Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator O'Neill for the question and acknowledge her advocacy in women's policy over the years. I acknowledge that today. The Albanese Labor government's Jobs and Skills Summit brought together Australians, including unions, employers, civil society and governments, to find common ground on some of our big economic challenges and to drive a consensus towards the solutions. Women's economic equality was a core focus of the summit. I've been really pleased by the response to date at the role of women at the summit: they were more than 50 per cent of the participants. They led the panels. They led the debate. There were some amazing speakers who attended the summit, full of talent. It was amazing to witness their contributions and the fact they were centre stage and a key focus.

Gender equality and women's economic participation were points of discussion across all the sessions at the Jobs and Skills Summit. The two-day summit's first session was focused specifically on this topic. Participants discussed the policy space, not only around equal opportunity and pay but also the care economy, boosting work and training opportunities for women, and examined how we can make all workplaces safer for women. And practical measures to reduce the gender pay gap were discussed at the summit.

One of the key outcomes of the summit, apart from the fact that the talented women at the summit were so amazing, was that there was agreement across all participants that women's economic equality should be seen as a key economic priority—something that I know many senators, like Senator McAllister and Senator Waters, have for some time been arguing for.