In this episode, we speak to the South Australian Minister for Women, Katrine Hildyard. 128 years ago, South Australia became the first place in the world where women could both vote and stand for parliament. Fast forward to the present day, we speak to Katrine about the reality women are facing in South Australia that shows we still have a long way to go. Listen to this episode as Katrine tells us about her burning passion for fairness, and the key policy areas that aim to tackle intersectionality, the pay gap, domestic violence and more.
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Carley Bishop
This is a Just Gold podcast.
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Carley Bishop
Captured on the lands of the peoples of the Eastern Kulin nation. We pay our respects to the elders past, present and emerging. In this episode we speak to South Australia's Minister for Women, Katrine Hildyard. Katrine paints a picture of the reality women are facing in her state and the key policy areas that address intersectionality, the pay gap and domestic violence.
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Carley Bishop
This episode is made with the support of City of Adelaide, the University of Adelaide, Fay Gale Center for Research on Gender and the South Australian Government Office for Women.
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Katrine Hildyard
First of all, just from the outset, I'd really like to acknowledge that when making this film on Ghana land and pay my respect to Ghana elders, past and present and to Ghana future leaders, and in making that acknowledgment, I wanted to wholeheartedly offer my gratitude to the many Aboriginal women leaders who generously share wisdom and culture and who are often tireless, fearless advocates over years, over decades and over lifetimes about all of the issues that impact women in our communities.
00:01:35:01 - 00:02:15:08
Katrine Hildyard
I wanted to to make that acknowledgment. And in making that acknowledgment and to get to your question about the various issues that women in South Australia face, I wanted to say that there is so much intersectionality. Often women who are experiencing particular issues or who come from diverse cultural backgrounds or who are living with disability, living in poverty, experiencing mental ill health, are often of course experiencing a deeply in an interconnected range of issues.
00:02:16:15 - 00:02:50:12
Katrine Hildyard
I was just reflecting on that question and thinking that, you know, it was only 128 years ago since South Australia, South Australian activists, women fiercely and proudly fought to make South Australia the first place in the world where women could both vote and stand for Parliament. That was an incredible achievement that was won by that fierce cohort of activists, women.
00:02:52:00 - 00:03:27:07
Katrine Hildyard
I often reflect, however, that we do have a lot to celebrate in that regard in South Australia, in terms of the advancement of women. But I often say that our riots were hard won, but we are absolutely not done because women still experience in South Australia a gender pay gap of around 7.4%. Women continue to experience domestic, family and sexual violence at a much higher rate than men do.
00:03:28:13 - 00:04:02:07
Katrine Hildyard
Women still are not equally represented in every aspect of public life and there are many other issues that we contemplate here in South Australia. We know that gender inequality lies at the core of all of those issues. We know that women were disproportionately affected by COVID in terms of economic security, loss of income, and also in terms of an increase in violence.
00:04:02:16 - 00:04:40:16
Katrine Hildyard
So here in South Australia, as is the case with other places in Australia, I think gender inequality continues to drive economic insecurity, economic inequality and also the horrific prevalence of violence against women here in South Australia and sadly beyond. Those are two of the key areas that women here in South Australia face. But there are many, many others and there's certainly a much more detailed explanation of each of those that I'm sure we will get to as we have our conversation today.
00:04:41:08 - 00:05:11:01
Katrine Hildyard
So I think that as women age, a number of the issues that are prevalent or can be prevalent throughout a woman's life absolutely intensify. So when I think about the issue of economic inequality, we know that that is particular really felt even more strongly when women reach retirement age because we know that they retire with far less retirement savings.
00:05:11:23 - 00:05:45:09
Katrine Hildyard
We know that the impact of having been employed insecurely throughout a woman's life is felt very cleanly throughout her life, but also at the end of her her working life. We know that older women are among the force, the fastest growing group of people experiencing homelessness and housing insecurity. So there are a range of issues that Patty Kelly impact women as they age.
00:05:45:15 - 00:06:43:01
Katrine Hildyard
Also, of course, I think that there are particular societal expectations that particularly negatively impact women. We know that sadly, the way that women are perceived in our community means that they are often, not always, but often assessed in relation to their appearance or their capacity to care. And as women age and as our society continues to see attractiveness in a particular frame that is perpetuated in all sorts of of ways, we know that women can become invisible in terms of the lens, that unfair lens that is placed on a particular way of viewing appearance.
