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WELCOME TO
NATIONAL FOUNDATION FOR AUSTRALIAN WOMEN
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We have some exciting news and events over the next three months, find out how to join us!
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Message from our President, Jane Madden
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The National Foundation for Australian Women (NFAW) will be playing a vocal role in bringing to our members’ attention KEY issues around critical policies for women that need to be addressed and part of the dialogue in the lead up to the 2022 Federal Election. Over the next few months, NFAW will be taking a deep dive on important policy issues that need to be aired in the media to hold current and future governments to account, and on task with the needs of all women in Australia. This platform builds on a track record of NFAW delivering a comprehensive Gender Lens on the Budget when the Abbott Government discontinued the practice of issuing a Women’s Budget Statement.
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A panel of highly regarded economists and social policy academics and practitioners, led by Professor Helen Hodgson, formed a Gender Lens panel in January 2022 to bring greater insights and critical thinking regarding the policies associated with the Gender Lens to the media. This approach includes thoughtful and thought- provoking questions they all need to be asking politicians around policies that they will implement. Watch this space for forthcoming pieces.
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We hope that this will help to inform discussion in this pre-election phase.
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Jane Madden
President | National Foundation for Australian Women (NFAW)
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International Women’s Day
#Break the Bias 2022
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VIDEOS
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Sally Moyle, Vice President NFAW
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Gender Lens 2022
Leading into an election – what you need to know!
In the lead-up to the 2022 election, NFAW will produce a series of social policy briefing papers for members and for media. These will include:
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- Framework for Employment Reform: Early Childhood Education and Care disability care and aged care services need major reform, support and investment
- Welfare Reform: a Social Compact
- Tax and superannuation reform
- Integrity and Accountability, including Gender Responsive Budgeting
- Climate Change and Resilience
- Post Budget: Review of Budget through a Gender Lens
Check our website regularly for Gender Lens briefing papers.
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Gender Lens Briefing Paper 1
Women’s economic security: gender responsive budgeting
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In Australia, as elsewhere, the outbreak of Covid-19 has exposed and deepened pre-existing inequalities. These include gender inequalities and ways women experience inequality, including on the basis of unpaid care roles, race, disability, age, sexuality, regional location or national origin. The same inequalities are being exposed and exacerbated by climate change. Our annual Gender Lens on the Budget analysis has exposed how flood, drought and fire have brought greater health risks to women, increased their exposure to violence and left them more likely to lose or forgo employment opportunities because of additional community and care responsibilities.
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We have seen women as primary carers and home schoolers, forced to cut working hours or withdraw from the labour force; women as exposed and underpaid deliverers of health, aged, child and disability care services; women as insecure casualised workers who are ineligible for sick leave and for Covid support; women as exposed multiple job holders moving between care sites; women as victims of violence trapped at home; growing numbers of women without basic income forced into homelessness.
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Put it another way: the stresses of Covid have exposed the fact that the national social infrastructure is failing – failing those who receive care and those who deliver caring services and failing those pushed into social welfare by chronic job insecurity, skewed tax and superannuation policies, and domestic and family violence.
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Marketisation has failed to deliver an adequate care infrastructure, and it has distorted the design, funding, delivery and adequacy of our social welfare services. Driven by a tax system that gives tax preferences to investment earnings over earned income, and better serves higher income earners, has caused services to be configured to suit for-profit providers to reduce government outlays, and to on family responsibilities of primary carers. Women work where these embedded drivers meet, in insecure and undervalued jobs in the underfunded and often understaffed workplaces where Australians receive care. Demands on failing social infrastructure will only continue to intensify with the ageing of the population and the growing costs and impacts of climate change. Resources for social infrastructure will continue to contract with a tax system targeting earned rather than unearned income.
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The 2020 budget is still notorious for having ignored social infrastructure and pouring resources into construction – and then excluding desperately needed social housing. The 2021 budget, which was supposed to deliver for women, stumped up only 0.14% of annual outlays over 4 years for its plan for women’s economic security.
