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

I thank Senator Pratt for that question, but also I note your announcement, Senator Pratt, since we last sat, that you won't contest the next election. I want to acknowledge the huge amount of work you've done, including in this space to reduce the gender pay gap for women workers across this country. I know there'll be plenty of time to make other contributions, but I did want to acknowledge that today.

Under Labor, the gender pay gap has dropped to a record low, with the ABS reporting last week that the gender pay gap has dropped to 12 per cent. The ABS identified that the reduction is driven by broad based wages growth, which has been particularly strong for women. The WPI rose by 4.2 per cent in the year to the December quarter of 2023. This was the highest annual increase in underlying wages growth since the March quarter of 2009. This shows that our efforts to lift wages are working and that our efforts to support women's economic equality are working in a very real and tangible way, and that is because women's economic equality has been a key priority of our government since day one. We have recognised that women's economic equality is a core economic priority. We've been working hard to implement reforms that'll have a real, practical impact on the lives of Australian women.

Tomorrow WGEA will publish employer-level gender pay gap reports. This is a first for Australia, and it will give employees greater visibility of how their workplaces are performing and increased transparency and focus on employers to accelerate change. This is on top of the reforms we've made to the industrial relations system, reforms the opposition opposed, of course; reforms to fix the bargaining system to get wages moving, particularly in industries dominated by women workers; reforms to change the law to put gender equity at the heart of the Fair Work Commission's decision-making; and reforms to ban pay secrecy clauses to reduce gender pay discrimination. We understand that the connection between— (Time expired)