We are all here because this is an important occasion.
It’s good to be here for the HeForShe breakfast as part of our celebrations for International Women’s Day.
I particularly note his presence with us today of the Chief of Army, General David Morrison, and I recall his powerful admonition to his fellow soldiers in which he did not mince his words. He said, “The standard you walk past is the standard you accept.”
That is the challenge of International Women’s Day: always to lift our vision.
It’s not to walk past the big challenges.
It’s not to accept the gender pay gap as something that will never close.
It’s not to accept inflexible childcare as just a fact of life.
It’s not to accept the social and cultural barriers that hinder women and girls from participating and achieving in every part of our national life.
And above all else, it is to reject violence against women in every way, shape and form – because violence is a crime.
As a husband, as the brother of three sisters, as the father of three daughters, violence against women is absolutely abhorrent to me.
Real men don’t hit women, they don’t threaten women, they don’t bully women.
It’s worth recalling today the first female member of this Parliament, Dame Enid Lyons, who in her first speech said: the problems of government are not the problems of statistics, they’re the problems of human values and human hearts and human feelings.
And that is the issue, is it not, the darkness as well as the lightness in the human heart that produces these difficulties that we struggle against on a day such as today.
Today I want to focus on the problems faced by some migrant women in our Australian community who often don’t understand their rights under Australian law, who sometimes have unsupportive communities and sometimes have oppressive families and even face problems of forced marriage, child marriage and worse.
Today, I announce that in keeping with the recommendations of the National Plan to Reduce Violence Against Women and Children, the Government will provide additional support to make our justice system more accessible for migrant women.
It is a daunting task to approach our courts at the best of times, but it must be terrifying if your language skills are poor and if you do so without the support of your family or your community.
So, the Government will work with the Judicial Council on Cultural Diversity and the Migration Council of Australia to make our justice system more approachable and more sensitive to migrant women and their families.
Just as General Morrison did with the Army – a revered and respected institution – where change is needed, we need to call it out.
If you love a community, you must face its darkness because that is the only way to change.
This means calling out child marriage for the crime it is.
It means recognising our citizenship pledge to the Australian people; whose democratic beliefs we share, whose rights and liberties we respect and whose laws we uphold and obey, is a pledge that includes the rights and liberties of women as well.
It isn’t a statement for some Australians, it’s one for all Australians, and sadly, there is no part of Australia where we can truthfully say that violence against women is not a problem.
It’s a problem in our migrant communities, it’s a problem in our remote communities and it’s a problem in our wealthiest and leafiest communities as well and this is why domestic violence will be addressed by the Council of Australian Governments this year.
We have already heard this morning of the tragic incidents and the frequency of domestic violence. One in three Australian women has suffered domestic violence in a lifetime, and every week, one Australian woman dies as a result of domestic violence.
So, we have to turn good intentions into real action, because good intentions – while better than nothing – are not enough.
So I do applaud the UN Women’s HeForShe campaign because it means men and boys stepping up and finding our voice to stand up for the rights of Australian women.
We do have, here in this country of ours, a strong story, but it’s not a perfect one when it comes to creating more opportunities and more freedom for Australian women.
Yes, we did lead the world 120 years ago when we gave women the right to vote, and yes, 20 years ago we were a signatory to the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action that we recognise this week and on International Women’s Day. And more recently, we did use our G20 presidency to ask the leaders of the world’s biggest economies to commit to reducing the gap in participation rates between men and women.
But there is always more to do and that’s what we pledge ourselves to this day. We pledge ourselves to do more.
I am delighted to be with you for this initiative and I am delighted to pledge my support for it.
Thank you.
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