The A-C-T-U's report changing the Rules for Working Women says the gender pay gap is influenced by a number of factors.
They include discrimination in hiring practices, women being disproportionately over-represented in lower-wage occupations, and caring responsibilities, which often force women to leave the workforce for extended periods of time.
A-C-T-U president Michele O'Neil says workplace rules and structures have let women down.
“We need to change the rules because at the moment in Australia women are paid 14.6 percent less than men. It's also the case that women are much more likely to be in casual, insecure and contract work. They are not able to get the hours of work that need and in many cases they are not able to accrue entitlements. Also, women are retiring with 47 percent less superannuation than men.”
The report says women are impacted by the trend towards casual work with more women than men employed on a casual basis.
The A-C-T-U says casual employees are more likely to be in industries and occupations increasingly subject to cuts in weekend and holiday pay, including hospitality, pharmacy, retail, and fast food workers.
Ms. O'Neill says workers need more protections, not less.
“Workplace laws need to change to support local women because they are mainly in casual and insecure jobs where they can't get enough hours work for what they need. This is really important because at the moment Australia's wages are not keeping up with the cost of living to be able to get a fair wage to be able to access paid leave if they are not well or their kids are sick and to be able to have a chance of getting enough superannuation.”
The A-C-T-U also wants a new expert gender equality panel to be established under the Fair Work Commission, with the power to hear sexual harassment and sex discrimination claims.
The panel would also be able to implement stronger pay equity provisions, with the commission legally required to promote equal pay for women.
Ming Long is the Executive Chair of the Diversity Council of Australia.
She doesn't believe a panel under the Fair Work Commission is the way to go when it comes to combating harassment.
“Anything in respect to pay then maybe they can look at that, but I think sexual harassment and discrimination claims actually is probably better not done with Fair Work because all of that stuff may not have a paid side to things. But certainly, there needs to be a greater focus on harassment and discrimination because we know it continues to exist within workplaces.”
Ms. Long says, along with legislative changes, a cultural shift needs to occur to combat entrenched bias in the workplace.
She says there's a power imbalance in society that has seen certain professions, which are female dominated, undervalued.
“We need to have a discussion in Australia about what values we are going to have and what roles we are going to prioritize in society. We need to value those who have caring responsibilities as well as those who are going to educate our next generation of kids as much as people who say have roles within financial services. Why is a teacher, a nurse, or a pre-school education person not an essential service and then paid accordingly?”
Apart from the recommendations to abolish primary and secondary carer definitions and giving families 26 weeks' parental leave to use how they please, a separate finding calls for parents to be given the right to family-friendly working hours, rather than just the power to request them.
Indian Australian mother of two Harita Chugh works for a government organization in Melbourne. She says in most government organization through enterprise agreement pay scale is equal for everyone however in private organizations management has the discretion to pay as they judge.
