To meet the vision and ambitions set out in this Strategy, the Government is committed to continuing to consult closely and deepen its engagement with women and gender equality experts in Australia. Using decision-making processes, Government will drive action and make sure policies support efforts to achieve gender equality. Tracking progress and regular reporting will provide accountability for action, ensuring progress remains on track.
Government also needs to demonstrate best practice gender equality – not only in the policies, programs and services it provides, but also by showing leadership as an employer.
It is critical for Government to hear the views of experts and the lived experience of women to deliver practical changes to improve gender equality.
Governance and engagement
In the Australian Government, the Minister for Women will oversee whole-of-government implementation of the Strategy, although all Ministers are responsible for delivering on the Government's commitment to gender equality. The Office for Women reports to the Minister for Women and is the central gender equality institution within the Australian Public Service (APS). The Government has strengthened the Office for Women to put women and gender equality at the centre of policy and decision-making, and to lead implementation of the Strategy in the APS.
Other key parts of the Australian Government's architecture to achieve gender equality include: the Workplace Gender Equality Agency, which reports directly to the Minister for Women; the Sex Discrimination Commissioner in the Australian Human Rights Commission, as well as the other commissioners who focus on human rights and discrimination; the Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Commissioner; and the eSafety Commissioner. These institutions are key to the success of the Strategy through their roles in driving efforts to end gender discrimination across the country, improving equality in Australian workplaces and improving women's safety.
It is critical for government to hear the views of experts and the lived experience of women to deliver practical changes to improve gender equality. The Government will continue to invest in women's advocacy to elevate issues affecting women's safety and economic equality in Australia and to deliver expert and strategic advice to Government on the solutions required to meet the Strategy's vision. The voices of First Nations women; migrant and refugee women; women with disability; and those living in regional, rural and remote areas will be central to guide progress under this Strategy, ensuring Government takes a genuinely intersectional approach to women's policy.
The Government will also establish a regular survey to hear directly from women about their lives, concerns and priorities. A new research partnership will help build the evidence base on what works to achieve gender equality, especially in relation to driving economic equality. This will help drive progress in Government and support public–private collaboration on gender equality.
Implementation
Gender equality is affected by the work of every Government portfolio. The Government will take a coordinated, whole-of-government approach to achieve long-term progress, guided by the Strategy's vision, ambitions and priority areas.
Putting gender analysis at the centre of decision-making and investment
The Government has put gender equality at the centre of public policy and the Budget through the reintroduction of gender responsive budgeting. Gender responsive budgeting embeds consideration of gender impacts through Budget processes, so the Government can make informed and practical decisions that close gender gaps and improve the lives of women and men.
The Government will continue to improve the practices, processes and tools for gender responsive budgeting, which is a key mechanism for ensuring that Government policies and investments support this Strategy. This includes enhancing intersectional analysis as part of gender responsive budgeting processes. The system is still in the initial stages of implementation – when it is more bedded down and tested, Government can consider options to ensure that the system is robust and sustainable.
Gender analysis and consideration need to be embedded in key Government functions beyond the Budget process. This includes new strategies, agreements with states and territories, Government reviews, consultations and research, evaluation processes, and internal consultancy. The Government will explore options to build on current approaches to using its purchasing power to encourage action on gender equality outcomes through procurement, while maintaining consistency with Australia's international government procurement trade commitments.
The Office for Women is responsible for supporting the capability of the APS to embed gender analysis in its work through its advice and the guidance it produces, and will focus its efforts on the Strategy's priority areas. All APS departments are responsible for leadership on gender equality within their policy areas and ensuring staff have the skills, information and resources to deliver high quality gender analysis, and departments must invest in the uplift required.
What structural change looks like: using Government procurement to drive gender equality
Government awards an estimated $70 billion annually on goods and services, and this is a prime opportunity to boost women's economic equality.
