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Below are some of the key questions we answered in our daily #WAgenda this morning, sent to our subscribers before they sipped their first coffee.
Our newsletter’s where we share our best stories, and where we announce the day’s ‘Agenda Setter’, the woman driving conversations that day.
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Who’s the new Senate powerbroker?
Say it isn’t so!
Pauline Hanson has become a Senate powerbroker after snagging a fourth seat, confirmed yesterday. The One Nation Party now holds two seats in Queensland, one in New South Wales and one that had been previously confirmed in Western Australia. It gives the party greater power than Nick Xenophon’s team, who picked up only three seats in South Australia following the July 2 election.
Want to know what our colourful new Senate looks like? Take a peek:
Coalition 30, Labor 26, Greens 9, One Nation 4, Nick Xenophon Team 3, Jacqui Lambie 1 Derryn Hinch 1, Mr Leyonhjelm 1 and Bob Day 1
Poor Malcolm’s got a rough road ahead with such a mixed bag of lollipops in the upper house. Bit of regret, perhaps?
Is Australia failing in its support of domestic violence victims?
Aside from the emotional and psychological barriers that stand in the way of women reporting acts of domestic violence, it seems the government is failing to sufficiently alleviate their financial burdens too.
Legal aid services are pushing the Australian government for an additional $200 million funding boost, to support victims who are struggling to pay for legal advice, with National Legal Aid chairwoman, Susan Cox arguing that the current Commonwealth means testing is grossly inadequate. According to Cox, legal aid centres across the country are seeing high numbers of low-income victims grappling with complex legal disputes:
“These people are very vulnerable and they’re often confronted by a very daunting legal system as well as an overly restrictive legal aid means test and that stems from inadequate Commonwealth funding.”
Recent awareness campaigns have led to an increase in women coming forward and reporting incidents of domestic violence. Let’s hope the government encourages this, by better funding the resources and support required in the aftermath.
Has Apple solved its gender gap?
Apple’s latest diversity report includes a massive achievement for the company– the gender pay gap no longer exists! Female employees are now getting paid the same as men for doing the same work.
“We’ve achieved pay equity in the United States for similar roles and performance. Women earn one dollar for every dollar male employees earn. And underrepresented minorities earn one dollar for every dollar white employees earn.”
There’s a long way to go for Apple however. The company is still disproportionately dominated by male employees– 68% to 32% female, and men hold 72% of all leadership positions.
Although we’re pleased the company is making positive strides we hope they combat their other dismal statistics soon.
Should we be sending out daughters to all-girls schools?
Well, maybe.
A recent study released by Melbourne University compared academic results and attitudes among boys and girls at both co-ed and single-sex schools, with a particular focus on the area of maths.
At co-ed schools year four boys were slightly more confident in maths than the girls, but by year eight, the confidence gap had increased tenfold with top male students proving far more confident than their female counterparts.
By contrast, girls who attended single-sex schools were far more confident in their abilities. The paper’s author Dr. Chris Ryan said that the results confirmed that negative attitudes to maths were not “intrinsic” for female students, but were rather a product of co-ed environments.
He also speculated whether teachers at co-ed schools were unconsciously favouring boys in maths classes.
