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Themes
The Listening Tour has three key themes:
- Economic independence for women
- Work and family Balance across the life cycle
- Freedom from discrimination, harassment and violence
1. Economic independence for women
Margaret’s story
Margaret's story
> Play video (WMV, 10 MB)
When my son Brad was born, my husband and I decided that I would stop
working and stay at home to look after him because it made financial sense.
When he got to primary school I decided to get back into the
workforce, but at the same time I was going through a separation with my
husband. I ended up leaving our home with Brad and moving interstate to set up a
new home. Brad’s father and I decided that I would have primary caring
responsibilities for Brad until he reached high school. Brad would visit his
father during some school holidays and for family gatherings.
Things were tough at this point but I managed to find a part time
job at a bank which provided us with enough money to get by.
When
Brad got to high school I changed to full-time work and I was promoted within
the organisation. I worked at this bank until I reached fifty-five. This is when
all the other employees my age left the bank.
When I got to this
stage, I started to feel anxious about how I was going to manage, particularly
with a mortgage to pay and with Brad starting university and needing assistance.
I had entered the workforce at a later stage in life and realised
that my superannuation savings along with the pension were nowhere near enough
to get me through retirement, given my financial commitments. I met with a
financial advisor and I realised I needed to keep working to keep building my
retirement savings for later on.
In the end I decided to rent out
my house, buy a caravan and travel around Australia picking fruit and vegetables
at various orchards to cover my living expenses. This is the only way I have
managed to keep up with my mortgage repayments.
I’m not sure
how long I will continue along this path. I still have a lot of uncertainty
about the future but getting Brad through university was important to me so that
he could have a greater range of opportunities. I hope one day I will be able to
live in my house.
KEY FACTS
Women working full time earn 16% less than men working full
time.[1]
The gender pay gap is even
greater when we factor in women’s part time earnings – overall women
earn only 66% of what men
earn.[2]
Half of all women aged
45-59 have $8 000 or less in
superannuation[3].
There is a significant difference between the superannuation balances of men and women. Current payouts for women are one third of men’s – 37K compared with 110K.[4]
For the top 200 companies listed on the Australian Stock Exchange at 1 February 2006 women held only 8.7% of board directorships.
And now over to you...
- Can you relate to Margaret’s story?
- What stops women from fully participating in the workforce?
- Is financial security a worry for you?
- What could be done to make you feel more financially secure?
- Is retirement income an issue for women? Do you feel confident that you’re going to have enough money in retirement?
Make
your contribution on this topic here
2. Work and family Balance across
the life cycle
Matt and Lisa’s story
Matt and Lisa's story
> Play video (WMV, 4 MB)
When Lisa and I got engaged and started to plan our family we made a
commitment to each other that we would equally share the caring responsibilities
of our children. When we were pregnant with our first child, Lisa and I spent a
lot of time trying to work out how we would manage financially and fulfill our
desire to share the caring of our child. I had just started as an accountant in
a firm and Lisa was working at the university.
When Anna was born
Lisa was on maternity leave from the university and I negotiated with my firm to
work 3 days a week. The plan was that once Lisa’s maternity leave was up,
I would continue three days a week and Lisa would go back to work two days a
week.
At first we were meeting our needs with a combination of
our salaries, Centrelink benefits and the baby bonus. However, we found
ourselves getting into more and more debt, having to ask our friends and family
for help.
So, we had to make a tough decision. I would go back to
work full-time. We tried to find reasonably priced child-care so that Lisa could
continue working but in the end we couldn’t get a place and Lisa
couldn’t go back to work. It wasn’t ideal, or what we had in mind
for our future, but given our financial situation it was our only
choice.
Although my workplace has flexible work arrangements
available there is so much pressure on junior accountants to work long hours.
There is an unsaid rule that if you take up flexible work arrangements,
you’re not interested in getting ahead.
I feel really
disappointed that I haven’t been able to spend the time with Anna as I had
planned. If I could change anything in my life it would be to spend more time
with Anna and for Lisa to be able to go back to work.
KEY FACTS
Australia remains one of only two OECD countries that do not have a
legislated paid maternity leave system.
Paid maternity leave is used by
around one third (34%) of employed
mothers-to-be[5]. Use of paid
paternity or parental leave by male partners is even lower at
25%[6].
35% of men currently
work 45 hours or more per
week.[7]
Fathers of young
children are likely to be working a greater number of hours than other men. The
average working hours of employed partnered fathers with an infant is 46 hours
per week.[8]
And now over to you...
