POL201

Matias Dominguez (42494915)

The State of Gender Equality in Australia on international Womens Day: What more
needs to happen?

This is a speech made by Elizabeth Broderick, who was the Australian Sex Discrimination
Commissioner from 2007 to 2015. As the title indicates, the speech is delivered to commemorate the
100th anniversary of International Womens Day on 2011. Elizabeth Brodericks speech deals primarily
with gender inequality in terms of pay equity, womens leadership (in corporate environments) and
violence against women. The inequality that women of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander origin face
is also discussed in length.
To understand Ms. Brodericks eloquent speech, we must first understand the times in which it was
delivered. As Ms. Broderick states, the Australian Government had just released the National Plan to
Reduce Violence against Women and their Children, which endorsed all states in Australia. This was
seen as a huge leap forward in preventing and raising awareness on gender violence. According to
the Department of Social Services, In Australia, around one in three women has experienced physical
violence, and almost one in five has experienced sexual violence since the age of 15 and there was
an increasing trend in the later years. The National Plans visions are that: Australian women and
their children live free from violence in safe communities & A significant and sustained
reduction in violence against women and their children.
The speech starts by remembering the struggles and history of womens advancement towards a new
equilibrium, where women were treated fairly, or rather not treated unfairly based on gender, but
instead on merit and equal opportunities. One of the issues she addresses which I found astonishing
is the fact that in 1965, women won the right to drink in a public bar. This is a great example which
describes the clear inequality which women faced in those times, and today it would seem as this was
the case maybe hundreds of years ago, not 50.
In terms of pay equity, she describes how in the previous years of 2011, the gender gap in pay had
actually widened to 17 per cent, and even more so in the corporate environment of ASX200 where
she says the key management personnel, the pay gap increases to 28.3%. This is obviously seen as
a way of marginalising women, as she states most workplaces operate with a view that people that
are paid more, matter more making women be perceived to be less valuable to a company. However
the Australian Services Unions test case was implemented that year which aims to lessen the pay
gap in female-dominated community sector workers.

Elizabeth Broderick goes onto mention the lack of female representatives in directorial and
managerial positions in the workplace. She alludes to the fact that from 2002 to 2010 we increased
the number of women on the top 200 boardrooms by only 0.2%. This is synonymous to close to no
change at all, and while also raising the awareness of gender inequality in the workplace, it also goes
hand in hand with the problem of misallocating talents and misuse of resources, which in itself is a
huge problem to any functioning society. Despite the almost motionless activity in boardrooms in
terms of gender composition, Ms. Broderick finishes in a positive note saying that since the previous
year there has been an almost 600% uplift in the number of women appointed to ASX boards,
comprising now 11% of board directorships on ASX200 companies.
The final issue, and most important in my opinion, which Ms. Broderick raises is the insufficient
progress in the areas of family and domestic violence. One of the most neglected groups in terms of
progress and rights, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women; she expresses the fact that they
are 45 times more likely to be a victim of abuse/domestic violence than non-indigenous women. This
is an area which I feel is imperative in focusing our efforts to alleviate the situation of these women as
they are most often than not very heavily under-represented in the socio-political spectrum. Another
fascinating point she makes is the fact that almost two thirds of women who experience domestic and
family violence are in paid work, which without a doubt would affect their work performance or work
history. This is a problem which branches out towards every aspect of the womans life, and should
not be ignored because we dont see it. As Elizabeth Broderick states, Women who experience it
are more likely to have disrupted work history, to have to change jobs and work in casual and part
time work, than women with no experience of violence which gives the feeling that this kind of
behaviour would turn into a continual downward spiral.
To finish with the speech, Ms. Broderick states that although the womens movement has experienced
many hardships and challenges in the past, there is definitely a positive future to look to. Many
organisations and laws have been implemented which aim to reduce all the issues such as violence,
pay equity and misrepresentation of women in leadership positions such as the National Plan. There
has been a rise in communities which provide safe places for women and men, and more than 1000
people have attended these as of 2011, which means that all these people were provided with
benefits such as family violence counselling, legal advice, child protection, sexual assault services
and behavioural change programs. I thought the speech provided many clear examples of gender
inequality which I never really thought of (such as women not being allowed in bars until 1965!), and
was an interesting read in a topic which many (including me) havent given it the reflection it deserves.