Page 188 - Week 02 - Thursday, 25 May 1989
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This is an issue that is crucial to allowing people to go out to work and to the well-being of children as well, of course. The Government will be undertaking a planning exercise to determine the child-care needs in the ACT into the next century. I believe that it is not adequate to look just at what is required now. When we see the statistics in the paper today that the ACT's population is very close now to 300,000 it goes without saying that many more children will be requiring child-care and we need to plan for that; we need to know what that demand will be.
In conclusion, Mr Speaker, I would just like to say that it is not the role of the Government to make choices for women, but it is the role of the Government to make sure that women have a real choice. I say again that women represent over half the population but they still have unequal access and control of economic and social benefits in our community.
An expression that has had some currency is the feminisation of poverty, meaning that if people are poor they are much more likely to be women, and that goes without saying. As Mr Whalan will point out, the kinds of economic issues to do with employment and training have a very great deal to do with that feminisation of poverty. Our objective is to make the choice of whether women participate in the paid work force a real option, and to ensure that all women are properly respected and are indeed equal partners in social and economic terms in the workplace, the home and the community. I commend that philosophy to all in this Assembly.
MR KAINE (Leader of the Opposition) (3.19): The Chief Minister has spoken often and, I am sure over the next three years, will speak a great deal about issues that affect that 50 per cent of the population that is male, so I hope that she will allow me to speak for the next few minutes on some matters that affect that other half of the population that happens to be female. There is no doubt that some assistance is required for some elements of that part of the female population. This morning I put forward a proposal that we should examine the problems associated with the ageing. There are all kinds of things that ageing people need - and not all ageing people require the same things.
I think we have to bear in mind that the same thing can be said about that half of the population that is women. Many of them do not need any help at all. Many of them are quite prepared to stand on their own two feet in the community, and have the capability to do so. In fact, those women who need assistance, I would submit, like all other groups, are a relatively minor part of the population, and they do not have common needs; they have a whole range of needs, some of which the Chief Minister has touched upon, and some of which I suggest she has not. So what I am concerned about is not the question of whether we
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