While there is rightly considerable policy interest in gender inequality, there has been surprisingly little attention given to the high school years as a key environment for this inequality or as a possible intervention point. Today’s analysis by Abigail Lewis (@AbigailLLew) at Per Capita (@PerCapita) provides a comprehensive overview of how a number of key gender inequities take root in high school, turning happy, confident girls into anxious young women who are already accustomed to experiencing violence and are on track to be paid less than the young men they graduate alongside.

This analysis is a summary from a chapter in an upcoming Per Capita report on gender inequity across the life course in Australia, launching in March 2020 and supported by the Women’s Leadership Institute Australia (@WLIAus). Sign up to Per Capita’s newsletter to be alerted to its publication.

Holiday reading - 2019 wrap-up

As 2019 draws to a close, the Power to Persuade and the Women’s Policy Action Tank will be taking a break over the holiday season. We will start the blog back up in February.

Over the past year, the blog has had over 100,000 page views from nearly 66,000 unique visitors. We oversaw an upgrade to the site to make our content easier to read and more accessible. We also held a successful symposium in October.

To leave you with some holiday reading, we have compiled our top 5 most-read blogs that were authored in the past year.

Social Policy Whisperer, Womens Policy Action TankPower to Persuade6 December 2019Policy making

Towards a national strategy to guide how employment participation is enhanced for older workers

In this original post, Jack Noone ((@DrJackNoone), Gemma Carey (@GemCarey) both of the Centre for Social Impact, UNSW (@SWIsocialimpact) and Tinh Doan from The Australian National University) (@scienceANU) discuss the need for a national strategy to guide how employment participation is enhanced for older workers. Researchers, governments, social enterprises, community groups, employers, advocacy organisations and other stakeholder groups are all working to remove the barriers to employment. However, without a national strategy to guide these activities, there is a risk of duplication and inefficiency. A national strategy, in contrast, would allow stakeholder to connect, coordinate, collaborate and use resources wisely.

Creating using evidencePower to Persuade5 December 2019Policy making, employment, ageing, aged policy

Debts and Disappointment: How Single Mothers and their Children Experience the Australian Child Support System

Single mothers are the most impoverished household type in Australia. Receipt of child support can keep single parent households out of poverty, however research indicates those in greatest need are also the most likely to miss out. In today’s analysis, Zoë Goodall (@ZAGoodall) and Policy Whisperer Kay Cook (@KayCookPhd) both of Swinburne University, and Terese Edwards (@Terese_NCSMC) of the National Council of Single Mothers and their Children share highlights from their new report into how women experience the child support system and why it is often difficult to receive payments.

Tracking Intimate Partner Homicide Risk Escalation: The Homicide Timeline

Intimate Partner Homicide (IPH) is a serious social and criminal justice issue and statistics suggest the problem is increasing. This puts serious pressure on those who respond to domestic abuse, coercive control, and intimate partner stalking, to be able to confidently assess the risk, or spot risk escalation. In this blog Dr Jane Monckton Smith discusses her research tracking intimate partner homicide risk escalation.

Nine months of Royal Commission but women and girls’ mental health is still largely invisible

Today the Interim Report of the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System was handed down, following receipt of 3,267 submissions and testimony from 99 witnesses before the four Commissioners. In the wake of yesterday’s announcement of the formation of the Women’s Mental Health Alliance, Sarah Squire (@SquireSarah) of Good Shepherd Australia New Zealand (@GoodAdvocacy) analyses how well the report responds to the mental health needs of women and girls.

Womens Policy Action TankWomen's Policy Action Tank28 November 2019mental health, gender

Potential risks and benefits of using a ‘family violence’ frame

For the 16 Days of Activism, today’s analysis considers the importance of word choice in talking about gendered violence. Sophie Yates (@DrSophieYates) of the Public Service Research Group (@PSResearchG) at UNSW Canberra unpacks some of the pros and cons of using a ‘family violence’ rather than a ‘domestic violence’ approach. While there is concern that this phrase makes gendered inequalities invisible, there are also opportunities that this framing provides. This analysis is drawn from a new article which is freely available until January 2020.

Womens Policy Action TankWomen's Policy Action Tank27 November 2019violence against women, family violence

Wage Theft, or “Have a go to… get stuffed”

With recent high-profile incidences of wage theft in the media, it is timely that the Attorney-General is looking at this issue. In today’s analysis, Helen Hodgson of Curtin University (@CurtinUni) and on behalf of the National Foundation for Australian Women (@NFAWomen) explains why wage theft is a gendered issue in Australia, highlights areas of concern from the discussion paper, and puts forward recommendations that would provide the necessary holistic response. The full submission is also available.

Womens Policy Action TankWomen's Policy Action Tank26 November 2019employment, gender pay gap

Backlash, Gender Fatigue and Organisational Change

The World Economic Forum estimates it will take over 200 years to close the gender pay gap globally. In Australia, at current rates it will be 80 years before there is gender parity in senior management roles. Meanwhile, women often trade flexibility for career progression and are also more likely to be discriminated against in the workplace. Why are we not making more progress? In today’s analysis, Sue Williamson (SWilliamsonUNSW) from UNSW (@UNSWCanberra) provides insight into how gender fatigue is slowing down progress for women in the workplace. This analysis is a summary of a longer article which can be found here.