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The NFAW Gender Briefing Papers 2022 will call on the Australian Government to rebuild national social infrastructure through more gender-responsive budgeting and reforms. We look forward to sharing our research and highlighting critical policy issues that need to be aired in the lead-up to the 2022 Federal Election.
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Chair Social Policy Committee
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Advisor to Social Policy Committee
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2021 National History Challenge Outcomes
NFAW has been a sponsor of the National History Challenge for 13 years, sponsoring the category of WOMEN with the intention of encouraging students to examine the significant but often overlooked contribution that women have made to the Australian nation.
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The Challenge itself is a project of the History Teacher’s Association and an annual research-based competition for students from Year 5-12. Themed each year - the current theme for 2021 is “Causes and Consequences" - the Challenge is aimed at giving entrants an opportunity to be historians, examining Australia’s past in a broader sense, or in a community sense or a personal family sense.
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The main criteria for an entry for our category is that the subject is an Australian woman or group of women, living or dead, and despite all the web information putting great stress on the women having direct links with Australia, sadly many worthwhile entries were ineligible as they did not adhere to the criteria of Australian links. We have therefore been advised to change the category from WOMEN to AUSTRALIAN WOMEN which we will do.
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The overall winner, and therefore the Young Historian of the Year 2021 was Michelle Lai from Sefton High School, and the winners in our category were 4 students from Brisbane Grammar, Andrew Beckinsale, Chester Battley, Edward Gracey and Tobias Dunglison. Their work was in the form of a video of a debate relating to Australian women on the home front and the relative contribution to the war effort of the Land Army as against the women in the munitions. It was an outstanding entry, the unanimous decision of the judges, and made more noteworthy being from 4 male students. The debate is available on the National History Challenge website as are all the prize-winning entries.
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As in the past we would like to express our thanks to the Board for the continuing sponsorship offered to us, and if Board members would like further information on any further information, please contact either Shirley or Danielle
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National History Competition Entry - YouTube
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SAVE THE DATE - APRIL PAMELA DENOON LECTURE
Friday 22nd April : 7.00pm to 8.30pm at Llewellyn Hall, ANU in Acton.
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The Pamela Denoon Lecture is Australia's oldest and most prestigious feminism lecture. The lecture was created to commemorate the life of Pamela Denoon - a former head of the Women's Electoral Lobby, who dedicated her life to equality for women.
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This year the lecture will focus on female film makers who were pioneers in their field and will include a high-profile panel discussion with some of Australia’s most iconic female film directors.
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More details on the 2022 Pamela Denoon Lecture to come, with priority access to tickets for NFAW members.
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WELCOME TO NEW BOARD MEMBERS
The annual board meeting was convened last December, and the following new board members were appointed.
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The board would like to thank the outgoing board members for their time and service to NFAW, Liz Rowell, Michelle Macgregor Owen and Alix Katala.
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NFAW was established through a $50,000 bequest by Pamela Denoon, with a further $50,000 dedicated to the Pamela Denoon Trust for special projects. Philanthropy is part of NFAW’s DNA.
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In the past year NFAW has been working towards obtaining philanthropic support that will allow us to continue to put our independent, apolitical case with confidence and freedom, and without fear or favour. NFAW is not willing to wait another generation to get action – we want action on gender equality now. By leaving a gift in your Will to NFAW you will be making a unique commitment to ensure our teams can continue to do vital work. You will also be helping to provide a lasting legacy on gender equality.
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If you are interested in having a discussion about this, then please contact Kate Gunn Fundraising, Marketing and Membership Committee.
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If you missed the NFAW Annual Dinner 2021 and our key note speaker Dr Janine Mohamed we are pleased to offer you the opportunity to watch this address here . It was an inspiring, hopeful and generous speech. Just what we need right now!
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Dr Janine Mohamed Narrunga Kaurna woman and CEO of the Lowitja Institute (Australia’s National Institute for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Research) was our keynote speaker for the NFAW Annual Dinner 2021. Dr Mohamed spoke on two key themes of reconciliation and health equity. She took a gender lens to her perspective and highlighted the challenges and opportunities that Indigenous women are facing.
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