Diversity Council Australia (DCA) has welcomed the introduction of new legislation – Workplace Gender Equality Amendment (Closing the Gender Pay Gap) Bill 2023 – to address the gender pay gap.
DCA has long advocated for interventions that bring improvements in the gender pay-gap in Australia.
In our submission to the review of the Workplace Gender Equality Act we called for consideration of greater transparency of pay-gap data. Such transparency is demonstrated to contribute to closing the pay gap in individual employers, across industries and therefore, across the economy.
In that submission, we also made suggestions about reporting sexual harassment and are glad that these changes are being implemented. This was also recommended by the Respect@Work Report and by the Respect@Work Council, which includes DCA’s CEO, Lisa Annese.
Quotes attributable to Lisa Annese CEO, Diversity Council Australia:
“DCA welcomes the introduction of new legislation to help to close the gender pay gap in Australia.
“Greater transparency of pay-gap data has been shown to contribute to closing the pay gap in individual employers and across industries, and we are pleased to see changes that will deliver greater transparency being introduced to the Workplace Gender Equality Act.
“We are also pleased that the new legislation will include new requirements about reporting on sexual harassment.
“DCA looks forward to the impact these changes will have on the pay gap and the experience and safety of women work.
“DCA will continue to advocate for more improvements in the Workplace Gender Equality Act, including more intersectional data to better understand how race, culture, disability and age, for example, impact on pay-gaps and experiences of discrimination and harassment at work.”
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Media contact: media@dca.org.au