- Can you relate to Matt and Lisa’s story?
- Do you feel supported to balance work and family responsibilities?
- Are the issues different for men and women?
- Do men want to get family-friendly working arrangements? Do they find it harder to access them? Why?
- What one thing would make the biggest practical difference to this area of your life?
- In a perfect world – where money isn’t an issue – what work and family arrangements would you have?
Make your
contribution on this topic here
3. Freedom from discrimination, harassment and violence
Nadine’s story
Nadine's story
> Play video (WMV, 8 MB)
When I first started working at this information technology
corporation I came with excitement about finally putting my study into practice
and making a difference in the world.
I had spent five
years at university, first studying Engineering and then a Masters degree in
Commerce. I felt as though I was ready to start building my future in the
industry.
I came into the sector knowing that it was male
dominated. I realized that when I was one of six women in my Engineering class.
I hadn’t had any problems with this at uni so I felt confident going into
my new job.
The first two years went really well. I worked
on a range of interesting projects and I got great feedback from clients and
management. I found that although the industry was male dominated I was working
with men who were respectful of me and my work.
In the
second year I was put onto a team of twenty engineers where I was the only
female. During this time I had uploaded a profile onto an online dating website.
A few times I would come to work and the rest of the team would be laughing
behind my back.
Then one day I came to work and I saw my
profile printed out and put on everyone’s desk with an offensive note
attached. A few team members made some lewd comments as I walked to my
desk.
I left and went home early very upset that day. The
next day I didn’t want to go back to work. The thought of facing members
of my team terrified me.
I rang my manager and told him
what had happened and told him it was sexual harassment. I said I wouldn’t
put up with it in my workplace. He was very supportive and helped me escalate it
to HR to make sure it was appropriately dealt with.
The
members of the team who initiated the harassment were disciplined and the whole
division had to attend a workshop on the impact of sexual harassment and the
cost to business.
My manager arranged for me to be
transferred to another team. I’ve had a positive experience in my new team
and I am happy that my manager took my complaint seriously and did something
about it.
KEY FACTS
Sex Discrimination
In the 2006/07 year there were 472 complaints under the Sex Discrimination Act. 87% were from women.
For women, the most common grounds of complaint were sexual harassment (19%) and pregnancy, including returning to work after maternity leave (17%).
Most common area of complaint was in employment (81%).
Sexual Harassment
National research commissioned by HREOC in 2003 found that 28% of females and 7% of males had experienced sexual harassment in the workplace.
Violence against women
1 in 3 Australian women have experienced violence (both physical and sexual) from an intimate partner in their lifetime.[9]
Domestic violence is the leading contributor to preventable death, disability and illness in Victorian women aged 15 to 44.[10]
Nearly 1 in 5 Australian women has experienced sexual violence[11] since the age of 15, compared to 1 in 20 men.[12]
And now over to you...
- Can you relate to Nadine’s story?
- Do you think women or men are treated unfairly on the basis of sex in the workplace? What are some examples?
- Have you ever been denied an opportunity based on your gender, or can you point of examples that you know of?
- Do you think sexual harassment is an issue?
- Do you know of any examples where workplaces have addressed these things well?
- Have you been affected by domestic violence or sexual assault? What has been positive about the responses and support you have received?
- If you have been affected by domestic violence or sexual assault, what could have made a difference for you to be better supported?
Make your contribution on this topic here
References
[1] ABS Average Weekly Earnings May
2007 trend data
[2] ABS Average
Weekly Earnings May 2007 trend
data
[3] Simon Kelly, National
Centre for Social and Economic Modelling – NATSEM, 2006
[4] Association of Superannuation
Funds of Australia – ASFA –
2007
[5] ABS Pregnancy and
Employment Transitions, Australia Cat No 4913.0 November
2005
[6] ABS Pregnancy and
Employment Transitions, Australia Cat No 4913.0 November
2005
[7] ABS Australian Labour
Market Statistics, Australia Cat No 6105.0 October
2007
[8] Data from the first wave
(2005) of Growing Up in Australia: Longitudinal Study of Australian
Children, Australian Institute of Family Studies,
Australia.
[9] 2002 International
Violence Against Women Study
[10] 2004 VicHealth The Health Costs of
Violence
[11] Sexual violence
includes sexual assault and sexual
threats.
[12] 2005 ABS Personal
Safety Survey