00:06:43:02 - 00:07:27:11
Katrine Hildyard
I also think that women at work can become less visible already, as I spoke about. Often women are employed insecurely. They are more likely to be employed in industries that predominantly employ women and structurally pay less as whole industries. So there is certainly a lack of economic freedom or power, if you like, for women. But also, I think that, again, gender inequality and that lens on what women should be doing or should look like at a particular age has an impact.
00:07:27:22 - 00:07:44:06
Katrine Hildyard
Sometimes unconsciously, sometimes certainly more consciously on their access to particular opportunities in a workplace or indeed across a whole industry. Employability is absolutely on the agenda.
00:07:44:20 - 00:07:49:05
Carley Bishop
We ask Katrine what's happening in South Australia at the moment in regards to women's issues.
00:07:49:12 - 00:08:32:16
Katrine Hildyard
First of all, one of the things that we know and I mentioned earlier is that women were disproportionately impacted by COVID in terms of their capacity to economically, equally and actively participate in our economy. And when I say that, I mean, we know that jobs were lost in sectors that are particularly dominated by women. So arts, tourism, retail, hospitality, which have a high proportion of women and are often already, I guess, industries that have a characteristic of being insecure.
00:08:32:24 - 00:09:14:13
Katrine Hildyard
We know that women in those industries who were already engaged in insecure employment, lost hours, lost jobs, and that many are still recovering from that particular loss. So one of the things that our government has committed to is to invest in industries like tourism and the arts. But we're also doing other things in that industrial relations space. For instance, we are exploring a scheme to provide portability of long service, leave entitlements to the community sector and the community sector employs 85% women.
00:09:14:22 - 00:09:44:17
Katrine Hildyard
So that will certainly make a difference to their economic security. Another thing that I'm very proud that we are doing is that we are intending to introduce legislation to provide paid domestic violence, leave for anybody employed pursuant to the State Fair Work Act. We know that that is also happening in the federal arena. So I think there is an opportunity there to align those efforts.
00:09:45:02 - 00:10:18:11
Katrine Hildyard
One of the other things that we have committed to doing is to creating a gender pay gap task force here in South Australia so that we can collaboratively look very deeply at those structural economic inequalities, any particular bias, so that we can address that gender pay gap. So they are just some of the things that we are doing that will assist women, empower women to equally and actively participate in our economy.
00:10:18:14 - 00:10:21:15
Carley Bishop
Katrina spoke to us about domestic violence and older women.
00:10:22:04 - 00:11:19:22
Katrine Hildyard
We sadly know domestic violence is a horrific scourge that seems to continue unabated across our community. And it is something that I think all of us, no matter how position, has a responsibility to do whatever is within our power, within our sphere of influence, to address in terms of older women experiencing domestic violence. We know that older women and women who do experience, I guess, intersectionality are more likely to experience domestic violence, hence why there is that terrible figure that we know about older women being the fastest growing group of those people experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity.
00:11:19:23 - 00:11:52:20
Katrine Hildyard
So we know that domestic violence is the biggest driver of homelessness among women, and we know that older women are among the group for whom housing, insecurity and homelessness is growing. So it does have a particular impact on older women. The other issue I would just raise, we are turning our minds to introducing legislation to criminalize coercive control.
00:11:53:22 - 00:12:32:13
Katrine Hildyard
Coercive control, as many people know, is a form of domestic abuse that is all about diminishing a person's rights, a person's sense of self-worth. It is about controlling a person. And as we move to criminalize coercive control, what we are doing is moving away from an incident based understanding and addressing of domestic violence to one that also addresses patterns of domestic violence.
00:12:32:22 - 00:13:16:20
Katrine Hildyard
And I say that because coercive control impacts many people, but there are certainly stories emerging of older women who have been subjected to that pattern of abuse for some time, sometimes, sadly, for a very long, long time. And I think alongside introducing that legislation, it is critical that we fulfill our commitment to educating, to growing community awareness about this particularly insidious form of domestic abuse, and also to growing the understanding of service providers, of support of personnel in courts.
00:13:17:01 - 00:13:53:02
Katrine Hildyard
So that they can recognize this particular type of domestic abuse and act on it. Whenever we put our minds to government policy in any area, we absolutely need to be aware if we are truly focused on achieving equality and equitable outcomes, we always need to put our minds to how we can amplify the voices of everybody who experiences a particular issue.
00:13:53:10 - 00:14:34:15
Katrine Hildyard
Because if you are genuinely wanting to hear and act upon people's experiences, people, as you said, who have that intersectional will, then our policy always must be carefully informed by that range of voices, not just one group that we do a formal consultation with, but rather we always need to look at how we can genuinely amplify the voices of a diverse group of people and really strive to understand their experiences and make sure that that informs any policy.
