Much to laud but gender still issue for young women: PM
WELLINGTON: Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says New Zealand has a lot to celebrate on International Women’s Day, but there is still work to be done.
Speaking at an event in Parliament yesterday morning, Ms Ardern said the moment when she could say ‘‘we’ve done it’’ would be when gender did not feature in the minds of young women in New Zealand.
‘‘A time when they’re born in New Zealand and they don’t think about the fact that they’ll earn less. Where they don’t consider whether there is a job they could or couldn’t do, because of their gender.
‘‘If she thinks only about her hopes, aspirations and her goals and her gender doesn’t feature in that, that to me will be the moment when we can truly, truly celebrate.
‘‘As long as we have a country where women are overrepresented in intimate partner violence; as long as we have women overrepresented in lowpaid work; as long as we have a gender pay gap, I think probably of all us will only celebrate to a certain degree, while we know there is work to be done.’’
She said there were a lot of ways the Government could help achieve this and listed aspects of new legislation, such as the increase in paid parental leave and the improvement of pay equity legislation, that had helped address some of these problems.
Howver, she said things need to go ‘‘much, much further than that’’.
She emphasised how important it was to have role models for the next generation of women.
She shared the story of one of her own role models — activist, author, feminist and former New Zealand politician Marilyn Waring.
In 1975 when she was 23, Ms Waring became the youngest MP in New Zealand’s history.
Ms Ardern’s teacher suggested she give Ms Waring a call for the project
She did, but only reached her answer phone and had to leave a message.
A month later, after the project had been handed in, Ms Waring called Ms Ardern back.
‘‘I had this amazing conversation with her. She took the time to talk with me, a 15yearold nobody from Morrinsville.’’ —