The shadow treasurer, Chris Bowen, has criticised Australia’s top economic policy-making bodies, asking why they have failed to hire women for their most senior roles.
He has said some of Australia’s biggest economic challenges have a gender dimension – such as female participation rates, the gender pay gap and the retirement income gap – and the dearth of senior female appointments at top economic institutions must have an impact.
He has also criticised Treasury’s decision to neglect targets for senior female appointments that were set by the former Treasury secretary Martin Parkinson.
He has said Parkinson, who now heads the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, had tried to change Treasury’s “blokey” culture by setting gender targets and “it is a pity that Treasury has withdrawn from the program since Parkinson’s departure”.
Parkinson was sacked in 2013 by Tony Abbott – one of his first acts as prime minister – and replaced with John Fraser in 2014.
Writing for Guardian Australia, Bowen says the recent appointment of Susan Kiefel as Australia’s first chief justice of the high court provided a moment for stocktake.
He says Australia has now had a female prime minister and governor-general, and every state bar one has had a female premier.
“But Australia has never had a female treasurer,” he says. “Or female secretary to the Treasury. Or a female Reserve Bank governor. Or deputy governor. Or female chair of the ACCC. Or Apra. Or Asic. I think you get the gist.
“Australia has a problem in that its many highly accomplished female economists have not been able to break through to the leadership roles they deserve and our nation is accordingly missing out on the potential contribution they have to make as our most senior economic policy makers.”
Janet Yellen, the first female chair of the US Federal Reserve, is one of the most powerful female economists in the world.
Christine Lagarde, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, the first woman to lead the IMF, is one of the most powerful women in the world.
“And yet, here in Australia no female has headed a national economic institution and there is no sign of this changing any time soon,” Bowen says.
He says Australia’s top economic institutions need to improve their gender diversity if they want corporate Australia to improve female representation in boardrooms.
“Until the government of the country gets its act together in our most important economic institutions, corporate Australia will have a legitimate point that Canberra shouldn’t be holding others to standards that we fail to meet ourselves,” Bowen says.
