Ms THEOPHANOUS (Northcote): This is a historic moment. Countless individuals have strived to progress gender equality and improve outcomes for women and girls, and consecutive Labor premiers have delivered real change. Only this week we said goodbye to a giant amongst them. Today we build on that legacy. Today we enshrine the Andrews government’s commitment to the women and men of Victoria to enact gender equality legislation. As a mother of two young girls, as a daughter proudly following the lead of my own mother and as a representative of an electorate that actually has more women than men, I am immensely pleased to be here today to speak in support of this bill and see our promise to the people of Victoria become a reality.

We should not need a gender equality bill, but we do. No doubt we will see some negativity from some quarters, but that will not deter us, because frankly we are used to fighting—women are used to fighting. The pushback did not deter us when we fought for equal pay, for paid parental leave, for our reproductive rights, for protections against discrimination or for the vote, and it certainly will not deter us now. Just like we have always done, we will stand up and we will fight, and I lend my voice now to that movement and that legacy and to all those women’s voices who have come before my own. It might seem like we have come so far that perhaps the fight is over, but all we have to do is look at the other side of the chamber to see how far yet we have to go. Nothing demonstrates the disdain for gender equality held by the opposition more than the fact that they have put just a single speaker up for this bill. Might I mention that the Greens are notably absent as well—disgraceful on both accounts.

Deputy Speaker, as you know, I have two young daughters. I think about the world they will grow up in, and I compare it to the world that my own mum grew up in. When mum was pregnant with her first baby, my brother Harry, she was working as a pharmacist. Perhaps naively she shared with her employer the exciting news that she was expecting. That same night she got a call from him to say he ‘couldn’t afford to keep her on’. She was devastated. Bruised by this experience, she took up another position soon after but kept the pregnancy a secret—until her new boss, thankfully a far better man, told her to stop lifting the heavy boxes because it might hurt the baby. She breathed a sigh of relief.

The road to equality is long and it is bumpy, but we owe it to our daughters and granddaughters, our sisters, our nieces and our mothers to fight for an equal future—a future where they will not be paid less for doing the same job as a man; a future where they are valued and respected; a future in which they never have to utter the words ‘me too’.

The Andrews Labor government’s commitment to equality, in particular gender equality and ending family violence, is second to none in this country. We held the Royal Commission into Family Violence, secured record investment to keep women and children safe, laid the groundwork for landmark family violence sector reform, appointed women to hold 50 per cent of positions on our public boards and launched Victoria’s first ever gender equality strategy, all in just four years. I am humbled to have contributed to that work, but I also know that we have a long way to go before we achieve true equality.

In many ways we are going backwards. We still see entrenched structural, social and economic disadvantage for women. We still see workplace discrimination, huge disparities in unpaid care responsibilities, blatant sexism across the public domain and low representation of women in positions of power. Most disappointingly, we still see some political parties lagging when it comes to female representation, and more and more we hear stories of harassment and bullying in the party room. Our government has more women on its front bench than those opposite have at all in this place, but when challenged on their poor record of electing women they tell us that we should have just let them win—that we should not have run against their candidates. Now, we often hear the opposition spouting that it is the Labor Party’s fault on many and varied issues, but this takes the cake. The party that still retains a spousal attendance policy is blaming us for their low numbers. Put women in winnable seats! They may just surprise you and win.

That brings me to my dear friend and colleague the member for Footscray. This house is a much better place for having her here, especially considering who the Greens political party tried to run against her to knock her off. What a disgrace.

What we do here matters. Who we are as leaders and decision-makers matters. We will continue to call these things out, and we will continue to drive a change in culture that embraces gender equality. That means fighting against negative and stereotyped attitudes towards women. It means building respect for women and social permissibility around women in power or in traditionally male-dominated industries. It means more women in Parliament and in decision-making roles. The thing is, equality not only advantages women; it also advantages us as a society. We know that as we move towards equality in pay and in workforce participation we see a huge bump in GDP. Similarly, when we have more diverse leadership teams we see better performance outcomes. When caring roles are more equally shared we see stronger families and stronger communities. Perhaps most importantly, when we move towards gender equality we also move towards reducing violence against women, because we know that violence against women does stem from disrespect and gender inequality.

Deputy Speaker, as you know, I had the opportunity to work alongside the former and formidable member for Northcote, Fiona Richardson, in her role as Australia’s first Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence. It was during this time that the Andrews government delivered the Royal Commission into Family Violence and invested an unprecedented $2.6 billion in the sector to forever transform how we approach this scourge—more than the commonwealth and more than any other state or territory.

Of course, having a royal commission is one thing—it is a very important thing—but what is most important is what happens next. There are two ways that can go. One is to take the document, smile politely and sit it on a shelf. The other is to take responsibility and implement every single recommendation in that document, and that is exactly what we are doing. Our Premier was prepared to say the system is broken and we need to fix it. A key element in delivering on that promise to fix it is what we have before us today in the house, because if we are ever to challenge a culture of disrespect towards women, we must have social, economic and political equality for women.

This bill aims to improve gender equality within Victorian government workplaces by requiring organisations to report on their progress to achieve gender equality and apply a gendered lens to their policies, programs and services. Public sector organisations will now have to demonstrate that they are actively working towards achieving gender equality. No other jurisdiction in Australia has taken this proactive approach. Indeed very few countries in the world have laws as ambitious as this one that we are debating today.

Under this bill over 300 Victorian public sector organisations, including our public service, councils and unis, will have to implement a gender equality action plan and report on its progress. Importantly, the bill also establishes a new public sector gender equality commission that will scrutinise the performance of these organisations and will have the power to call them out if they are not demonstrating real progress over time. Organisations will be required to publish details of what they have and have not achieved.

But one of the most exciting parts of this bill in my view is its power to issue funding and procurement guidelines. Let me unpack that a little. We know that the gender pay gap in Victoria remains at 9.6 per cent and that women’s workforce participation is still 11 per cent lower than men’s. We know our labour markets are still divided along gender lines, with women still employed in jobs that pay less. Shifting this occupational segregation and evening out the spectrum of employment between men and women is a key lever to improving economic security for women. We can only do that if we have the private sector on board too. This bill allows us to leverage our position as a major purchaser of goods and services to drive equality measures not just for the public sector but for the private domain. It says to the private sector, ‘We will engage with you, but only if you back in gender equality too’.

Finally, I want to acknowledge and thank all those who have contributed to the development of the bill and the important work that preceded it, including Fiona Richardson; the former Minister for Women, the member for Sydenham; the current minister, the member for Dandenong; the Premier; and the many, many Victorians who engaged in all of the consultations. We are committed to building a Victoria where gender equality is a reality rather than a goal. I know there is a long road ahead, but this historic bill is a crucial step towards achieving the cultural change that we want and that we need. To that end, I commend the bill to the house.