical principles and/or legal obligations.
DATA PRIVACY
We have a dedicated Data Privacy Manager for the UK and Ireland, who provides guidance, information and templates to support data privacy issues, and also sends out periodic data privacy updates to ensure employees are kept fully informed on regulations and changes. To ensure that employees are aware of the importance of data protection, we also offer training modules for all employees through online and face-to-face trainings, which are adapted to different functions of the business.
GENDER PAY GAP
In 2021, our median pay gap of 4.6% has improved this year whereas our median bonus gap has slightly increased compared to 2020. We continue to work on diversity of background, experience and thinking at all levels of the organisation which we need. For example, in 2021 we launched several projects to:
- Ensure that our employees are paid in a fair and equitable manner, whatever their gender
- Ensure that all have the same career opportunities at Ipsen
- Avoid any bias all along the Ipsen career of the employee
DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION
We continue to work on diversity of background, experience and thinking at all levels of the organisation which we need to best serve our customers and patients. In 2021 we have:
- Re-launched the global mentoring programme and continued our UK and Ireland mentoring retreat, to ensure female talent at all levels of the organisation are supported in their career development
- Created a new UK and Ireland inclusion forum, which has been put in place to increase awareness and understanding of different diversity groups, and engage employees to create more inclusive working environments within the UK & Ireland
- Defined a meaningful and robust diversity, equity and inclusion roadmap for 2021/2022, which covers 4 main pillars: Organisational culture, Talent attraction and recruitment, Career progression and retention, and also Surveying and measurement.
We also continue to create new people policies and update existing policies to ensure they are fully inclusive.
IR35
The UK & Ireland Sites Steering Committee, an Executive Committee considered the financial and Human Resources implications of IR35 for 2020 onwards and the business impact of this legislation has been fully assessed and managed. Since the new ‘off payroll’ rules were introduced in April 2021, we now manage IR35 on a “business as usual” basis with external contractors and relevant employment agencies.
3. STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT
Our ability to respond to stakeholders’ expectations is a measure of our credibility and sustainability.
The Company has a transparent and regular dialogue with its stakeholders including shareholders, payors, patients and healthcare professionals, suppliers, regulatory authorities and agencies, local communities and the media in order to provide reliable and factual information, to pursue a constructive dialogue, develop partnerships, support patient associations with the ultimate goal of providing differentiated and innovative solutions that improve patients’ lives.
PATIENTS AND HEALTH CARE PROFESSIONALS
Ipsen maintained the highest standards in terms of safety and quality to all our products. Responsibly engaging with patients and patient organisations to ensure that we can properly understand their requirements and manage our supply chain to safeguard medicine supply.
SHAREHOLDERS
The board of directors understand the importance of continued relationship with shareholders, it is important to us that our shareholders understand that our strategy and objectives are aligned with the Ipsen global group (the “Group”) and there is a consistent and ongoing dialogue between the Company and the Group.
ENVIRONMENT AND THE COMMUNITY
The Company is committed to protecting the environment and minimizing our impact on it by making our business activities safe and sustainable. The effectiveness of our program is independently verified through the Ipsen Group certification to the international standard ISO14001:2015 – Environmental management systems. The Milton Park facility joined the group certification in 2021.
Biodiversity surveys were extended to the Wrexham and Dublin manufacturing sites. Species data from these and previous surveys is monitored in a new database containing all wild fauna and flora recorded. The UN International Day for Biological Diversity in May was celebrated across Ipsen with a range of activities including local habitat creation and enhancement (nest boxes, ‘bug hotels’, tree planting, wildflower planting), employee community day activities such as partnerships with external conservation organizations and litter picking. Employee awareness was also enhanced through employee engagement activities (children drawing competitions, involvement in habitat creation on site, pledges and commitments). The Milton Park facility hosted, regenerative farmer, wildlife photographer and inspirational speaker, Rebecca Hosking, who was invited to speak on site, and online across the Group, about the criticality of biodiversity, its decline and what every individual can do to protect it.
Ipsen is committed to science-based reductions in our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, sufficiently ambitious to help keep global warming to 1.5oC as called for in the Paris climate agreement. By joining the Business Ambition for 1.5oC campaign in 2021, Ipsen has also committed to reach net-zero value chain GHG emissions by 2050.
Ipsen UK’s electricity is supplied from renewable sources, lowering our overall carbon footprint. HVAC (Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) is the most significant energy user at manufacturing sites. Projects are already in progress at all sites to reduce HVAC emissions across non-GMP areas. A recent HVAC replacement project at Slough with new AHU commissioned beginning of 2021 has resulted in the total energy consumption reducing by 29% in 2021 compared to 2020 (- 250,000 kWh gas + electricity). Ipsen is working with industry leading experts at the Wrexham site to develop an extensive list of projects that can be implemented to reduce our overall gas consumption and to reduce our carbon intensity. This has resulted in the installation of air conditioning auto control temperature/movement sensors, installation of 6 lean burn gas boilers and the replacement and upgrade of two chiller units. All our sites are also committed to reducing their gas energy consumption, considering heat recovery projects or boilers efficiency programs. The Wrexham site has recruited a contracted Energy Manager to reinforce this commitment.
The Group ‘Fleet for Future’ project was also launched in 2021. This project will significantly reduce fleet energy intensity and define Ipsen’s fleet energy mix transition to low carbon alternatives. Ipsen has identified the opportunity to have 30% of the Group fleet transitioned to electric vehicles by 2025.
SUPPLIERS
The Company worked in close collaboration with a wide range of suppliers whose services and goods are critical to the performance of the Company and quality of its products. As part of the Ethics and Compliance programme, we operate an independently managed, risk-based approach to interactions with third party suppliers. This includes due diligence, background checks and investigations into adverse media. Where risk is identified we look further into the supplier to establish what compliance practices they have adopted including their code of ethics, how they deal with concerns that are raised and human rights and labour laws. Where required, we provide training and education on our compliance and anti-corruption requirements. Due diligence also identifies sanctions against individuals associated with the supplier.
REGULATORS
All quality processes are documented in a formal Quality Management System (QMS) that insures full traceability on every batch of product. The QMS also assures that the processes are reproducible and allows teams to demonstrate this by means of the comprehensive internal audit. There is an established, documented, implemented and maintenance of effective QMS in accordance with the appropriate requirement of regulations, standards and directives. Subject to periodic inspections by regulatory bodies with which we fully cooperate.
GOVERNMENT AND PAYORS
The board has an established public affairs function, the Head of which also heads the UK & Ireland Sites Steering Committee (which the board of directors are members of), ensuring that Government and Payor engagement is considered by the board and its committees.
On behalf of the board
A Visciglio – Director
12th September 2022
CRSC-GB-000058
June 2023