I’d like to first put this on the record: the Liberal Party supports women. We also support gender equality. A core belief is that we value women and men as co-contributors to the economic and social wellbeing of Australia.
For those who may not remember it was a Coalition Government that enacted the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Act 1999.
Just as we support the basic freedoms society holds dear – freedoms of thought, worship and speech, the need to encourage initiative and personal responsibility, the creation of wealth and competitive enterprise, and the other beliefs that guide our policy agenda; the belief that all people are equal underpins how we on the Conservative side of politics think and the policy decisions we make.
The Liberal Party’s policies are aimed at giving people the skills they need to take charge of their lives and to make educated and properly informed decisions about their careers and their families.
We want to enable women to lead secure lives in safe communities, to further economic independence and stability, and to improve flexibility in working arrangements.
The Minister for the Status of Women’s second reading speech outlines the Government’s reasons for the legislation. She says the Bill will support gender equality and improve workforce participation and flexibility.
This rhetoric is far from reality.
Regrettably, the proposed legislative changes fail to deal with the social, cultural and real world issues needed to drive real change and provide tangible benefits for women. The Bill, in reality, is just more red tape for business.
I want to see improvement in gender equality indicators, like the gender pay gap, which stands at a two-decade high of 17.4 per cent, the percentage of women on ASX 200 boards – which stood at 14.4 per cent in July – and others. And like most, I recognise both the business case for a diverse workforce and the productivity gains to be made by improving womens’ workforce participation rates.
I have sought input from industry representatives on how we can encourage more women into the workforce, and on considering their views, I do not believe the Government’s proposed legislative changes will achieve the desired outcomes the amendments comprise.
As a Senator it is my responsibility to critically and constructively analyse legislation that comes before the Senate to assess whether it will live up to its objectives. What concerns me most about this Bill is the extent and scope of the Minister to exercise her discretion without Parliamentary scrutiny
The Bill is bad law, reliant either on regulations that aren’t yet drafted, or on future Ministerial Directions with many aspects to be defined after the legislation has been passed.
.
The Bill gives the Minister wide powers to specify matters which must be publicly reported on in relation to Gender Equality Indicators. Regrettably because these matters have not yet been determined, nobody knows what these matters could entail – and because they haven’t yet been specified they can’t be the subject of Parliamentary scrutiny or debate before they are made.
It would be irresponsible for any legislator to support legislation which gives the Minister or any future Minister, the power to exercise their Ministerial discretion and do whatever they like – including adding any new matters as they see fit.
That this legislation is no more than a framework which the Minister can use to impose additional obligations on employers, rather than a comprehensive and clearly defined set of measures, cannot be ignored. In its present skeletal form the legislation purely creates uncertainty and provides no incentive for businesses to comply.
In a media release on the Bill, the Minister stated: “Gender inequality is a significant disincentive to women’s workforce participation.”
Gender inequality itself is not a disincentive. It is a symptom of factors like the lack of accessible, affordable and flexible childcare, which the Coalition has promised to further investigate through a Productivity Commission inquiry, to enable us to determine the best and most effective ways to make change.
The Coalition does not see gender equality as a box ticking exercise. When looking at ways to improve gender equality it is vital to also discuss the broader issues. Discussion around those issues – ranging from flexible work arrangements to paid parental leave to division of household work and childcare – is moving away from the margins and into the mainstream and this is in itself will help engender cultural change.
In any discussion it is also important to properly acknowledge parents who stay home to care for their children in the first few years of their lives. The contribution of these mums and dads isn’t adequately publicly recognised, but as the future of the country will eventually be in the hands of our children, investing in them in their early years is crucial and essential but can also be a thankless task.
Treating Paid Parental Leave as an ordinary type of leave and paying it as replacement wage with superannuation, instead of treating it as a welfare payment, is another way the Coalition is working to improve the career disruption that women go through when they have the responsibility of nurturing and bring up children.
I want to see women thrive. I want to see them prosper. And I want to see them achieving this and more, in an environment where they make best the best informed decisions for themselves, and for their families and their careers
But we must acknowledge that men have never had it all either – so many have been absent parents while working long hours to be the primary breadwinner, whether they were too afraid of being penalised by their employers for asking for flexible arrangements, or because the family relied on their wage. We need to move towards a society where women and men can both optimise what is important to them.
The reform of EOWA represented the chance for the Government to do something meaningful to advance gender equality in Australian workplaces by introducing measures to improve flexibility, productivity, and incentives to encourage women back to the workforce after having children. But I am not optimistic that the Government has fully grasped the extent of the issues set out in the KPMG review and consequently the amendments to the EOWA as set out in this Bill will fall short of the mark.
Instead of measures that might make a genuine difference, the Government has drafted a vague piece of legislation which may end up harming business at no gain for Australian families or the pursuit of more fair and equal communities, homes and workplaces.