The NFAW and WomenSpeak/ERA, with valuable input from Professor Patricia Apps, independently held meetings to discuss the Henry Report at the University of Sydney through the Women and Work Research group, and at the University of Melbourne (Taxation Studies, Law School)
This submission focuses on unpaid care work done by women: women account for 8 out of 10 carers in Australia, and all accounts indicate that caregiving has greater impacts on women’s financially status, social well-being and physical and mental health.
The National Women’s Alliance1 has called on Commonwealth and State/Territory Governments to reduce the systemic barriers to women with family responsibilities who wish to enter or return to the workforce.
In recent consultations with women throughout Australia, women identified a range of issues as relevant in determining the extent to which they are able to engage in the work force.
The consultation on the Australia Institute (TAI) report The Impact of the Recession on Women1 was facilitated in Broken Hill, New South Wales, on 29 September 2009, by Darriea Turley, Chair of the National Rural Women’s Coalition2 , The Broken Hill Enterprise Development Centre3 (BHEDC), Women on Boards4 , and the National Foundation for Australian Women5 (NFAW).
The loss of the women’s budget process has meant that the Australian government no longer has a systematic way of analysing the impact on women of its policies or measure progress in achieving gender equality. NFAW believes that this national conversation offers a critical opportunity to address this gap in Australia’s budget preparation and analysis.
We greatly regret that this Review does not encompass payments for sole parents, as we consider that some of the Welfare to Work changes have been particularly disadvantageous to sole parents and their capacity to be successful or even adequate parents.
The NFAW and its affiliates were instrumental in building a broad coalition of business, nongovernment, industry and representative associations of women across all sectors (the Coalition of Working Women) to lobby Government to withdraw its exposure draft of a legislative instrument that would remove a range of key items from a list of matters that relevant employers are required to report on annually under the Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012 (the WGE Act)
Our position is that every child should be a wanted child, and that parents should have access to good quality information and services which enable them to make decisions as to the numbers and spacing of their children.