From: Family Responsibilities
Sent: Thursday, 15 December 2005 2:27 PM
To: Family Responsibilities
Subject: FW: NPC Address and General Comments
-----Original Message-----
From: The Mushroom
Sent: Wednesday, 9 February 2005 8:38 PM
To: Paffairs
Subject: NPC Address and General Comments
Hello
In part, my comments are addressed to Pru Goward as a response to her address at the National Press Club. Whilst I agree in principle to what Ms Goward was saying, my main concern was the reference to the 'gap' between a man's total weekly hours (combined paid and unpaid) and a woman's. This was stated as being an extra 1.5 hours per day towards women.
Statistically, men work longer paid hours than women whereas unpaid work hours are reversed. Whilst these statistics may be true, although I have my doubts as to the credibility of the 'combined' hours, there is no allowance made for the 'unpaid' paid work hours that most men do on weeknights and/or weekends. On average, men may be at work for 50 hours per week but realistically, their work hours extend into the out-of-hours (or hometime) domain. These are not taken into account and when the general public eventually absorbs the statistics and message being delivered, they will treat Ms Goward's statements with a degree of disdain. Unfortunately, I feel that many men may be in this situation and therefore pay little regard to Ms Goward's message.
Whilst I am an advocate for a work - lifestyle balance (and have some ability to instigate this for my staff) combined with a common goal between men and women to share workloads, it is very important to deliver 'real life' statistcs if a credible debate is to take place.
On another matter, as a male it disturbs me greatly that there are so many government departments, politicians and community groups that are focussed solely on the rights, health and welfare of women. Your department is the classic example of this. Whilst I will never pretend that women's issues are not important, it is very apparent that public agencies have all but ignored men's concerns compared to women's concerns. I know you could argue that you are attempting to reverse decades of male dominance (as ridiculous as that sounds in 2005) but you are creating a divide by ignoring many men's issues that are becoming more prevalent. Some examples are:
- prostate cancer (compared with breast cancer - statistically similar)
- the imbalance between rights for child custody
- the imbalance towards child maintenance payments (not the amount of payment but how they
are treated by the ATO - eg. income tax, Medicare Levy)
- male suicide rates
Incredibly, the difference between life expectancies between men and women, both aged 65, is approximately 7 years (and growing). If you take into account the apparent extra 1.5 hours per day that women work and the fact that men generally die 7 years earlier, doesn't this equate to a large imbalance of 'unrecognised' responsibilities/stresses/issues that men face.
Maybe you can attempt to address this difference as part of the solution, especially by looking more closely at the points raised above.
If you have any intention of replying, I would be glad to read your comments.
Regards
Vance Soster
