We’re not just here for the photos, Tony

As much as Tony Abbott might try to convince us that he is a feminist, unlike his Foreign Minister or his Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women, it’s an appellation that doesn’t quite measure up.  Women have been the victims of tokenism for too long to swallow the lines and gestures.

Take his recent Cabinet reshuffle.

Sussan Ley was promoted to Health (and Sport) to immediately face a storm of discontent from doctors, welfare groups, and the public.  With no experience at all with the health sector, she has to try to convince us that we should give up universal healthcare, convince the doctors they should take a significant pay cut, and make the economic case to fix a problem that doesn’t exist with a solution that won’t work.

When the PM’s new cabinet were sworn in by Governor-General Sir Peter Cosgrove at a ceremony at Government House in Canberra a couple of weeks ago, Tony pulled aside his one new female cabinet member for a special photo op (something, it should be noted, he didn’t do with any of his male ministers).  The body language says it all.

It was very reminiscent of when Tony was searching for his “ladies” for the photo in Davos.  These very powerful businesswomen apparently had more important things to do than pose for awkward advertising shots to be posted on facebook.

He also made a decision to relieve Julie Bishop’s Parliamentary Secretary of his duties (I thought Foreign Affairs was supposed to be doing well?) and appoint Steve “slit her throat” Ciobo to be Ms Bishop’s assistant.  And in, to my mind, the ultimate backhander, appointed the same man to be Parliamentary Secretary to Julie’s minder, Andrew Robb.

Though she denies it, Julie was apparently furious when Tony made Andrew chaperone her at recent climate change talks in Peru, so I wonder how she feels about having a spy in her midst to monitor her.

The Coalition is currently focusing on their achievements in 2014 which have mainly been tearing down the achievements made by previous governments and selling us out to global corporations.

We all know, and Tony freely admits, that ad libbing isn’t his best thing, but one would hope that the Prime Minister for Women, when lauding his achievements for the year, would have something prepared as to what he had achieved in his self-appointed portfolio.

It appears he only has two answers nowadays – the disaster inherited from Labor and the carbon tax.

We ladies should apparently be over the moon as we sweat over our household budgets that the carbon tax has been removed.  Righto, that should fix up all our concerns.  As Julie Bishop said, “stop whinging and get on with it.”

I suppose it was expecting too much to get any sort of sensible policy discussion when he explained the carbon pricing system, rather than as a market mechanism, in terms of its effect on our ironing, whilst of course being photographed ironing to show when he says “housewives” he isn’t being sexist.

Tony isn’t at all sexist.  When he exhorted people to vote for him because his daughters were good-looking he was just being a “daggy dad”.  When he described their virginity as a gift when arguing his opposition to Gardisil, he was being a protective father though, by Tony’s own admission about one of the reasons he left the seminary and his actions whilst at university, virginity and celibacy for a man are more a burden than a gift.

So what can we expect in the coming year after this ignominious apprenticeship as a feminist?

Scott Morrison has come riding in, the knight in shining armour, with some baubles and trinkets for the lovely ladies.  He is a father, after all, so he must be nice.

Scott is here to deliver Tony’s signature policy, Paid Parental Leave.  Please everyone ignore his previous strident opposition to it.  When he said “over this government’s dead body” he really meant we will decide when there may be votes in it for us.

Tony announced this policy at a women’s lunch with no consultation with colleagues, no costing, no modelling, ignoring the Productivity Commission’s advice that there would be little benefit to workforce participation.  It smacks of Big Daddy handing a velvet lined box containing a diamond bracelet across the table while winking.  Why would we worry our pretty little heads about how it is being paid for and whether it is worthwhile?

When describing this as a “workplace entitlement” Tony seems to forget that they are paid by employers.  He often refers to the maternity leave on full pay that is offered to public servants as unfair whilst ignoring that this was an entitlement negotiated by unions for their members from their employers.  There were trade-offs to get this entitlement.  Many women choose a career in public service which might mean less pay than they could have got in the private sector but better entitlements and security.  If companies value their female employees they offer similar packages.

Scott is also bringing us some childcare changes but all we have heard about so far is rebates for nannies.  We are supposed to ignore that they slashed before and after school care assistance by $450 million and axed a $300 million funding boost aimed at improving the wages of ,childcare workers.

It has been argued that more and more families will be lured away from mother-care in the home (tax contributing cohort) to the very lavishly subsidised day-care facilities (thus becoming part of the tax consuming cohort).  Additionally, mothers will scramble for part-time work in an attempt to meet the ‘paid work’ test in the hope of obtaining a cool $11,500 to $50,000 cash when the next baby arrives.

This shift of lifestyle towards the subsidy pool will blowout the budget year on year and will entrench the “age of entitlement” for a certain class of families: those that do not care for their 0-5 year old children between 9am and 5pm due to irresistible financial incentives.

What women want is choice, not to have decisions about their health dictated to them, not to be given gifts, not to be talked down to with simplistic housework analogies.  They want to be respected, not only that they can understand policy debate, but that they can make a valuable contribution to it.

We’re not just here for the photos, Tony.

 

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