Launch Action Plan for New Zealand Women

Women's Affairs Minister Ruth Dyson
Launch Action Plan for New Zealand Women
Banquet Hall, Parliament, Wellington 5.15pm, Monday, 8 March 2004

Rau rangatira maa,
tenei te mihi ki a koutou i runga i te kaupapa o te ra.
Tena koutou, tena koutou, tena koutou katoa.

[Distinguished guests, greetings to you gathered here for this purpose today. Greetings once, twice, three times to you all.]

Good evening. It is my great pleasure to welcome you all here to celebrate the launch of the Action Plan for New Zealand women.

Today is International Women’s Day, a most appropriate occasion to launch the action plan. For almost a century, women around the world have come together on this day to celebrate their achievements, reflect on the progress they’ve made, and call for further progress.

As we look to the future this evening, we can take strength from knowing we are part of a long tradition of struggle by ordinary women for equality, social justice, peace and development.
I understand there are more than 300 people here tonight. We women certainly know how to get together and celebrate!

As I look around me, I see women who have made a contribution in every walk of life. There are too many of you to name individually, but I want to say how much I appreciate your support and the effort you have made to be here.

Acknowledgements
I bring the apologies of the Prime Minister, and acknowledge my colleague Margaret Wilson and other MPs.

I want to extend a special welcome to Kitty Bennett (Te Arawa), president of the Maori Women’s Welfare League, Beryl Anderson, president of the National Council of Women and Jean Mitaera, president of PACIFICA.

As Minister of Women’s Affairs, I have entered into a formal partnership with these national umbrella organisations. They add enormously to our understanding of New Zealand women, and in particular I want to thank them for their contribution to the development of the action plan, including hosting many of the consultation meetings.

I want to take this opportunity to welcome Shenagh Gleisner as the new chief executive of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs, and thank her team for their work in developing the action plan. It hasn’t done much for their own work/life balance, I know. But it has provided us with a plan that – as its vision says – will help create an equitable and inclusive society where all women can achieve their aspirations.

I also want to acknowledge Anne Carter who oversaw the development of the plan during her time as acting chief executive of the ministry.

Finally I want to thank everyone involved in the consultation process – the external reference group, government departments, business, community and voluntary groups, and individuals.

Some of you attended the 30 consultation meetings around the country. Some of you took part in the six focus groups for Mäori, Pacific, migrant and rural women, women with disabilities and women with low incomes. Others contributed to the almost 270 public submissions;

Without you all, we simply couldn’t have done it. Thank you.

Need for an action plan
Why do we need an action plan for New Zealand women?

We have come a long way since being first in the world to win the right to vote. We occupy most of the top jobs – Prime Minister, Governor General, Attorney General, Chief Justice, head of our largest company.

Unfortunately, this success has created misconceptions. Older women in senior positions and young women tend to think we have achieved equality, while there is a certain backlash from those who resent the gains women have made.

In 1908 when Katherine Mansfield was reflecting on the possibilities for future generations of women, one Wellington paper described the “New Woman” as being
“an utter failure … the sort of woman that people call intelligent is the most awful nuisance in the world … she combines the respectful dullness of a church meeting with the mental fatigue of a mathematical problem … Moral! Bear in mind that men like to be amused and never instructed.”

We may find this amusing – but we cannot afford to be complacent, even here. Not only do many women struggle for equality, to lead a life of dignity, self-respect and meaning, but there are also those who will deny that this struggle is a reality.

So we should remember that there are people writing now in 21ST Century Aotearoa New Zealand, who claim that feminism was the worst evil of the twentieth century, followed very closely behind by the twin evils of tolerance and diversity.

Less than a week ago, a woman columnist commented in an article entitled “Liberate us from this diehard feminism” that for most women, equality of economic outcomes, is not only “completely irrelevant”, but “oppressive”.

No – when we read words like that we cannot afford to be complacent, even in New Zealand in 2004. A letter to the Herald last week was a timely reminder to all of us:
“If people are unequal and you treat them the same, all you do is increase the inequality. You have to treat equal things equally, and unequal things unequally.”

As for resenting the gains that women have made - I find this somewhat hard to analyse with logic. If I had a plan for young people - a plan that would give young people in New Zealand more opportunity, more security, a better quality of life and a chance to fully contribute to society - no-one would say, ‘That’s terrible – that’s to the detriment of older New Zealanders!’

They would say ‘That’s great,’ because we all know that if we give young New Zealanders better opportunities, it’s of benefit to our whole society.

Well, exactly the same applies to the women’s action plan. Actions which are of benefit to New Zealand women are to the advantage of us all – not to the detriment of men!

Because, although it’s true that women have made enormous progress, we still have some way to go.
Women are concentrated in low-paid jobs, and earn less than men even when we work in the same professions.

