Meet the man who calls women MPs 'window dressing'

By JAMILA RIZVI

Hello world. Meet the man who thinks women members of parliament are just there as ‘window dressing’: Fairfax columnist Paul Sheehan.

Today’s Paul Sheehan special ‘Labor patronises women and burdens business‘ takes aim at women in the federal ministry, women in the Labor Party, women in the parliament, women in the workplace and well, women in general, really. And this all occurs in the name of ‘defending’  Australia’s business community against the excesses of government intervention.

I am tempted to just go on a giant (and borderline abusive rant) but ultimately, that would make me no better than the deluded Sheehan. So instead, let’s take his argument point by point shall we? And see what we can learn along the way.

1. There shouldn’t be a Minister for the Status of Women: “Collins is the Minister for Community Services, a real job, but also Minister for the Status of Women, a window dressing portfolio. It shouldn’t exist.”

Paul, I don’t like the fact that there is a need for this portfolio to exist either. And I look forward to the day we can hit the delete button on that particular line in the Ministerial Responsibilities list, comfortable in the knowledge that Australian women no longer face barriers to full and free participation in community life.

But you know what? So long as Australian women continue to earn around 80c in the dollar compared with men, remain underrepresented in parliaments and boardrooms, struggle to make the transition back to work after childbirth, are falling into poverty later in life because of insufficient superannuation and suffer from truly shocking levels of physical and sexual violence – I reakon we might not have ticked the gender equality box just yet.

Do you know what sort of policies and programs Minister Collins is responsible for, Paul? She’s responsible for the 1800 RESPECT hotline, a 24 hour telephone and internet counseling service for women who have experienced family violence. She’s responsible for the support  and rehabilitation of women who have been trafficked to Australia to work in the sex industry.

Minister Collins is responsible for supporting women in remote Indigenous communities to break the cycle of violence and poverty, so that they can raise their families in safe and secure homes. She’s responsible for representing Australia on the world stage, at the UN Convention on the Status of Women (Oh yes, you see? The United Nations, along with most of the developed world, thinks a women’s portfolio should exist).

And if none of that gets your groove going, Minister Collins is also responsible for working across Government to ensure that issues, which matter to women like child care, maternal health, parental leave and workplace discrimination stay firmly on the national agenda.

2. Good looking women members of parliament are just ‘window dressing’: “Julie Collins used to sit in the slot where the government always placed a couple of young women MPs, preferably good-looking, behind the Prime Minister so that they are visible on TV during question time… This year Collins has not been in the frame because she’s been promoted to the ministry. But even there part of her job is still window-dressing.”

That’s right, Paul. You have discovered a deeply secretive, highly effective left-wing union conspiracy to recruit Miss Universe contestants into the political arena. The Australian Labor Party has searched far and wide across our expansive continent for the best looking birds, thrown them an affirmative action quota or two for that extra leg up, got them elected to the Federal Parliament and sat them behind the Prime Minister during Question Time. THAT WILL WIN SOME VOTES. Yeaahaahaahaa.

Seriously. Get over yourself. Those politicians who sit behind the leaders in Question Time are generally the Members of Parliament who hold marginal seats. The theory is that the ‘nodders’ get a bit of extra TV exposure that they wouldn’t otherwise attract and that will help raise their profiles in their electorates. Both sides of politics do it. If you want to have a further discussion about the inherent gender discrimination in why women are more likely to be preselected in marginal seats than safe ones, then I’m super keen, let’s go and grab coffee some time.

3. Government changes to the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace (EOWA) Act equate to ‘social engineering’: “The act is not even remotely about “supporting” business. It is another of the government’s pieces of social engineering and ideological impositions.”

Paul, do you even know what social engineering is? If not, that’s fine, there are lots of things I don’t know. Among them is why you continue to be published in our nation’s newspapers. In it’s broadest definition, social engineering is the  ‘application of sociological principles to specific social problems.’ It’s most common usage these days is in regards to computing, where it refers to ‘manipulating people into performing actions or divulging confidential information’. (Another left-wing conspiracy).

The changes to EOWA Act are not social engineering. The changes you’re attempting to reference are the

requirements for businesses, to provide data to the Agency about the number of women they employ, their pay rates, speed of progression etc.

Now, this is often commercial in confidence information, so yes, it is significant. But if you’d taken the time to have a look at the actual legislation then you’d see that NONE of this information will be published in a way that allows companies to be identified. The purpose of the legal changes are to allow the Government to analyse data at an aggregate level, to see where the pay and achievement gap between men and women in business is emerging and why.

What frustrates me most, is that I presume you would be in the camp that is normally bemoaning the lack of statistical evidence for discrimination against women in the workplace. And yet when women go out and try and GET you the hard data, you turn around and try to roadblock it. You can’t play both sides mate.

4. New Government laws to improve gender equality at work will hurt Australian businesses: “It is clueless to the point of hostile, as if employers have a bottomless well of time, energy and money to comply with bureaucratic micro-management by federal agencies… Yet another layer of red tape will thus be foisted onto business.”

Wrong again, Paul. The changes to the Act are actually going to reduce the red tape and paperwork burden that larger Australian businesses are subjected to. As the then Minister for the Status of Women Kate Ellis explained when first announcing these changes:

Under these new reforms businesses will no longer have to provide lengthy and detailed reports to the Agency but rather provide raw data about the number of women and men they employ and at what level. Reporting costs to businesses that are already required to report to the Agency are estimated to decrease over time from $1200 to $450 annually.

That’s right, by scrapping the detailed reports businesses currently deliver – in which they are forced to pay ineffective lip service to gender equity – and replacing them with reporting of hard data, these reforms will actually minimise the burden on business. (While also giving us the data we so sorely need to actually understand what’s going on behind the scenes when it comes to women’s advancement in the private sector).

Moreover, the new laws will actually see the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency take on a new focus that is less about women and more about gender equity. The Agency has explained:

The focus of the legislation has changed from equal opportunity for women to gender equality in the workplace, specifically recognising that equal remuneration between women and men and the family and caring responsibilities of women and men are central to achieving gender equality.

Paul, reading your column each week tends to provoke me to totter off to my closet in search of my favourite pair of outrage pants. But in recent months your columns have moved far beyond the realm of mere extremist, misogynistic, outdated claptrap and jumped on the superfast broadband network to Completely Bloody Bonkers.

It’s been fun chatting it really has but forgive me for saying, I hope it doesn’t happen again soon.

Political disclaimer: Jamila Rizvi has worked for both the Rudd and Gillard Governments, including as an adviser to former Minister for the Status of Women Kate Ellis.