Dear Mr Turnbull,
You’ve got what you wanted. You may not have won the majority government you wanted and expected, but you’ve been elected as Australia’s 30th Prime Minister.
In June 2016 you declared yourself a feminist. It’s an easy enough statement to make, and now you need to back it up.
Some Australians are still waiting on the “real” Malcolm Turnbull – to find out if he’s any different. Now you’ve been elected by the Australian people – Mr Turnbull. Now is your chance to put your money where your mouth is.
If you are a feminist, Mr Turnbull, you will stand up for women’s leadership in your government.
A feminist-led government should be headed by a gender-balanced cabinet.
Given only 12 of the Coalition’s 74 confirmed seats are held by women, equal representation for women is sadly impossible. If you are a feminist Mr Turnbull, as the leader of your party, you have the power to ensure increased opportunities for women as representatives and leaders in your party. However, we still expect that, as a feminist, you will commit to increasing the number of women in your cabinet from the mere six you named after taking over from Tony Abbott.
If you want to promote gender equality, you must lead by example. And it’s not impossible. Justin Trudeau, who has embraced feminism in Canada, named a ministerial team with an equal number of women and men last year when he came to power. Is it too much to ask you to follow in the footsteps of our North Atlantic friends?
If you are a feminist, Mr Turnbull, you will start putting women and their communities first, and not big businesses.
The Australian public is robbed of up to $30 billion in tax revenue every year by tax dodging corporates. You took baby steps with your latest budget to implement measures to stop multinational tax avoidance, but you need to do far more.
Instead, you turned your back on communities and offered corporate businesses a handout of $48 billion through a tax-cut that you claim will boost our economy based on failed trickle-down economics. What’s worse is that 40% of that money will end up offshore.
This is money that should be going back to the Australian public, and particularly women, not multinational corporations.
If you are a feminist, Mr Turnbull, you will commit to funding public services that protect women and their rights in Australia.
You called domestic violence a “national disgrace”. Rightly so – it is Australia’s biggest killer. Horrifyingly, one Australian woman is killed every week by her partner.
Yet while thousands of women are turned away from women’s refuges and community legal centres, you are spending $50 billion on submarines. That’s $50 billion that should be going to essential public services – from the most basic, like street lighting and public transport, to hospitals, schools and legal services that would help to save the lives of hundreds of Australian women.
This, however, still leaves the women most in need of the support that we owe as Australians – our neighbours. Our sisters in low-income communities in countries like Bangladesh, Myanmar and the Pacific.
If you truly are a feminist, Mr Turnbull, you will reverse the devastating cuts that your government has made to the Australian foreign aid budget. If you are a feminist, you will ensure that Australia fulfils its very reasonable commitment of 0.7% of GNI to overseas aid as the UK has done.
Australian aid supports women in low-income communities to stand up for their rights and make change happen.
All around the world, humanitarian disasters are increasing in scale and frequency, largely as a result of global warming caused by the rapid industrialisation of countries like Australia. When disasters strike, its women who suffer the most. Not only because of pre-existing gender inequality, but also because women almost always take up roles as caregivers and first-responders in disasters.
This also makes women the key to ensuring the resilience of our neighbours.
Empowering women at home and abroad is not only the right thing to do, it benefits everyone.
Mr Turnbull, if you are a feminist, here is your chance to stand up for women and their rights.
Archie Law is the Executive Director at ActionAid Australia.
ActionAid Australia is a global justice organisation working to empower women to challenge injustice and inequality and claim their human rights.