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espite the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission’s recommendation in December 2002 for a national paid maternity leave scheme for Australia, no such scheme has yet been introduced and the concept remains contested socially, politically and industrially. The paper suggests that the explanation for this confusion and contestation may be understood in terms of the various orientations to paid maternity leave in current Australian debates. As a way of understanding the policy paralysis more clearly, the paper proposes a typology of these orientations to paid maternity leave. This typology shows that each of the existing orientations hinders the introduction of universal access to paid maternity leave for Australian working women. In order to change this and to constructively progress policy development, it is argued that a new policy orientation based on ‘social feminism’ and a ‘new equity’ is required. Unlike other orientations, this one recognises equality and difference and places the rights and needs of working women at its core.INTRODUCTION
For the past three to four years, the Australian public, politicians, policy makers, unionists and academics have been engaged in vigorous debate about the provision of paid maternity leave for working women. Many have lamented the lack of a universal paid maternity leave provision and have compared the merits of different funding models, while others have disputed its need altogether. In surveying the argument, observing and participating in the debate and reflecting on the contested history of paid maternity leave in Australia, two things have become clear. The first is that paid maternity leave is a poorly understood and appreci-ated concept in Australian scholarship. The second and relappreci-ated issue is that women’s work interests and needs remain relatively easily marginalised in Australian public and industrial relations policy. This is despite the steady growth in women’s participation in paid employment and women’s continuing and disproportionate contribution to unpaid domestic and caring work.
In this paper it is suggested that a way to make sense of this history and the current debate is to understand the differing orientations to paid maternity leave in Australia. Then, so that the debate can be recast in a way that it is explicit and positive about women’s special and multiple roles and in order to develop
policy that provides equality for working women, a new and different orientation to paid maternity leave is offered for consideration. This orientation derives from the notions of ‘social feminism’ and is grounded in a position which seeks to achieve equity for women at work by recognising difference when necessary, for instance, around child-bearing and maternity leave.
Such a re-orientation is required because over recent decades the gender distribution of labour force participation has been transformed. The Australian workforce is now 44 per cent female and 56 per cent male. Women’s workforce participation rates increased to 64 per cent in 2002, while men’s participation rates continued to decline (ABS 2003). In the period 1986–2001, the proportion of women aged 15–24 years who were studying also increased, from 36 per cent to 56 per cent (ABS 2003). The impact of women’s growing participation in paid work and education is reflected in the changed income arrangements in house-holds and the ongoing erosion of the traditional ‘male breadwinner model’ (Bittman and Rice 2002; ABS 2000: 18). With skilled labour shortages predicted and an ageing population, Australia is increasingly relying on women’s contrib-ution to the paid workforce. Additionally, the higher education levels of women are increasing their expectation of on-going labour force attachment (Charlesworth et al.2002: 23). Significantly, women’s participation in the labour force in the prime child-bearing years (25–34) increased from 61 per cent to 70 per cent in the period 1986–2001 (ABS 2003) and their participation rate now almost equates with the participation rates of men in that age group (Charlesworth et al.2002: 23). The difference of course is that women, not men, are the child-bearers; they are society’s re-producers as well as increasingly contributing to the production of goods and services. The case for equal opportunity and treatment for women must acknowledge the difference in women’s and men’s roles, yet this difference and the changes in social practice have not been fully recognised in policy-making. Neither have they been adequately addressed in industrial relations scholarship, despite the exhortations for gender to be considered an important and explicit category of analysis (Pocock 1997; Forrest 1989). Nowhere is the need to provide a more explicit gender analysis in industrial relations more obvious than in the context of the paid maternity leave debate.
orientation a particular discourse, agency, mechanism and set of outcomes is identified and explained.
The following discussion and analysis suggest that none of the three existing orientations adequately and fully addresses the needs of Australian working women in the twenty-first century. It is argued, therefore, that a different orientation to paid maternity leave based on notions of ‘social feminism’ and ‘equity through recognition of difference’ is required in order to facilitate the development of appropriate, contemporary and just, paid maternity leave policy that places the needs of working women at its core. It is proposed that this be called a ‘new equity orientation’. It is hoped that the typology of orientations to paid maternity leave developed in this paper provide a means for better under-standing the debate in Australia, the shortcomings of prevailing orientations and the basis upon which new policy could and should be developed.
