Women's Rights

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Women's rights have come a long way, but...

...women still fight for the right to make choices about their lives and bodies:

1. Women working fulltime earn $155 a week less than men on average

2. A lack of childcare places and cost robs around 160,000 women of the choice to work - Australia's employment participation rate for mothers with children under 6 is one of the lowest in OECD

3. A handful of powerful politicians are trying to limit women's access to terminations and contraception

4. Australia lacks government-funded paid maternity leave

5. 1.1 million women experience domestic violence

6. The law discriminates against single women and lesbian couples who want IVF or to adopt

7. Over 100,000 single mothers are living in poverty

8. Men hold 70% of seats in Parliament and most positions of power

Senator Lyn Allison
Leader of the Australian Democrats
This information is from the Australian Democrats Democrats website

How has a world leader fallen so far behind?

Australia once led the world in efforts to improve equality between women and men. We once set benchmarks in increasing women's influence over public decision-making; in promoting gendered analysis of public policies; in enshrining the principle of participatory democracy through a well-funded and consulted women's groups sector; and in a national commitment to legislative and policy innovations to enhance women's human rights and civil liberties.

Yet Australia's standing as a leader in the global struggle for gender equality is much diminished.

The Gender Report for the Democratic Audit of Australia paints a worrying picture of Australia's progress towards gender equality. Many achievements of an earlier period have been undone.

Women's Day again: so what's there to celebrate?

"...An estimated 20 million unsafe abortions are performed worldwide every year, resulting in the deaths of 70,000 women. Each year an estimated 2 million girls suffer genital mutilation. Twenty to 50 per cent of women experience some degree of domestic violence during marriage. The majority of women earn on average about 75 per cent of the pay of males for the same work. In most countries, women work approximately twice the unpaid time men do. Of the world's nearly 1 billion illiterate adults, two-thirds are women. Women hold 11.7 per cent of the seats in the world's parliaments. Nearly 70 per cent of the world's 1.3 billion poor people are women. Between 75 and 80 per cent of the world's 27 million refugees are women and children. And just so you know, International Men's Day is November 19..."
Click here to view Catherine Deveny's article in The Age March 7th 2007

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Women's health matters to me. Does it matter to you?

Why Women's Health?
Because women are different from men.

Various social issues impact on women's health and well-being, including sexual and family violence, social isolation and poverty.

In the current policy vacuum on women's health and wellbeing, a 10 Point Plan for Victorian Women's Health 2006-10 has been developed and endorsed by all Victorian women's health services.

We are seeking commitment to this plan from the government and the opposition.

  1. Social determinants of health approach – recognising that many factors determine the health status of an individual.
  2. Gender as a determinant of health
  3. Overarching values – including the right to live safely and free from violence and fear; the right for women to fulfil their potential and the right to be informed and have real choices
  4. Priority issues – for the next 5 years should be: state-wide reproductive and sexual health policy and funded programs; end violence against women; emotional and mental health
  5. High level cross-government leadership – establish new Ministerial Women’s Advisory Committees within each of the critical portfolio areas and a mechanism for cross collaboration
  6. Inclusive approach – establish a process to involve women’s health advocates in policy development and changed practice
  7. Honesty and transparency – in consultations and in resulting actions
  8. Resourcing and accountability – for implementing a gender approach and this 10-point action plan
  9. Women’s specific services – renew commitment
  10. Collaborative frameworks – support women’s health services to work collaboratively with other organisations in primary and acute care

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RU486 and Victorian Abortion Law Reform showed that we can lobby successfully. 

Let’s use our collective power to tell our politicians at State and Commonwealth level that we want women’s services. We want equality. We want to change these stats as they stand in 2006:

Lobby, lobby, lobby

1. Ask your candidates to send you their women's health policy
2. Tell your candidates your voting priorities:
Sexual and reproductive health
Prevent violence against women
Mental health and well-being
or your favourite.
3. Make sure the women members of parliament know how you feel
4. Take part in surveys
5. Write letters to newspapers
6. Join protests
7. Vote in electronic polls
8. Pass on this information to friends and people in your circle of influence. Never under estimate the ripple effect!

Other Helpful Websites

The International Women's Tribune Centre (IWTC) is an international non-governmental organization established in l976 following the United Nations International Women's Year World Conference in Mexico City. With a commitment to empowering people and building communities, IWTC provides communication, information, education, and organizing support services to women's organizations and community groups working to improve the lives of women, particularly low-income women, in Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Latin America and the Caribbean, Eastern Europe and Western Asia. Website

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