Through the Workplace Gender Equality Procurement Principles, relevant businesses that employ 100 or more people must be compliant with the Workplace Gender Equality Agency Act 2012 in order to be eligible to win some Government work. Compliance requires employers to meet gender equality standards, report to the Workplace Gender Equality Agency on their performance against Gender Equality Indicators, and communicate their performance to employees, shareholders and governing bodies. From 1 April 2023, employers with 500 or more employers were required to have policies or strategies in place to support the 6 gender equality indicators in the Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012. The indicators cover the gender composition of governing bodies and of the workforce, equal remuneration, flexibility and care friendly work arrangements, workplace consultation on gender equality, and efforts to prevent and address sexual harassment.
Government will also introduce a requirement for businesses with 500 or more employees to commit to – and achieve – workplace targets against at least three of the Gender Equality Indicators, in order to win government work.
To support women owned and led businesses, the Government will introduce a public, searchable supplier register to identify women owned and led business. The register will also track and monitor Government contracts being awarded to women-owned and led businesses, and allow for these businesses to register their willingness to supply to government. The register will help identify relevant suppliers for Government, and will support development of future actions by building the evidence base on the experiences of women owned and led businesses navigating Government procurement processes.
Reporting framework:
tracking progress
The Government will track, measure and report on progress under the Strategy through a reporting framework that provides specificity about what success looks like, what steps the Australian Government needs to take to get there and how the Government will know if it is reaching its goals. The reporting framework will guide this work over the 10-year life of the Strategy.
The foundation and priority areas in the reporting framework illuminate the areas where change is needed. The ambitions describe what must be met to achieve the vision of the Strategy. The outcomes describe what success will look like and are supported by indicators that describe what information and data will be used to monitor progress. Actions that drive change change in the reporting framework outline where Government and others can focus effort and attention in order to achieve progress on the outcomes. Data measures will be disaggregated by sex or gender and, where possible, further disaggregated by specific priority cohorts. Data measures will also continue to evolve and be refined over the life of the Strategy, as new data becomes available. The Government will release a baseline data report within the Strategy's first year of publication. This report will link ambitions, outcomes and indicators in the reporting framework with the current state and nature of gender inequality in Australia, and will be used as a baseline for measuring progress.
Monitoring and public reporting tools and reviews
The Government will use a number of tools to report on the impact of the Strategy and broader progress towards achieving gender equality. These include:
- the Status of Women Report Card, which will be updated annually to report on the status of key outcomes and indicators under the Strategy
- the Women's Budget Statement, which will outline the actions and investments being made by Government in annual budgets to reach ambitions under the Strategy
- Departmental Annual Reports, where Australian Government agencies will report on their efforts to achieve gender equality and build gender analysis capability.
There will be two reviews of the Strategy, which will be published at the midpoint and at the end of the Strategy in 2034.
Focusing on the evidence
The reporting framework will draw on data and information sources available across government.
A robust evidence base will be required to identify the most effective ways to achieve gender equality. The Government will improve the use of the data that is available, collect new data where needed and develop tools to present an accurate and nuanced understanding of gender equality in Australia. A gender data action plan, complementing the Government's Data and Digital Government Strategy, will further support these efforts by building data and data analytics capabilities. The Government is also implementing reforms outlined in the 2021 review of the Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012 that will build on the Workplace Gender Equality Agency's role in collecting and reporting on employer data on workplace gender equality.
The Government is committed to continually improving intersectionality of data and recognises that limitations in current data impacts on the ability to measure all people's experiences of inequality. Where possible, and increasingly over time, information will be disaggregated to measure progress towards gender equality for First Nations people; culturally and linguistically diverse people; migrant and refugee people; people with disability; LGBTIQA+ people; people in rural, regional and remote communities; children and young people; and older people. Where new data relevant to the Strategy's outcomes are available, these will be incorporated into regular reporting.
The Government is also committed to ensuring First Nations communities retain ownership of their cultural knowledge and intellectual property, and is promoting the Indigenous Data Sovereignty Principles in its collection of data under the reporting framework.
With sustained ambition and effective investment and effort against the Strategy's priority areas, this reporting and data should start to show a genuine move towards an Australia that works for women, where people are safe, treated with respect, have choices and have access to resources and equal outcomes no matter their gender.