00:14:35:01 - 00:14:57:11
Katrine Hildyard
So in all of my portfolios, that is what I always strive to do. I know that is what our government always strives to do to make sure that we are truly understanding and truly acting upon that diversity of voices. And I think that is a really that is always the right thing to do. So why is the respectful thing to do?
00:14:57:12 - 00:15:23:22
Katrine Hildyard
It also means that we get much better policy outcomes and I always say that diversity in decision making makes for better decisions. It is absolutely the case, and we should always strive to make sure it is there and it's heard. Just to reflect in in two different ways. A lot of people often ask me why I went into politics.
00:15:23:23 - 00:15:59:12
Katrine Hildyard
Sometimes people say, Why on earth would you would you go into politics? And the answer for me is always the same. I always reflect back on my early childhood years of growing up in a family where things were very difficult. There was a lot of domestic violence and alcoholism, and I definitely learned from a very, very, very early age through experience, you know, through being very, very poor, that there isn't some neat distribution of means and resources, but in fact, quite the opposite.
00:15:59:16 - 00:16:29:02
Katrine Hildyard
And I developed what I call my burning passion for fairness. I got taught by my very, very strong and very loud mum that no matter what was happening, for us to always look upwards and outwards into the community and to be very active in the community. And my brother and my two sisters and I were very active in our community in different ways, whether that was through surf, lifesaving drama, sport, music, community groups, whatever it might be.
00:16:29:14 - 00:16:57:01
Katrine Hildyard
And I learned that by being active in a community that you find wonderful community leaders, sometimes in the least likely places who really include you as part of a community family and give you help to give you that sense of belonging. And I also found that by working together as a community, that is how we get things done and how we make change that includes people and make sure people are all treated fairly.
00:16:57:21 - 00:17:28:18
Katrine Hildyard
I also got taught by my very strong mum during those quite difficult times to find your voice and to speak up on that which was unfair. Even when your voice was shaky and it was hard to do so. And I think I think about that a lot. And I think we as leaders always need to focus not just on finding our own voice, but also on how we empower other people's voices.
00:17:29:07 - 00:18:01:10
Katrine Hildyard
And so I say that for two reasons. One, just to reflect back on the comment I made about that diversity of voices always making for better decisions, but also to say that when I was younger, I did experience that I guess self doubt or not being quite sure of how to, you know, that I fit and that I could say things or and often felt quite awkward and like I didn't quite belong for a range of reasons about things that were happening in my life.
00:18:01:10 - 00:18:44:16
Katrine Hildyard
And I think about that a lot in terms of the work that I do now. And I think about how difficult it is for a whole group of people. And I reflect particular on women and their journey to find their voice. And in a world sometimes where, you know, in the political world you are often expected to be immediately confident and able to articulate what you want to say and be able to to shake things off to some degree.
00:18:44:16 - 00:19:10:08
Katrine Hildyard
I often reflect that it is really important that we empower more women to become involved in the political world, not to feel like Why on earth would you ever do that? And to have confidence in their own voice and absolutely for them to know that what they say, what they feel matters, that they matter and that they absolutely have a place there.
00:19:10:17 - 00:19:41:24
Katrine Hildyard
It's a journey, certainly, that I went on. It's one, and particularly in the context of thinking about older women and how their voices may or may not be valued so that it's incredibly important that we, first of all, understand that that journey to having confidence in your own voice can be difficult, but that we, as leaders empower those voices and support them and nurture people to speak up and out about what is important.
00:19:41:24 - 00:20:24:17
Katrine Hildyard
Women in any sort of public arena, politics included, are often judged by our appearance. And I was reflecting a couple of years ago with one of my very, very close women colleagues about what happens when corflutes when the posters go up and the rise that you get on social media and other places about how you look. And one of the things that my friend and I were reflecting that you actually, in that awful world of judgment about your appearance, you can't actually win because one group of people will think you're too pretty.
00:20:24:17 - 00:20:59:04
Katrine Hildyard
And so therefore, you must be, you know, not so bright or that, you know, you don't look very good. And what on earth are you doing here? And so we were just talking about how nothing nothing is actually right in terms of how you look, because it's all just judgment and it's actually all just nonsense. So I think there is this thing of just finding that way to be absolutely comfortable and confident and to really speak out against that utter, utter nonsense.
00:21:01:08 - 00:21:05:10
Carley Bishop
We ask Katrine are female politicians treated the same as their male counterparts?
