The Minister for Employment and Minister for Women, Senator the Hon Michaelia Cash, has launched a key strategy to increase the number of women in the workforce.
The Towards 2025: An Australian Government strategy to boost women’s workforce participation outlines the Turnbull Government’s roadmap to reduce the gender participation gap by 25 per cent by 2025.
“Getting more women engaged in work is an economic and social priority for the Turnbull Government – it’s good for women, families, business and our economy,” Minister Cash said.
“Boosting women’s workforce participation is essential to raising living standards and securing Australia’s future prosperity. It has the potential to add up to $25 billion to the Australian economy.”
The Towards 2025 strategy addresses the many factors critical to create the change needed to improve women’s workforce participation and economic independence.
Labour force figures released in June show that under the Coalition Government women’s employment is at a record high of 5.6 million.
“The workforce gender participation gap is narrowing, but more work needs to be done if we are to achieve our target of reducing the gap by 25 per cent by 2025,” Minister Cash said.
The Towards 2025 strategy incorporates many of the important initiatives outlined in the 2017–18 Budget, that will deliver significant outcomes for Australian women and the economy.
The Turnbull Government’s historic investment of an additional $2.5 billion in child care and $430 million to support universal access to pre-school for all four year olds will encourage more than 230,000 families to return to work or increase their paid employment.
An additional $263 million over the next four years will expand the ParentsNext pre-employment program, which helps parents of young children to plan and prepare for work by connecting them with services in their local community.
The Turnbull Government also committed $10 million over the next three years to the new Launch into Work program, which is due to begin later this year.
“By delivering practical and innovative programs like Launch into Work and ParentsNext, coupled with our key reforms and record investment in child care, the Turnbull Government is committed to assisting more women enter, return to or remain in work,” Minister Cash said.
Towards 2025: An Australian Government strategy to boost women’s workforce participation is available here.