Overview of 2012 New Zealand Census of Women’s Participation

New Zealand Census of Women’s Participation

Human Rights Commission

November 2012

Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand

http://live.isitesoftware.co.nz/neon2012/documents/hrc_womens_census2012.pdf

Do we want to keep seeing women in leadership positions? If we do we’re going to have to do something about it because it wont happen of its own accord. – Former PM and UNDP Administrator, Rt Hon Helen Clark.

“We are tired of having a “sphere” doled out to us, and of being told that anything outside that sphere is unwomanly.” – Kate Sheppard, Suffragette.

“The perceived predominance of women across some of the country’s key leadership positions during recent years… carries the risk of a double-edged sword. It is all too convenient to assume that this profile accurately represents the status of all professional women.” Dame Silvia Cartwrights, former Governor-General of New Zealand.

While women on boards of the top 100 companies listed on the New Zealand Stock Exchange have climbed over 10% for the first time, they have yet to reach 15% (14.75%).
At the rate of progress for women in corporate governance over the past decade,
it will be another 35 years before boardroom equality is achieved.

The good news

• Two of New Zealand’s markets, the NZSX top 100 and the New Zealand Debt Market (NZDX) have improved more than five percentage points from 2010
• Women are now 30% in sports governance, an improvement on 24% women in sports governance in 2010
• National executives of trade unions are now at just over 39% female representation
• Recent appointments will lift the proportion of women as public service chief executives over 24%

• The Corrections Department tops major public service departments in ensuring the implementation of equal pay and pay equity
• The New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants has taken a leadership role in urging its members to address gender pay differences
• The NZX has agreed to a gender diversity rule
• The Prime Minister John Key, and successive Ministers of Women’s Affairs, Hekia Parata and Jo Goodhew, have helped mainstream the debate about women on boards.

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Some businesses aim for women corporate governance  of 10% which appears to accept 90% male domination of governace as normal. The targets, goals and tiny frames set are not sufficient and may be a symptom of regression rather than progress in women’s representation. They are an unexpected and unacceptable denial of the Kate Sheppard legacy. They also dampen women’s expectations of progress.

The bad news

·       Two companies in the top ten, Sky Network Television and TrustPower, have no women on their boards and have no excuses

·       The New Zealand Police and the New Zealand Defence Force have stalled in terms of women’s progress at the top

·       Twenty two government departments have gender pay gaps bigger than the average pay gap in the labour market

·       Nine government departments have more than a 20% gender pay gap including Treasury and the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet

·       Women are still less than 30% of judges, less than 25% of senior academic staff, and less than 20% of top legal partnerships

·       The percentage of women on government‐ appointed state sector statutory bodies has slipped again

·       Women in Modern Apprenticeships are still not well represented in better paid trades

·       Women in Canterbury suffered significant job loss over the earthquake period and there is little measurable evidence that they are an employment priority.

Feminist Germaine Greer during her New Zealand visit in 2012 told audiences that women had
lost ground partly because they had become
far too polite.
There are now a number of women’s groups, business organisations, networks and campaigns working on the issue.
DR JUDY McGREGOR
EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES COMMISSIONER NEW ZEALAND HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION
(Since Norway passed its quota law in 2003 which has resulted in 40.3 percent female
board representation in listed companies, other European countries Spain, Iceland, France and Italy have followed (a 40% target) and two more, the Netherlands and Belgium, have legislated targets of 30% and 33% respectively. )

Cooks Food Group Limited is the only company on the NZAX to have proportionately (66.6%) greater numbers of women directors than men.
In accountacy our figures show that women are paid less even when experience is taken into account. In fact the pay gap is wider for those with more experience than those with less. Women with less than five years experience are paid on average nine percent less (than
men with similar experience) but those with over 21 years experience are paid 23% less
on average.”
Male attitudes towards women in terms of their ability to do the job,
and their level of comfort in having female colleagues were clearly an issue for some women in some workplaces.
“I have noticed that male tend to ask males for help/opinions etc. I’m not ignored but I have to make an effort to be noticed.”

In media and public relations men earn between $15‐17,000 more a year after the first four years in public relations. Early in their career men earn about $8,000 more than women. The biggest variance in salaries according to the survey is where women are paid almost $40,000 less than men in consultancy roles. In teaching and academic roles women are paid $8,500 less and in in‐house roles in the private and public sector women are paid on average $10,000 less. Only in in‐house public sector (local government and DHB) roles are women paid more, and then by only $1500.

Dr Strong’s doctoral thesis (2011) looked at the place of female journalists in the New Zealand newspaper workforce. Her thesis noted that, whereas the majority of the journalistic workforce is female, few women make it to top levels in the industry.

A study shows the Wikipedia editing community suffers from a lack of women editors. Despite an increase in the number of female editors over the past few years only 8.5% of editors are women. Wikipedia is keen to attract more women editors.

Parliament
Of the six women Ministers inside Cabinet,
three have a top ten ranking. They are Judith Collins at 5, Hekia Parata at 7, and Paula Bennett at 9. Other women in Cabinet are Anne Tolley
at 12, Kate Wilkinson at 16 and Amy Adams
at 19. One woman, Jo Goodhew, is a Minister outside Cabinet and Tariana Turia is a support party Minister.
Two departments have a gender pay gap in favour of women, the Ministry of Women’s Affairs and the Serious Fraud Office. The remaining
30 departments have gender pay gaps in favour of men, ranging from 2.77% at the Department of Corrections to 42% at the Ministry of Defence. Interestingly both these departments have a majority of male staff, with 43% women staff and 31% women staff respectively.
Sometimes the jobs typically done by women are down‐valued because they are seen as “women’s work”. Gender–neutral job‐ sizing is one response to ensure occupational segregation does not discriminate against women.

Using the most recent NZIS data (June 2011) the Human Rights Commission calculates the mean gender pay gap at 14.09% and the median gap at 9.64% in the labour market.

“The major driver for the pay gap between men and women continues to be the over‐ representation of women in lower graded roles and under‐representation in higher graded roles. Women represent 59 percent of the department overall, but in general they tend to dominate administration, secretarial and a variety of business support/clerical roles within the department.” ‐ DIA

Potentially discriminatory practices favoured men who were able to negotiate a better starting salary.
If a woman takes time away from work to have a family and/or works part time, she will not have as many publications and be less competitive when competing for funding as her male counterparts.