Review of the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Act and Agency
28 October, 2009 | Submission
The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) welcomes the opportunity to make this submission to the Review of the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Act 1999 (EOWW Act) and the role of the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace (EOWW) Agency.
The review of the effectiveness of the EOWW Act and Agency is much needed. Despite the introduction of the Affirmative Action (Equal Opportunity for Women) Act 1986 almost a quarter of a century ago, women continue to be disadvantaged in the workplace:
- Australia ranks a lowly 41 in the global index of women’s workforce participation.
- Women in full-time paid work still earn 17% less than men; amounting to over one million dollars less over a lifetime.
- While women are now more likely to have a tertiary qualification than men, women graduates will earn $2,000 less than male graduates and $7,400 less by the fifth year after graduation.
- Fewer than 2% of ASX 200 companies have a female chief executive officer, only 1 in 12 board directors are women and only 55% of Australian companies have at least one woman in management compared to 85% in the US.
- Women retire with less than half the amount of savings in their superannuation accounts than men.
- Women are four times as likely to experience sexual harassment in the workplace compared to men.
The ACTU outlined its views with respect to pay inequity in its submission to the recent Inquiry into Pay Equity and Female Workforce Participation in October 2008.
In that submission we noted that, despite almost 40 years having passed since the Australian Industrial Relations Commission awarded equal pay for work of equal value, pay and workplace inequity has remained a stubborn feature of our labour market.
The current EOWW legislation has been inadequate to genuinely address this inequity, and in fact, the latest EOWW Agency census indicates that there has been a steady reversal of the initial gains made under the Affirmative Action (Equal Employment Opportunity for Women) Act 1986.
Over the past 2 years alone:
- The gender wage gap has widened from women earning 87 cents for each dollar earned by men in 2004 to 84 cents in 2007
- The number of women Executive managers has declined from 12% to 10.7%
- The number of companies with no women executive managers has risen from 39.5% to 45.5%
- The encouraging increase of women in line management roles from 2003 to 2006 (4.7% compared to 7.4%) has reversed to pre- 2004 levels
Summary of Recommendations
This submission proposes a holistic, balanced approach which incorporates a matrix of strategies to genuinely address equal opportunity in the workplace, including:
1. A stronger reporting regime which enforces mandatory reporting by employers obliged to report under the Act.
2. Broadening the scope of the EOWW Act to include Federal and State public sector organisations and, over time, employers with less than 100 employees.
3. A requirement that organisations identify and develop targets and action plans as part of the reporting process.
4. Practical education and support for employers to build their capacity to meet their reporting obligations to an appropriate standard.
5. Greater streamlining of the reporting process including on-line and automated reporting, and provision of specific resources for employers to facilitate accurate and quality reporting.
6. Re-building employee and stakeholder engagement in the reporting process.
7. Improved public transparency of employer’s EEO targets and progress, including integration with corporate reporting requirements.
8. An enhanced system of review and analysis of reports, including effective monitoring and review of organisations’ progress towards meeting EEO goals.
9. Development of appropriate minimum EEO standards.
10. An enhanced compliance framework including penalties for breaches of the EOWW Act, published league tables of performance, corporate accountability and government incentives.
11. Effective advocacy of equal employment opportunity including an enhanced relationship between the EOWW Act, industrial and anti-discrimination legislation; and
12. Ongoing monitoring of the effectiveness of the overall EEO framework in improving EEO for women in the workplace.
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