Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing and Seniors) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) notes that:

(a) at least 23 women have been murdered so far this year at the hands of an intimate partner in Australia;

(b) on average, more than one woman a week is murdered by a current or former partner;

(c) violence against women and their children is worsening in the face of job losses, stand-downs and financial stress and uncertainty; and

(d) domestic and family violence services funding was inadequate before the COVID-19 pandemic and the impact of the associated restrictions will affect rates of violence for a significant time; and

(2) calls on the Government to:

(a) follow Labor's call to convene a national summit on violence against women and their children; and

(b) urgently provide more support for frontline services.

Of course, what we know from COVID-19 and what we've seen from the data and statistics is that it's having a really big impact on women in our community. Indeed, we know that most of the essential workers who have been working throughout this pandemic, and particularly during times of lockdown like we now see in Victoria, are women—predominantly, sadly, in low-paid jobs.

When we look at the statistics, 80 per cent of the aged-care and disability workforce are women, and we've seen the horrific impact that COVID-19 is having on aged-care facilities right across the country. That's not just in Victoria—of course, we had two terrible outbreaks in New South Wales as well. Eighty per cent of healthcare and social assistant workers, including nurses, doctors and hospital staff, are women and 85 per cent of primary school teachers are women. Seventy-five per cent of checkout operators in retail stores are women, 57 per cent of commercial cleaners are women and of course 96 per cent of childcare workers are women. We're seeing a real issue in Victoria at the moment in relation to accessing child care for those women who do work as well as the workers in child care themselves. Of course, the workers in child care in Victoria at the moment are unable to access JobKeeper and women who are not able to go to work in the lockdown in Victoria are facing a big dilemma about whether or not to hold their childcare places. That is impacting very heavily on the workers and centres in terms of their workforce. We know that during the months of April and May in Australia the government did provide some additional support to childcare centres, but we know that the premature withdrawal of JobKeeper for childcare workers is having a very significant impact on that workforce, particularly in Victoria today.

We know that at least 200,000 Australian women who have insecure work in the accommodation, food services and retail sectors alone missed out on JobKeeper. They were in casual positions and had been in them for less than a year and therefore were excluded from this payment. So we know that it's also impacting them. We also know from the ABS that women lost more jobs during some of the shutdowns that have occurred across the country—and again, in Victoria, which is really bearing the brunt of its lockdown at the moment.

The other important impact is that we know that women are now doing more unpaid housework because of COVID and that women are predominantly taking on more of the teaching and learning-from-home work with their children during the lockdowns that have occurred across the country in the last few months. So this pandemic is really having a significant and disproportionate impact on women in Australia.

What we haven't seen from the government is an actual response which impacts on women significantly. What we've seen instead is a proposal from the government to change fees for TAFE and university for some of the positions that women predominantly work in. We've seen a suggestion that they're going to produce some sort of economic statement that we haven't yet seen. I've asked many times about this JobMaker program that the government has and how many jobs it will actually make for women. Of course, the only program that we've heard announced under JobMaker to date really is about the predominantly male industry of the building sector. We haven't seen from the government an actual response that deals with the disproportionate impact that this crisis, this pandemic, is having on the women of Australia. Of course it will be the women of Australia that are being impacted in the economic response or lack thereof unless the government does something about addressing the disproportionate impact. Women will continue to be disproportionately impacted for a long time to come.

So I hope that the government does actually deliver the economic statement that it said it would do in June, because Australian women and their families are depending on it. We have Equal Pay Day coming up later this week. We know that the gender pay gap remains stubborn at around 14 or 15 per cent. I think it is about 14 per cent at the moment. We know there is more work to do. This pandemic will increase the gender pay gap. Women are going to go backwards because of this pandemic. The women of Australia need a government that will respond, that has some answers, that addresses the disproportionate impact. As I said, at the moment the only program under JobMaker is to do with the building industry. That does need some support, but it is disproportionately dominated by men. So it's about time that this government has a program that disproportionately impacts on women when it comes to the response, because the women of Australia and their families really need it.

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