International Women's Day

I have been thinking about IWD and what happened or did not happen in Australia on that day. International Women's Day is celebrated each year on the 8th of March. It is a celebration of the contributions to and the value women have in society. A very noble cause and one I subscribe to. However I have to say that I was underwhelmed this year by the activities in Canberra to celebrate this great day. Apart from a display and some research that I did for work, I did not celebrate.
In addition to the lack of celebrations, women have fallen futher on the political agenda (how many women are on the front bench?), women are under represented in the board room, young women seem to think that all the hard work has been done and are happy to morph into men to get short term goals!! Women still earn less than men in Australia, women in Australia do not have universal access to paid maternity leave. In the struggle to combine work and family, there is now a feeling that it would be better to stay home, for longer to better balance the care of the family. This is certainly what Virginia Hausseger of the Canberra Times, was saying on the 8th. On Saturday the 10th, Virginia went further, in her article "Gender equality button is still stuck on pause". Virginia talks about the facts;

• that IWD did not "generate any significant debate",
• women are becoming complacent,
  
• lack of role models.
  

Virginia challenges us to name five powerful Australian women! Take the challenge now, how many powerful women can you name in 30 seconds?
Let us hope that next year the IWD report card for Australia will be more positive. For more information about IWD.

And while this has no bearing on IWD, if you saw Difference of Opinion on the ABC on the 5th, there are further worrying trends. For instance Australian's work the longest hours in the OECD, and in a recent Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Report, it stated that people feel stressed and overworked. It was great to see Barbara Pocock in the flesh, as I have been reading her articles for several years now.
Mondo