Appendix 4 – What we heard: summary of consultation themes

What was heard

Several key themes emerged from consultation including:

• The WGEA dataset is world-leading and gives a high-level picture of the progress being made on gender equality in workplaces over the eight years. Similarly, WGEA has made a contribution to help reduce the gender pay gap in Australia in the last decade through its work as an educator, influencer and regulator.
• The Workplace Gender Equality Act and WGEA are only one part of a holistic approach to address gender inequality in the workplace. Governments, employers, and the community all have a role in promoting and improving gender equality in Australian workplaces.
• The rate of change on gender equality in workplaces is not happening fast enough. Gender gaps in pay, leadership, and representation continue to exist. Australia is also falling behind in international gender equality rankings. More action from employers and support from WGEA is required to drive real and meaningful change for diverse groups of women and men in the workforce.
• While reporting to WGEA has opened a window into the current state of gender equality in organisations, there is a large disconnect between reporting and real action. There are concerns that the current WGEA reporting is seen by some employers as a ‘tick a box compliance exercise’ rather than helping drive change. Current compliance mechanisms and reporting standards are not going far enough to hold organisations accountable for progressing gender equality.
• There is also a gap between policy and behaviour where organisations have policies in place but access to those policies is inequitable and culture is slow to change.
• Increasing women’s workforce participation is vital for economic growth and productivity, which is so important in the recovery from COVID-19.
• A number of employers expressed concern about the burden of current reporting obligations to WGEA. SMEs (Small and Medium Enterprises) and other employers are concerned about the regulatory burden that any additional reporting would bring. Further consultation is needed to understand opportunities for streamlining data reporting, particularly given the COVID-19 challenges facing employers.
• There are gaps in the dataset that mean the true state of gender equality in the economy is not being reflected, and therefore is not being fully leveraged to drive targeted action. Key gaps include intersectional perspectives from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women, women living with disabilities, culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) women, and non-binary people. Other gaps include reporting from SMEs and Government.
• WGEA can play a larger role in educating and enabling organisations to take action on gender equality. They also have a larger role to play in compliance with the Act and holding organisations accountable.
• A range of stakeholders called for further consultation on any legislative reform proposals that might flow from this WGEA Review.

What needs to change – themes from consultations

There were a number of recommendations, considerations and concerns put forward by stakeholders. A summary of these changes is outlined below.

Theme 1 – The function of the Workplace Gender Equality Act

There are recommendations from stakeholders to increase the ambition of the Act to eliminate Australia's gender pay gap and for WGEA to work with employers to drive change in their workplaces and generate solutions to gender inequalities. There is support for WGEA to be seen as one part of a gender equality ecosystem and that Australia should aspire to having a world-class, national gender equality sector that enables organisations to develop strategies and measures to improve and sustain gender equality. Legislation should enable closer collaboration between the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) and alignment with the Fair Work Act 2009 could strengthen legislative measures to address gender inequality.

Theme 2 - Expanding the scope of the Act

There is strong, but not unanimous, agreement that the current coverage of the Act, around 40 per cent of employees, is too small and there is significant concern that the existing threshold excludes critical sectors: the exclusion of the public sector includes a large proportion of female employees including health and education. The exclusion of SMEs includes vulnerable casual and part-time employment by smaller businesses, male-dominated industries including construction, and states and territories where the dominant business model in some jurisdictions is small business. There is strong support for expanding the scope of the Act, with consideration for reporting approaches that are proportionate to the size of organisations. However, business groups are concerned about regulatory burden including for smaller employers.

Theme 3 - Transparency of remuneration data

There is strong agreement that focus on making gender pay gap data transparent at the organisation level (as opposed to just the industry level, which is currently reported by WGEA) will accelerate the pace of change towards closing the gender pay gap, as well as promote ethical leadership. The support for pay transparency is qualified by concerns of unintended consequences including impact on wage growth and morale. There are recommendations that organisations need support to transition to pay transparency and that an approach be developed in consultation with employers.

Theme 4 - Bridging the ‘action gap’

There is strong agreement that the current model of minimum standards is not creating change fast enough, organisations have policies in place, yet inequities persist, and culture change is slow. Inequitable access to policies is a significant barrier to their effectiveness.

Recommendations from stakeholders include:

• Action and progress on gender equality, through measurable and specific targets and benchmarking
• Targets and benchmarks to be co-designed with employers to be relevant to different sectors
• Expanded coverage of the minimum standards, to apply to all organisations covered by the Act
• Increase the minimum standards to include all of the gender equality indicators.

Theme 5 - Reducing the regulatory burden

There is concern that the WGEA reporting process is burdensome and seen by some as a ‘tick a box’ compliance requirement that provides little return in shifting gender inequality within their organisations, while others highlight that reporting to WGEA makes gender equality salient to organisations. There are recommendations to simplify the process, align reporting requirements in relation to gender equality and reduce reporting to every second year. There is concern that classifications must reflect sectors and contemporary organisational structures (some said that ANZSCO classifications are not relevant to the higher education sector).

Theme 6 - The intersection of gender with other forms of diversity

There is very strong support for the collection of diversity data, it is considered important that WGEA data is reflective of the diversity of the Australian community, and that the compounding factors contributing to gender inequality are addressed. However, it is also acknowledged that currently there is little diversity data available and there are risks associated with employers collecting the data. Most significantly there are sensitivities about data collection and disclosure of complex identities in environments where there are inequities and discrimination, and women feel unsafe. There is a longer-term vision for mandatory collection of additional diversity. There are also short-term recommendations for the collection of diversity data to be voluntary while WGEA addresses sensitive issues for both employers and employees arising from collecting additional diversity data. These issues include privacy issues, resourcing implications and employee uptake issues.

Theme 7 - Sexual and sex-based harassment, workplace discrimination and Respect@Work

The Respect@Work report has highlighted the failure of our current regulatory framework to keep workers safe from gendered violence and harassment, including sexual harassment. There is support for a recommendation that sex-based harassment and discrimination be specified as GEI 6 and that additional data is collected as specified by the Respect@Work Council is strongly supported. Further stakeholder recommendations include obligations on employers to report any sexual harassment complaints to an overarching body, such as WGEA or the Australian Human Rights Commission.

Theme 8 - Refining the Gender Equality Indicators (GEIs)

The understanding and definition of workplace flexibility and the intersections between home and work have been transformed by the COVID-19 pandemic. Stakeholder recommendations include:

• Dividing GEI 4 into two separate indicators: Flexible working arrangements and caring responsibilities
• Expand policy and leave related to domestic violence.

Theme 9 - Strengthening compliance

There is concern that the current procurement principles are not consistently applied or effective for all organisations and strong stakeholder recommendation for a review of these principles. There is acknowledgement that any expanded scope of the Act will require new compliance mechanisms and that these should be in line with WGEA’s current compliance posture, with proportionate and relevant sticks and carrots for organisations at all stages of progress and commitment towards gender equality. There are recommendations for stronger penalties for serious non-com pliance.

Theme 10 - Maximising the value of WGEA data

Many stakeholders called for ensuring the consistency and comparability with existing WGEA data collections is maintained, aligning data collection across different reporting mechanisms and ensuring all WGEA data is appropriately understood and cited (there were concerns about users mis-quoting WGEA data).

Theme 11 - Resourcing the role of WGEA

There is strong agreement that WGEA should be resourced to support any changes to the Act and should work closely with employers in different sectors to understand and achieve an action-based approach, step up the level of ambition on gender equality and work towards the elimination of Australia’s gender pay gap.

Theme 12 - Other

Given the importance of gender equality, there should be further targeted consultation with both employers and specialist organisations on all these recommendations.