We are more likely to have a post-school qualification, but take much longer to pay back student debt (and incur more interest) because of our lower earnings and childcare responsibilities.

We are under-represented in the highly-successful Modern Apprenticeship Scheme, and we still occupy fewer than one-third of all senior management positions in New Zealand companies.

Nor have we got the right balance between paid work and the rest of our lives. Women make up almost half of the paid workforce. Yet society expects us to rear children, care for family and whanau, and do much of the unpaid work in our communities.

Work/life balance is an issue that affects men too, but the stress is greater for women because of our primary role as carers. As I’m fond of saying, we have worked hard for the right to do anything. Now we must work for the right not to have to do everything.

Last year, the CEDAW committee - which oversees the United Nations Convention for the Elimination of Discrimination against Women – praised the progress our government has made to improve the status of women.
However, the committee warned us not be complacent, and highlighted a number of ongoing concerns, including:
·women’s access to legal services;
·the prevalence of gender-based violence; and
·the needs of Maori, Pacific, refugee, migrant and disabled women.

Barriers continue to exist which prevent many women from participating fully and equally in all aspects of society. As UK pay equity expert Denise Kingsmill said on her recent visit, women have largely broken through the glass ceiling - now we have to deal with the sticky floors.

The action plan
Thirty years ago, the women’s movement put women’s rights on the agenda. Society has changed dramatically since then, and it’s time to look again at the challenges facing women and the best way to address them.

That’s why our government has developed the women’s action plan.

The plan builds on achievements we have already made, gives us a vision for the future, and provides a framework for action across the whole of government.

It identifies three key themes for women:
·having enough income to care for ourselves and our dependents;
·work-life balance; and
·preserving our health and well-being.

This is the first time that any government has committed itself to an integrated plan to improve women’s lives, with identifiable priorities, milestones, and ways to monitor our overall progress. It’s great cause for celebration.

Paid parental leave
Another cause for celebration is the Prime Minister’s announcement this afternoon that the Paid Parental Leave scheme is to be extended. Paid parental leave is an excellent example of the action plan in action, and embodies all its themes.

It gives women job and income security. It enables them to take time off work when they have a baby, and it improves the well-being of both mother and child.

Initiatives
The extension of paid parental leave is one of many initiatives in the action plan that will improve the lives of New Zealand women. Let me run through a few others:

·Women’s success in enterprise will be the focus of a new inter-departmental steering group, set up to enhance sustainable business growth among businesses owned and operated by women.

·Mäori women will be helped to gain governance, management and business skills in an initiative led by Te Puni Kokiri.

·Women’s participation in modern apprenticeships will be promoted by the Tertiary Education Commission.

·The Retirement Commission and Ministry of Women’s Affairs will develop a targeted campaign to increase women’s access to financial planning advice and uptake of retirement savings schemes.

·The Ministry of Education will look at ways to reduce the impact of student loans on women. As a start, this year’s Budget will enable more students to qualify for student allowances from the 2005 academic year.

·Also in the Budget will be major improvements in the level of family income assistance, which will benefit the many women in lower-income groups.

·New policies to encourage work-life balance will be reported back to government in June, while a plan of action to address pay and employment equity will be considered shortly.

·Greater support for early childhood education, and out of school care and recreation, will address issues of cost, quality and access that pose a major barrier to women’s participation in paid work.

·A social statistics package, including plans for a second Time Use Survey and the development of satellite accounts to help understand the contribution of household and non-profit activity, is being developed by Statistics New Zealand.

·The Ministry of Women’s Affairs and the Office for Disability Issues will work together on new policies to enhance opportunities for women with disabilities, particularly in the area of employment.

Conclusion
This list is by no means comprehensive, but it gives you some idea of the whole-of-government approach of the action plan, and the task we have set ourselves.

Today is really just the beginning. The proof of the action plan is in the implementation, and that requires the commitment of us all – women in central and local government, business, the state sector, the community and voluntary sector, doing paid and unpaid work.

I believe our success depends on our ability to work together, build on our collective strengths and respect our differences.
I am committed to ensuring that I, and the Ministry of Women’s Affairs, work collaboratively, not just with the women in this room, but with women’s groups up and down the country.

New Zealand has a proud tradition of leading the world in women’s rights. The action plan gives us a unique opportunity to be at the forefront again. I appreciate your support, and I look forward to working with you to address the challenges facing women in the 21st century.

I want to leave you with the words of Black Elk, a Sioux First Nation author who lived from 1863-1950. He said this:
“A vision without tasks is just a dream.
A task without a vision is drudgery
A vision with a task can change the world.”

The women’s action plan has the three essential elements for success.
It gives us a vision to improve women’s lives.
It has the government’s commitment underpinning it.
And it sets out the tasks that will enable us to achieve that vision.

Thank you.