Barry Haase (Kalgoorlie, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Roads and Transport) Share this | Hansard source

On behalf of the coalition members I thank the secretariat of the Standing Committee on Employment and Workplace Relations for their efforts in assisting the committee in the publication of the report Making it fair: pay equity and associated issues related to increasing female participation in the workforce. The coalition accepts the motivation for the inquiry and many of the recommendations of this report. However, we cannot entirely endorse it because we believe there are other factors of significance that have not been detailed. We were disappointed by the lack of private enterprise evidence presented to the inquiry and, therefore, these recommendations should be considered as some of the stepping stones for future reform.

The majority of evidence adduced from this report has been from organisations, individuals and groups who are more likely to be aware of and able to enforce gender pay equity, sectors that in one form or another are supported or funded by state and/or federal governments. Very little evidence has come from the private sector, which will also be directly affected if this report is adopted, and as such the recommendations should first be applied to public sector agencies to measure their impact. The costs associated with the implementation of these recommendations are currently unquantifiable and must not be imposed on the private sector until the ramifications of such adaptations are known. Without a cost-and-benefit analysis of these recommendations being undertaken, we are at risk of imposing processes that may in fact further disadvantage women from either entering or remaining in the workforce.

The Fair Work Act 2009 is in its infancy and, as a number of recommendations are focused on changes to this act, the coalition is mindful of endorsing measures that alter the aspirations, processes and results of legislation that has not yet been fully implemented and suitably tested. This report will not revolutionise the female workforce and I believe the issues that dominate this inquiry do not address the major factor in gender pay equity. I deem the dominating factor to be the mindset of Australian society and until such time as Australians as a whole change their beliefs in relation to the role females have traditionally held in society the gender pay issue will never be solved. We have a cultural hurdle to overcome that women are the primary care givers and are expected to be the bosom of our society. The Australian vernacular terms of ‘stay at home mothers’ and ‘working mothers’ are firmly embedded in our language and therefore our culture. You may on occasion hear the term ‘stay at home father’, but I have never heard the term ‘working father’ bandied around and there lies the difference in attitudes towards men and women in Australia. This will always negatively affect female earnings, participation and conditions as opposed to their male counterparts.

The test we use today examines the working life earnings, including superannuation, accumulated by a female employee compared to that of a male. Whilst women are the primary care providers, time spent in the workplace will always be less than their male counterparts. The singular change to the workplace that will increase participation is the provision of at-work childcare facilities for children and the formal support by government of after school supervision and mentoring facilities. The staffing and resources generally of such services will be a huge financial impost, and this will necessitate support or compensation from the government of the day.

I once again thank the members of the secretariat: specifically, secretary, Dr Glenn Worthington; inquiry secretary, Ms Cheryl Scarlett; senior research officer, Mr Raymond Knight; and office manager, Mr Daniel Miletic. (Time expired)

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