Genter Julie AnneHon JULIE ANNE GENTER (Minister for Women): Tēnā koe Mr Speaker. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. The Green Party has long led on increasing female representation in leadership and I think that we've demonstrated just what can be achieved by that when you have explicit policies. We now have 75 percent of our caucus who are female—and incredibly high performing—the highest percentage of course for a long time of any party in this Parliament. I'd love to see other parties follow our lead especially the National Party which sadly still has less than one-third of their MPs as women.Now since I've taken on this role as Minister for Women I've done a number of interviews on the persistent gender wage gap and a number of interviews that have demonstrated to me why it is so necessary that we have a Ministry for Women to promote women's affairs. There is an understandable perception out there in the public that somehow we've already achieved gender equality that there is no need for explicit policies and that men and women are paid the same for similar work. The data shows us that is simply not true. There is a persistent wage gap and women are significantly under-represented in governance and leadership in the private sector at a much higher rate than in the public sector. Just this week we had the Diversity Dividend Report that Westpac New Zealand puts out and I was quite shocked at just how low the percentage of women in leadership roles still is. It's only at 29 percent even though women make up 49 percent of the workforce in New Zealand. What this report shows is that having equal female and male leadership can lead to better economic outcomes. It's actually better for business. This is a major economics consultancy that's come out done the research on this and demonstrated that. So when I go out and I say it's my goal as Minister for Women and this Government's goal to improve the situation for women and girls in this country to close the gender pay gap both in the public sector and in the private sector and to ensure that there's greater diversity in leadership and governance particularly in the private sector where it's lagging behind the public sector—when we say that inevitably we get a bit of a response from some quarters of New Zealand that say It should just be the best person for the job. We shouldn't hire women just because they're women."Well what that view fails to take into account is that women currently aren't getting the jobs they deserve and they would do very well at because of bias. And that is clear in this report. It says the top barrier cited is a perception of a lack of female talent and yet it also says businesses would be better performing and better off if there were more women in management roles.So the only way to address this bias that is out there in the workplace is to have explicit plans and policies and a commitment to address this problem. The research showed that only 40 percent of businesses had a gender parity strategy and only 26 percent of them were even measuring themselves against it. So this is time for us to come together in Aotearoa and to achieve better outcomes for all people.I'm so proud not only to be in the Green Party but to be part of this new progressive Government which is in and of itself more diverse—certainly more than the previous Government and probably any Government that we've had in New Zealand. I think it's a fantastic strength of this new Government that we represent different views and that we represent a wider range of New Zealanders. While the Opposition will try to paint this as some sort of problem for the Government in fact it is our strength that we will negotiate and work together on the areas where we have common ground and we will represent more than just the top 10 percent or just those who are already doing the best or just those who happen to be in the dairy industry in New Zealand. The previous Government tended to over-represent certain sectors of society. We want to represent all of New Zealand and we will make better decisions when we do that. This Government is committed to policies that will increase female representation but it's going to take more than that. We've already demonstrated that by extending paid parental leave to 22 weeks and then 26 weeks which is going to help all families and particularly women; by increasing the minimum wage—there are 350000 women in precarious work in New Zealand and increasing the minimum wage will improve their situation—and of course by ditching the last Government's terrible pay equity and equal pay legislation which would have put in place barriers to women actually achieving equal pay.This Government is committed to equality and well-being for all New Zealanders and we know that by taking an evidence-based and inclusive approach we can achieve that."