Bold climate action and low carbon recovery measures will create thousands of jobs and a sustained boom in prosperity. Still, there is a need to ensure all members of our community benefit.
Women have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19 in multiple ways. Women lost more jobs than men during the pandemic and, are being overrepresented in casual and part-time positions, saw higher rates of job losses and reduced hours
than men.
Stimulus packages tend to focus on male-dominated industries like construction, infrastructure, and clean energy. Women are also underrepresented in areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, all core areas set to boom in a decarbonising economy.
Clean State strongly advocates for everyone to benefit equally from stimulus and recovery packages, and for women and girls are supported and included in the jobs and prosperity boom implicit in the transition to
a decarbonised economy.
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The proposal
Clean State is advocating for the following proposals to ensure women benefit from the low carbon stimulus and decarbonized economy:
- Introduce an early age school program that engages girls into STEM activities and exposes them to the type of careers and opportunities provided by STEM.
- Set targets and provide funding for more female-founded low carbon start-ups in WA.
- Revolutionise childcare in WA by providing
funding for free creche and childcare at all WA universities, TAFEs and VET facilities by 2022, all government agencies, and require all large WA businesses to provide childcare or creche on site by 2025, and strongly advocate for the commonwealth government to reintroduce free childcare, permanently. - Expand the ‘Onboard WA’ program to the private sector to lift the representation of women on
Board positions. - Increase funding for start-ups in the New Industries Fund to $2.4m and create a new program specifically targeted at supporting, mentoring and training women in STEM start-ups to get investment and pitch ready. The program should aim for 100 Female STEM start-ups by 2030.
- Expand the pilot project on voluntary reporting on workplace gender equality in the public sector to all industry sectors and explore introducing targets and incentives to lift female participation in
STEM industries. - Retrofit and Repower WA’s 1883 Aged Care and Childcare facilities, to make them more comfortable to work in and cheaper to run, and money saved on energy bills can be reinvested into wages, employee benefits and affordable care.
