Associate Justice Minister Lianne Dalziel and Women's Affairs Minister Steve Chadwick have welcomed the release of the 2008 Census of Women’s Participation as a useful tool for raising awareness of gender inequity and for driving progress towards equality.

Speaking at the launch of the Census – a biennial report produced by the Human Rights Commission – Lianne Dalziel said the data in the Census prodded all New Zealanders, both in the public and the private sectors to improve women's participation at all levels, but especially in leadership roles.

Lianne Dalziel noted that in its comments on New Zealand's latest periodic report to the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the United Nations committee praised New Zealand for its commitment to achieving equality for all women, but also recommended that New Zealand take concrete action to increase the number of women in decision-making roles.

"This Census provides an important yardstick in measuring our progress when reporting to bodies such as CEDAW. The 2008 Census tells us we have made progress but also reminds us that we all still have work to do.

"The Human Rights Commission rightly points out that it will take significant whole-of-government commitment to reach our self-imposed target of 50 percent women’s participation on state sector boards and committees by 2010.

"This is a target that has been committed to by successive governments but now the heat is really on. The latest figures show that we have risen only slightly over the past couple of years to 42 per cent participation. Closing that 8 per cent gap by 2010 will require resolve and effort but we are going to do our utmost to achieve it. This is a problem for all New Zealanders and all governments. The way to achieve change is to identify the problem then jointly push for a solution and that's where this census is so valuable," Lianne Dalziel said.

Steve Chadwick said that as Minister of Women’s Affairs, one area that particularly concerns her is the very low participation rates of women on company boards and in senior management.

"I find it disturbing that less than nine percent of the directors of companies listed on the New Zealand Stock Exchange are women and that only one company has more than two women directors. There is a lot of room for improvement”

Steve Chadwick said there was compelling evidence from overseas that companies with more diversity on their boards perform much better, on average, than those with few or no women on their boards, which mean real profits for shareholders.

"Perhaps it’s the shareholders who should be asking ‘where are the women?"

Steve Chadwick said it was worth pointing out that New Zealand continues to be ranked highly in international measures of gender parity (fifth in The Global Gender Gap Report 2007, up two places from the 2006 ranking).

"We all benefit when all New Zealanders are able to make their full contribution to our nation. The Census of Women’s Participation is a tool to help us get there."