00:21:05:22 - 00:21:31:08
Katrine Hildyard
Those two experiences that I've had and I just thought always think of wonder if that would have happened to a male politician. And that is that twice when I've gone doorknocking, a man has, I think, quite deliberately opened the door in the nude. And so my advice is always just look up mine tight. No, I can't. But I do often wonder.
00:21:32:09 - 00:22:01:03
Katrine Hildyard
Somebody asked me once, you know what I did when that happened. And as well as looking up clearly, I, I actually recognized that that was somehow about power and trying to intimidate. So I just continued to have the conversation. And I just think, as I said, I just wonder if that kind of if that would ever happen to a man who who is out doorknocking.
00:22:01:08 - 00:22:02:04
Katrine Hildyard
And I doubt it.
00:22:03:24 - 00:22:07:12
Carley Bishop
We ask Katrine why she thinks we need more women in public life.
00:22:07:14 - 00:22:47:04
Katrine Hildyard
We need more women in parliament. We need more women in public life. And that is because we make better decisions as a parliament when we have a diverse group of women, in fact, a diverse group of people there in our parliament. And I just wanted to finish by saying that in South Australia, even on the Government Benches, Labor now has 14 out of 27 of our parliamentarians in the House of Assembly are women and I have been talking about diversity in decision making in every aspect of life forever.
00:22:47:04 - 00:23:18:09
Katrine Hildyard
I've been saying it always, but I can't quite put into words the feeling that came on that first day of Parliament when we finally had achieved equality still gives me she was. When I think about it, it felt different. And in terms of changing culture, in one of those old type of systems, you can just cannot underestimate how important it is to have a diverse group of women, diverse group of people at that table to make those decisions.
00:23:20:22 - 00:24:05:00
Katrine Hildyard
I'm also the Minister for Sport, Recreation and Racing. And one of the things that I have decided to do as the Minister for Sport and as an enthusiastic, lifelong participant in many different sports, I don't want to say competitor, rather participant, enthusiastic participant. I made a decision that no matter what I get asked to do, whether it's getting on a bike, doing a sprint test, going in a boat, whatever, I just do it because I also think that's a really important message about thing, you know, of a particular age, a little bit on feet and just participating.
00:24:05:00 - 00:24:41:10
Katrine Hildyard
So I made that decision that's found me in all sorts of interesting places. But the other thing I just wanted to speak very, very briefly about is I'm very passionate about advancing the advancing equality in sport and women in sport, because I think there is something quite transformative when we as a community see women competing at the highest possible level of sport, when we see them strong physical talent and skillful, and that they're being celebrated for being.
00:24:41:10 - 00:25:08:00
Katrine Hildyard
So it is actually quite transformative in in the way that women are seen both in sport but more generally. And I think that gives us an incredible opportunity to challenge those stereotypes about the particular roles that women should play. That gives us a great opportunity to address all sorts of aspects of gender inequality. I think that we need to be as inclusive as possible.
00:25:08:00 - 00:25:21:03
Katrine Hildyard
We we need to include people. That is my my view. We absolutely need to include all women in sport or women in whatever they want to participate in.
00:25:21:03 - 00:25:25:00
Carley Bishop
We ask Katrine to tell us some advice she would offer her younger and older self.
00:25:25:07 - 00:25:53:13
Katrine Hildyard
So the younger one is really easy. I would say you are good enough, you're enough. You deserve to be here and to have a voice and to be heard. Because I didn't always feel like I quite fit in because of all sorts of things that were happening in my life. And so that message is really clear, and it's a message whenever I get the opportunity to just encourage girls, that is exactly what I say.
00:25:53:13 - 00:26:18:08
Katrine Hildyard
I talk with them about how important they are. No matter what is happening for them, they are valued and important and welcomed and we want to hear from them and we want them to absolutely participate however they wish to do so in terms of the older self, that is an excellent question. That is a great question and I don't know if I've been asked that one before.
00:26:18:15 - 00:26:44:10
Katrine Hildyard
I'm very, very conscientious and driven and always want to do the best I possibly can. And that's because I really, really care about people and about change. And I think perhaps what I would say is just give yourself a little bit of a break sometimes. Yeah.
00:26:47:05 - 00:27:15:18
Carley Bishop
The Invisible Woman Project, funded by our Social Enterprises Impact Program, promotes awareness and actions for women and gender diverse people to age with dignity, security and safety. Find out more on justgoldwomen.net or on our socials at Just Gold Women.
00:27:16:11 - 00:27:23:03
Kyriakos Gold
This was a just gold podcast. Find out more about our social enterprise at JustGold.Net.