Hansard debates

Mr McGUIRE (Broadmeadows) (16:10): Reforming inequality is not a gendered issue; it is a cause for all of us. This is a landmark piece of legislation, an Australian first and a timely reminder of why Labor governments matter and why the labour movement matters. I think it is important to remind the house it was more than half a century ago when the equal pay case was launched, when Bob Hawke, then head of the ACTU, stood and said, ‘We want equal pay for equal work’. We are still not there. It is not going to happen by chance; it is the will and the wit and the effort of so many people. I made the point when we commemorated John Cain, the longest serving Victorian Premier, on how proud I think he would have been of this; the Minister for Planning is here at the table as well. These are emblematic issues. This is what defines the difference. It harks back to the liberating changes that John Cain pioneered simultaneously as Premier and as minister for women, and it defines why the past is never dead and buried; it is not even past. It is about our responsibility to continue to drive this change, because it will not happen by chance; it still has not happened. I mean, it is staggering when you find the gender pay gap still at 9.6 per cent, driven by a number of factors, including unequal workforce participation, discrimination and occupational and industrial segregation. I mean, it is still there.

I want to commend all of the women over the whole period of time that it has taken, from the suffragettes, to the women in the labour movement and to those on the other side of politics who want to make the same commitment—I acknowledge that too—to build that pressure over time and to have affirmative action in the cabinet of Victoria for the first time. These are landmark steps and progress, to have the women who are in the caucus and their experience and, Acting Speaker Couzens, your own experience. I have a particular point about what we are doing as a government and what we need to do to drive even further change and, I think, particularly about some of the other initiatives mandating that 50 per cent of the positions on boards have to be for women. We would all be dead before it happened otherwise; that is just the plain truth. So it has been fantastic how we have done that.

I am also conscious, as I know you are, Acting Speaker, of representing a disadvantaged community with a lot of women who came here as factory fodder. That was the only chance they got—they worked on the assembly lines. My mum was on the assembly lines at Yakka, Ericsson, Denzil Don and Nabisco—they have all gone. How do you get your opportunity? How do you get your chance? This is a big responsibility, and I think it is really important that these reforms continue.

I remember this clearly: even if you are in the land of opportunity, as my late dad always called Australia—and he was right—how do you make those differences? I think a lot of people do not quite understand that you got up at 6, you got the breakfast on the table and you got the kids out at 7 to be on the train line to get to school. Then you had to go and do the afternoon shift from 3 o’clock till 11. When we got a car, Dad would make the dinner. I would hold it on the tray, and we would go and see Mum so she could have a break from the assembly line. It was really lonely for people. People do not understand that.

This is the dignity of women that needs to be fought for and needs to be addressed. I have raised this with the Minister for Women; I want to look at how we actually evolve again for women in these circumstances. One of the issues for them is that all they have is their time and their labour, and their time is crushed from all different areas. I have spoken directly with Muhammad Yunus, who won the Nobel Peace Prize for his microfinancing model, and I think this is really important. How does it work? What does he do? It is giving some money for women to start small businesses, to start to be able to invest, to have a go and to be given a better opportunity. And guess what—the result has been outstanding, and it works. Who would have thought? Why don’t we just empower women to have a chance, show their initiative, their creativity and everything? We will look at that in the future as well.

I think these issues and these emblematic causes are in a proud tradition. I do want to acknowledge the minister for bringing this piece of legislation, which has to be driven; her predecessors, including the member for Sydenham here and the late Fiona Richardson; and all the other women who have come before, as has been said—Joan Kirner, the first woman Premier of Victoria, Mary Delahunty and Sherryl Garbutt. It is an honour; the rollcall is highly distinguished—legislators, advocates and people who made huge differences. You think of Julia Gillard rising to be Australia’s first woman Prime Minister as well.

So this is it: we see that you can—and so you should—have the opportunity to have any position in this country. That is what we are about fundamentally, and Australians get that, so this is another step in how we do it. Again it goes to: what is the mechanism that is being used? Well, we are looking at the public sector and public service bodies, public entities, special bodies, councils, Court Services Victoria, universities and the Office of Public Prosecutions. These are entities of 50 or more employees, to be determined by headcount. The threshold of 50 employees ensures an appropriate balance is struck between achieving the objectives of the bill and encouraging organisational change and ensuring a reasonable and achievable reporting burden.

It does take me back to the way that John Cain was clever about using the power over public land, over Crown land, to actually remove discrimination against women—the white line, the memberships—so that they could actually get in the door. That is all women really want. They just want to get in the door, have a chance, have a fair go and get the opportunity. So I think for a whole range of reasons this piece of legislation resonates. It is an important next step in this long journey for equality, equal pay and equal opportunity, and I think that it is extremely timely given the resonance with the commemoration of John Cain and all of the key women who influenced him as well. The speech that was made at his memorial service was also an outstanding speech, defining all that he had done.

This is how change occurs. It is the critical proposition about driving how we continue, just opening the way and showing that, yes, these are the leaders who were there. It is what I say to my daughter, Tess, if I can just refer to her on this, that the next generation of women coming through are outstanding for education. They see the opportunity. They are not going to be waiting; they are going to be driving the change and leading at all the different levels. I think that as a Labor government for us to continue to do this is really important and we should use the mechanisms that we have.

We still have 65 per cent of women in Victoria aged 20 to 74 participating in the workforce compared to 79 per cent of men, leaving a percentage gap of 14 per cent. Women currently spend almost twice as much time undertaking caring or domestic duties, and women are still under-represented in decision-making roles across our community, which contributes to workplace cultures and norms which inherently disadvantage. We know that more than half of working women are likely to face gender discrimination, workplace violence or sexual harassment. This insight is staggering, that this still continues, so I want to commend the Premier, the cabinet and particularly on this day all of the women for all that they have done and for all it has taken. We cannot thank you enough. I commend the bill to the house.