A citizens’ jury, put together by the state government ahead of its proposed Gender Equality Bill, is recommending a 40:40:20 target – 40 per cent women, 40 per cent men, and 20 per cent flexible – for all senior management and executive roles in the public sector.

Women's Health and Wellbeing Barwon South West acting chief executive officer Justine Devonport said quotas would help eliminate structural discrimination women could face heading into any role.

“I think it’s a positive step,” she said. “It allows women to represent other women and helps redress that entrenched male privilege that happens.”

“My immediate feelings about quotas is that if you say you’re against them then you’re almost saying that there’s been no women of merit for the past 100 years. People say ‘well, you can get there on merit’. So men have had merit throughout history, but women haven’t been and still aren’t as clever, talented and meritorious?”

Ms Devonport said building gender balance in the workplace went both ways.

“When you look at certain sectors like the health sector where it’s mainly women, you’ve got to ask the question, why aren’t we attracting men? It’s possibly because stereotypes say men aren’t allowed to have that flexibility, or the part-time option,” she said.

“It’s about equality across both genders and shattering stereotypes for both genders so that we have equal and accessible workplaces for all. It doesn’t just make it good for women, but it will also improve the way men can work as well,” she said.

The jury also recommends incentives for organisations to implement quotas, establishing an independent authority to oversee progress and starting programs to eliminate gender bias in career pathways.

South West TAFE chief executive officer Mark Fidge welcomed the plan of introducing gender quotas in the public sector, but said the TAFE was already leading the way.

“We’re really proud of the fact that we’ve got around 55 per cent women to 60 per cent men in our management team,” he said.

Its board is made up of 70 per cent women, led by chair Felicity Melican.

“It hasn’t been a strategic or deliberate decision but rather having the most capable and skilled people for the job,” Mr Fidge said.

“I think it’s really exciting for us as an organisation that we’re leading the way on this.”

Mr Fidge said the ratio of women across the whole organisation was about 55 per cent.

A flexible working environment played an important part in retaining staff, Mr Fidge said.

Flexible work arrangements have already been shown to save employers big bucks.

Wannon Water was among the organisations that were sampled as part of a state government investigation into flexible work arrangements earlier this year. It found the company’s flexible set-up saved it $150,000 annually.

Wannon Water branch manager of people and resilience Jeremy Dixon said the organisation had a strong focus on flexibility, particularly around providing more gender-equitable solutions.

“There are studies outside of this which show that if your engagement is increased… then there’s productivity increases, happiness increases, cultural aspects increase and so that results in better outcomes for everyone… there’s less stress people are taking home,” he said.

“Some of the studies show that by reducing work hours people make sure that they get stuff done because they’re planning a lot more effectively. We have executive members on flexible working arrangements. It’s right through.” 

Visit engage.vic.gov.au/gender-equality to view the jury’s report or make a comment on the draft bill.

The gender equality bill is expected to be introduced to Parliament in early 2019.

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