‘PREGNANT PAUSE’ IN POLICY
Paid maternity leave is defined as income replacement to compensate for the leave from paid employment necessary around child-birth (Baird 2002a: 2; HREOC 2002a: 13; Earle 1999: 211). There are two significant elements in this definition. The first is that since it is women who give birth, women should be the primary beneficiaries of any leave scheme. That is, maternity leave is distinct from parental leave, which is a broader concept including paternity leave and generally applic-able for a longer period of time covering the early years of a child’s life. The second is that it is an entitlement related to participation in the paid labour force. That is, it is distinct from a general payment made to all mothers regardless of workforce participation. Over the past century there have been various forms of maternity payment in Australia. Presently there are programs to assist Australian families in need, but there is no payment which is specifically paid to women and which recognises their dual responsibilities of motherhood and paid employment. Since 1993 working parents in permanent full-time jobs have had access to 52 weeks unpaid parental leave (Parliament of Australia, Workplace Relations Act 1996s.14) and in 2000, this entitlement was extended to ‘long-term casuals’. The total of 52 weeks is to be shared between the parents and, except for the week immediately after the birth, the leave cannot be taken simultaneously by the parents. As MacDermott (1996) has previously argued, this unpaid leave means that women (who tend to utilise the leave more than men) not only bear the child but also the economic cost, necessitating a period of dependency on the state or their partner.
and refrains from legislating for paid maternity leave for working women, the ‘pregnant pause’ in policy persists and the concept itself continues to be contested socially, politically and industrially.
Paid maternity leave has been on the public agenda a number of times in the past (Baird et al. 2002b), but the most recent debate is the subject of this analysis. This debate reached a new height in early 2002 when HREOC produced a paper outlining the options for a paid maternity leave scheme and followed this with a wide ranging consultative process with the community, business, the union movement and academics (HREOC 2002; Baird 2002a; Baird et al. 2002c). It should be noted that HREOC’s participation and intervention in the debate was not at the federal government’s request but was of their own initiative, in response to the growing international and domestic concern about Australia’s lack of paid maternity leave. At the end of the year HREOC proposed a federally funded paid maternity leave scheme to provide for 14 weeks maternity leave for all working women (inclusive of casual, contract and self-employed women), paid at federal minimum wages (HREOC 2002b).
The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission recognised that existing mechanisms did provide for some access to paid maternity leave, albeit with limited and variable results. The most obvious ways being through the current bargaining arrangements of the industrial relations system or through managerial goodwill and company policy (see Baird et al. 2002b). The Commission did not, however, explicitly advocate that their proposed model be part of social security or industrial relations policy. Furthermore, HREOC left unresolved the specific way in which their model would integrate and interact with the existing industrial relations framework, except to endorse women’s indus-trial rights to bargain for ‘top-up’ provisions and to recommend that ‘current industrial arrangements in relation to maternity leave continue’ (HREOC, 2002b, Recommendation 12).
As proposed, the HREOC model is compatible with the current industrial relations framework and philosophy. As the federal system now operates, a minimum, ‘safety-net’ level of wages and conditions is provided through the award structure, with any additional wages and entitlements above these minima either ‘jointly regulated’ by enterprise-based bargaining or ‘unilaterally regulated’ by managerial discretion. Conceivably, then, with reference to the HREOC model for paid maternity leave, a two-tier system could operate. In such a scheme, all female employees would have access to a level of paid maternity leave equal to 14 weeks at the federal minimum wage, provided by the federal government. Where this amount does not cover a female employee’s current income, enterprise bargaining or company policy could be used to supplement or ‘top-up’ to an income replacement level.
is the low level of payment. The preference of these groups is income replace-ment capped at average weekly wages. There is also some merit in this position, as previous research about the ability of enterprise bargaining to deliver generous paid maternity leave provisions suggests its limitations (Baird et al. 2002b). Therefore, a reliance on bargaining to top-up minimum rates to average weekly wages or income replacement levels is a potentially precarious strategy. On the other hand, it is estimated that between 35 per cent and 48 per cent of all working women would receive the equivalent of income replacement if paid at minimum wages (HREOC, 2002, 232), reflecting the relative low income levels of many women in Australia. While there is negligible data available on the proportion of female employees receiving paid maternity leave at income replacement levels, it is generally assumed that where it is provided through bargaining or company policy that an employee receives income replacement, though compensation for over-award or overtime income regularly earned is not known.
The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission recognised that some employers already provide replacement level income and therefore recommended that employer top-ups be encouraged and allowed above the minimum wage recommendation. This drew criticism from some employer groups, for example, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Australian Retailers Association, the National Farmers’ Federation, Australian Business Industrial and the Australian National Mines and Metals Association. These employer associ-ations prefer that employers not fund paid maternity leave at all and that they not be forced to pay through a levy or as a result of bargaining (HREOC 2002b). If a government-funded scheme were introduced, some mechanism for reimbursing employers who currently provide paid maternity leave would probably need to be implemented.
It is abundantly clear that there is a need to address the ‘pregnant pause’ in paid maternity leave policy in Australia. A number of domestic and international events and initiatives have added to the pressure on the federal government to fund such a scheme, yet the federal (and state) governments continue to delay and obfuscate policy development and progress, becoming stalled or diverted by arguments about fertility and funding. It is time to re-orient the policy debate so that it addresses the central concern and issue, that of the inequitable treatment of working women.
