4. Question No. 4—WomenARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa) (remote) to the Minister for WomenQuestion No. 4—WomenCHRIS BISHOP (National): Point of order Mr Speaker. Thank you Mr Speaker. Just in relation to question No. 4 before you call it I think a few of us were slightly surprised to see the wording of question No. 4 today because it starts with In light of today being International Women's Day". I'd draw the Speaker's attention to Speakers' ruling 174/6 which says "(1) Questions must not be prefaced with a statement; or (2) with assertions or assumptions such as 'given' or 'in the light'."—most recently from 2017—SPEAKER: Right. No I accept I made an error in accepting the question. I will take the member's advice and be much stricter in accepting questions from now on. CHRIS BISHOP (National): Well no—point of order Mr Speaker. The point I was going to make before you stood up sir was that if there is going to be a slight liberalisation in relation to the rule that particularly primary questions have to start with a question word I don't think there would be much disagreement in relation to that if there was to be some slightly loose liberalisation if that is indeed where we're going. SPEAKER: No. I want to make it clear: this was not a deliberate decision on my part. It was an error and I will be looking very carefully at all primary questions—more carefully than I have been—to make sure that they're fully within the rules and I'll warn the whips and others who put them in of that now. 4. ARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa) (remote) to the Minister for Women: In light of today being International Women's Day what work is she progressing to break biases towards women?Hon JAN TINETTI (Minister for Women) (remote): Happy International Women's Day. The theme of International Women's Day today is "Break the Bias". Today I'm calling on all of us to reflect that research shows around 80 percent of the gender pay gap is caused by factors such as conscious and unconscious bias. That means we all have a role to play in breaking the bias and being responsible for our own thoughts and actions. Under Labour we've made good progress in closing the gender pay gap in the Public Service. It's at the lowest it's ever been at 8.6 percent down from 9.6 last year. The Government's eliminating the gender pay gap and the Public Service action plan is implementing actions and milestones towards eliminating the gender pay gap in the Public Service. I'm also progressing work to see those gains in the private sector pay gap with Māori Pacific disabled and ethnic women.Arena Williams: How else is the Government leading by example to break the biases women face?Hon JAN TINETTI: The Government appoints people to over 430 State sector governance boards and committees. The Government has met its target of 50 percent women's participation on public sector boards with 50.9 percent of appointed members being women as of December 2020 the highest ever proportion achieved. Equal representation of women in governance leadership and parliamentary roles breaks biases inequality and discrimination.Arena Williams: What work is under way to reduce barriers for women in the labour market?Hon JAN TINETTI: As a Government we are committed to ensuring our economic plan is a plan that works for women and in particular includes the most vulnerable groups of women. I've been working with Cabinet colleagues on a cross-Government approach that addresses the intermediate impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on women as part of the Government's wider COVID-19 economic recovery programme. This has culminated in the development of New Zealand's first ever Women's Employment Action Plan a dedicated plan to embed medium- and long-term changes. When the employment action plan is completed it will be about more than simply jobs. It's also about reducing barriers increasing access to childcare and providing training and support for women in business and entrepreneurship. We can create a future free from gender pay discrimination."