Womens Policy Action TankWomen's Policy Action Tank25 November 2019gender pay gap, employment

How Do We Ensure That Primary Care in the UK Remains in Good Health?

General practice in the United Kingdom has long had an international reputation as a positive exemplar of primary care. Free at the point of access, funded on basis of population and needs (i.e. not a fee for service), and led by clinicians, our model is seen to have a better chance than most of providing the support that is preventative, coordinated, and with continuity of care. In this post, Professor Robin Miller considers how over recent years, it has become apparent that our traditional model will struggle with expected demographic changes such as an ageing population, the rise of obesity, and increasing people living with multiple long-term conditions. These combined pressures are indeed leading to frustration for patients in relation to accessing appointments, and considerable stress for general practice.

Taking a stand against bullying: Addressing mental health problems from within

Many people have childhood memories of being pushed around and being punched by other pupils when we felt you couldn’t retaliate. They may also remember being the topic of nasty rumours or being excluded by others. Unfortunately, being bullied is not an unusual experience, even today. Similar to maltreatment, bullying involves abusive behaviours where it is more difficult for the victims to defend themselves. But in contrast to maltreatment, these abusive behaviours are perpetrated by others of the same age. In this blog post, Professor Louise Arseneault discusses research that she has been conducting for the past 15 years – alongside great collaborators – and emphasises the importance of moving away from the common perception that bullying is just an unavoidable part of growing up.

How is patient experience feedback used to improve the quality of adult inpatient mental health care in NHS England?

EURIPIDES is the short title for Evaluating the Use of Patient Experience Data to Improve the Quality of Inpatient Mental Health Care study. EURIPIDES aimed to understand which of the many different approaches to collecting and using patient experience data are the most useful for supporting improvements in inpatient mental health care.

Researchers from the EURIPIDES study team have made a series of recommendations for improving the way that NHS mental health trusts collect and use patient feedback to improve the quality of care for mental health inpatients. In this post, Dr Sarah-Jane Fenton summarises some of the key findings ahead of the full report being published in early 2020 as health research academics call for NHS to act on mental health patient feedback.

What the Productivity Commission has to say about income support and mental health consumers

When the Productivity Commission recently released their draft report into mental health, there was a somewhat surprising focus on structural issues – particularly the role that the social safety net plays in supporting people with mental health conditions, their family members and carers. This is a particularly important issue for women, who have higher rates of diagnosis of mental health conditions and are more likely to be in unpaid caring roles. In today’s analysis, Yvette Maker of the Melbourne Social Equity Institute provides a summary of the draft report’s main concerns and what will be needed for the final report to make a real difference to current government policy trends.

Can the OECD be the clinic to get our economies off growth?

Power to Persuade8 November 2019Policy making, economic policy, wellbeing

Integrating needs and services: A person-centred and place-based approach

Providing support services has become an increasingly complex task, with current approaches not adequately meeting the needs of individuals or communities, especially those with multiple care needs. The increasing social and economic cost burden of this failure compounds a multi-level system that is already struggling with service integration (The Drum 2019). At least part of the problem relates to the lack of connection between the two levels of person and organisation, two circling systems that are not fully integrated.

Power to Persuade7 November 2019

Can Hip-Hop Save Rulemaking?

Power to Persuade5 November 2019Policy making, politics and democracy, social justice, media

Changing the story: Narration and framing in regulation and governance

In the once separate fields of politics and governance, the narrative is everything. Perhaps more. Mark Kenny from Australian Studies Institute looks how the government controls the storyline across Newstart, refugees and the Uluru Statement from the Heart and concludes it is the ‘back story’ that lends the government legitimacy.

Is she just more organised? Understanding the gendered labour of synchronisation and scheduling

Is there a gendered component to leisure time? Who organises and facilitates it in heterosexual couples? While the reinstatement of the Time use Survey is an important step in understanding how Australians use their time, in today’s analysis Julia Cook (@julia_anne_cook) of University of Newcastle (@Uni_Newcastle) and Dan Woodman (@DrDanWoodman) of University of Melbourne (@unimelbsoc) share the findings from their recently-published paper which utilises an in-depth approach to not only time use but also how time is coordinated and how women and men feel about task-sharing.

Womens Policy Action TankWomen's Policy Action Tank31 October 2019gender, Work-Life Balance, family

Black Swans Make Better Policy

At the recently-held Power to Persuade Symposium, the talk given by Aurora Milroy (@AuroraMilroy) of ANZSOG (@ANZSOG) was a stand-out. Unfortunately, due to technical difficulties, her talk was not captured on film. We are therefore pleased to present a summary of her talk and her slides here. Aurora spoke of “black swan theory” which highlights the deficits of western knowledge and ways of working. Acknowledging and honouring the ‘black swans’ that Indigenous ways of being and knowing represent brings a more holistic understanding and can mend broken relationships.

Why racialized youth perceptions of police matter

Kanika Samuels-Wortley, scholar at the University of Waterloo, reveals stories of police violence and prejudice towards Indigenous and Black populations, and explains why understanding these experiences is critical for justice and equity.

Issues, AdvocacyPower to Persuade30 October 2019policing, policy problem, justice, Social Welfare, incarceration, Equity

Blog

THIS WEEK’S MODERATOR