Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Families and Social Services) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Keneally for her question. I would actually refute that the budget brought down on Tuesday night by Mr Morrison and the Treasurer, Mr Frydenberg, didn't contain anything in relation to women's workforce participation. In fact, the very substance of the Women's Economic Security Statement is around enhancing women's economic participation. We all know that, prior to the pandemic, economic participation by women in the Australian workforce was actually at an all-time high and we had also seen the gender pay gap reduced to its lowest level ever. So as part of the Women's Economic Security Statement on Tuesday night, we sought to undertake a number of initiatives that are really focused on making sure that we provide specific and particular initiatives around workforce participation. But that must exclude the fact that many, many other initiatives in the budget that were not contained in the Women's Economic Security Statement are also available for women to access.