ORIENTATIONS TO PAID MATERNITY LEAVE
was a workplace entitlement ‘best left to enterprise bargaining’ and that a com-pulsory maternity leave scheme would only be introduced ‘over this Government’s dead body’ (Kirk 22 July 2002). In the progress of the debate, paid maternity leave was sometimes seen as a solution to declining fertility rates, but in contrast to this position the Treasurer (and others) argued on a number of occasions that it would not address the fertility problem (Costello 2002) and, in any case, it was ‘too costly’ (Kirk 22 July 2002). Paid maternity leave was also commodified by the Minister for Family and Community Services who at various times referred to it as just ‘one product on the shelf’ (for example, in an interview with Alexander Kirk on PM Radio National 11 December 2002). At one stage the Prime Minister even suggested, rather ambiguously, that paid maternity leave wasn’t necessary in Australia as the country had entered the ‘post-feminist stage of the debate’ (Hewett 7–8 September 2002).
Why does the issue of paid maternity leave generate such politicised, vehement and contradictory responses and what do these various responses actually mean? It is argued here that not only do they indicate competing positions on how paid maternity leave should be paid for, but more fundamentally, they reflect quite different orientations to paid maternity leave.
It is also argued that in the current debate it is possible to identify three different orientations to paid maternity leave. In this section of the paper these various orientations are identified and explained. For discussion purposes they are called a ‘welfare orientation’, an ‘industrial orientation’ and a ‘business orientation’. Each orientation encapsulates certain characteristics which define the different approaches to paid maternity leave and the consequent outcomes. The characteristics include the dominant discoursewhich highlights the language, the rhetoric and implicit messages being communicated; a principal agencywhich is the party or group mainly responsible for conveying the message, advocating the particular approach and having carriage of the issue; a primary mechanismby which the policy is introduced and codified; and, finally, a set of expected outcomes that can be recognised and anticipated as a result of the specific orientation.
(reflecting the ILO recommendation) for all working women is to be achieved. All four orientations are elaborated below. They are also summarised in Table 1.
Welfare orientation
The first orientation to be discussed is the ‘welfare orientation’, an orientation that tends to accept uncritically the traditional male breadwinner model, with the female dependent on her male partner for economic security, with if necessary, support from the state. This orientation has dominated Australian public policy over the past century and continues to play a major role in the current debate. It is based on the notion of women’s ‘maternal citizenship’ (Eveline 2001): that women’s primary (and almost exclusive) role in society, and for which they should be protected, is reproduction, care-giving and domestic service for the good of children, the family unit and the community. As such, the dominant discourse in this orientation utilises the language of domesticity and dependence, motherhood, child welfare, family and fertility. As a consequence, it has a direct connection with the population debates.
It is not that women in Australia have never received monetary recognition for their maternal role, but that in the main this recognition has been restricted to welfare payments made by the government as an incentive to women to have babies and to remain at home in traditional domestic and family roles. Eveline (2001) argues that the Australian ‘social settlement’ made between unions, pro-tectionists and the government at the turn of the twentieth century and mani-fested strongly in the Conciliation and Arbitration Act (1904) endorsed (white, Anglo-Celtic) men as full industrial citizens yet excluded women (and Aboriginals) from receiving the full status and benefits of paid work, thus perpetuating policy development around the traditional male breadwinner model.
In the welfare orientation, the primary agency for promoting a maternal discourse is the government, generally of a paternalist and protectionist persuasion, and the primary mechanism for providing maternity-related welfare payments is through legislation. The first Maternity Allowance intro-duced in 1912 and the current First Child Tax Rebate scheme, (the ‘Baby Bonus’), are both good examples of the application of this orientation. It is generally recognised that the primary objective of schemes such as these is to encourage fertility and traditional home-based roles for women. Neither of these schemes was intended to encourage women’s on-going attachment to the paid workforce or to compensate working women for income or career foregone as a result of child birth. The first Maternity Allowance, for example, as well as being a payment designed to protect the health and well-being of mothers and babies (Lake 1999: 75) was also directed towards population growth of white Australians. The introduction of the ‘Baby Bonus’ in 2002 was arguably an opportunist response by the federal government to quell the maternity leave debate just prior to the last election and it has been widely criticised for financially penalising women who return to work (see for example Apps 2001).
in being adequately recognised in industrial relations and public policy. One of the most obvious areas is in the lack of a paid maternity leave provision for all working women. When a ‘welfare orientation’ is adopted, the issue is conceived of as maternity payments necessary to protect women in order to maintain fertility rates and the nation’s (white) population rather than as one of paid maternity leave necessary to ensure women’s economic independence and work-force participation. Additionally, because fertility and population sporadically arise as political issues and there are invariably competing claims on a government’s budget, maternity payments are minimised by paying flat amounts and means testing. Furthermore, policies which are grounded in this orientation place women at the mercy of the state and their biology, rather than giving women economic independence. Either a male breadwinner or a paternalist state is relied upon to provide for women as mothers.
Bargaining orientation
In contrast to the ‘welfare orientation’, the ‘bargaining orientation’ regards paid maternity leave as an entitlement or employment condition attached to work and therefore an industrial right of women. Considered in this way, paid maternity leave is gained through bargaining or joint regulation. In Australia this is via enterprise bargaining between unions and employers, or arbitration by the industrial tribunals. In a bargaining orientation, the main proponents for paid maternity leave are unions, but the industrial tribunals may also support the issue. By contrast, employers tend to prefer not to have to bargain about it or will attempt to control the agenda in bargaining. Conservative governments tend to remain absent or silent on the issue. While the outcomes of the bargaining orientation are contingent on market factors such as bargaining power, labour market power and economic conditions, this orientation does recognise women’s participation in the paid workforce and their rights as industrial citizens. Continuing with the theme of maternal citizenship and the male breadwinner model, however, it is evident that as industrial citizenship was historically the province of men in Australia, industrial relations bargaining and conditions of work have primarily reflected their interests. If men had babies, one might claim, paid maternity leave would have already been widespread in awards and agree-ments, along with paid long service leave, paid annual leave, paid sick leave, paid jury service and paid military service!
maternity leave in line with the NSW public sector, a significant improvement since council employees previously had no paid maternity leave, but still less than recommended international standards (Baird 2003).
Whatever the industrial process, be it negotiation or arbitration, paid maternity leave becomes by the very nature of the system, however, a contested issue and this is not always a desirable outcome. Precisely because of the nature of bargaining and arbitration, paid maternity leave is susceptible to being traded off against other employment conditions and entitlements, with the potential not only to divide employer and employees, but to divide workers against each other as well. Other research has similarly noted the problems of including issues like paid maternity leave in bargaining. For instance, the OECD reports that ‘whereas family-friendly work practices are often on the table at the start of negotiations, unions often withdraw their demands when it comes down to a choice between them and more money’ (OECD 2002: 194); alternatively, they are introduced at the same time as redundancies and productivity measures (Bramble 2001: 31; Probert et al.2000), tainting them in a negative rather than a positive way. One relatively recent example of this very issue occurred when Sydney City Council offered to include 12 weeks paid maternity leave in their enterprise agreement, on the condition that the jobs of the outdoor workforce (mainly male) be subject to ‘competitive tendering’, a process where all jobs would be spilled and employees would have to re-apply for their positions against other applicants. The Council ultimately decided not to pursue this strategy but, had they persisted, it would have potentially pitted male employees’ interests for job security against female employees’ interest in gaining extended paid maternity leave (Baird 2003).
There are a number of logical outcomes of the ‘bargaining orientation’. Where paid maternity leave is gained through bargaining, the entitlement is enshrined in agreements or awards and this is a positive outcome for it means the condition is codified and less vulnerable to manipulation or avoidance. Access to the provision is, however, restricted to those covered by the agreement or award and therefore the bargaining orientation does not guarantee universal access. Other outcomes are contingent on the bargaining power of the parties and so the reality of paid maternity leave for working women is that there is partial coverage with highly variable provisions. Generally, those female employees who gain it as a work related entitlement will receive a payment equal at least to their base wage. (For an analysis of paid maternity leave under enterprise bargaining in Australia see Baird et al. 2002b) The outcomes are usually codified or enshrined in industrial awards and industrial agreements, and any change to these necessitates further bargaining between the parties. Furthermore, the bargaining orientation allows the state to withdraw from responsibility, and consequently, one outcome of this passive state model is that there is no codification in the form of universal legislation.
Business orientation
employment rather than welfare. This is similar to the ‘bargaining orientation’, but with the important distinction that in the ‘business orientation’ provisions such as paid maternity leave are more closely associated with company or business needs rather than the employee’s needs. Therefore when paid mater-nity leave is approached from a business orientation, it is not automatically regarded as an industrial right of women and must instead be argued for on other grounds, most typically, in terms of business case arguments.
Business case argument is the dominant discourse in this orientation. Within business case rhetoric common phrases are business success, strategic and competitive advantage, improving the bottom line, human capital, investment in human resources and diversity management (Cassell 1996). The business case, although typically vaguely defined, argues that the benefits to the employer or business of introducing paid maternity leave can be shown to outweigh the costs of paying employees while on leave. These benefits are generally seen to include improved motivation, morale and productivity, reduced recruitment and training costs, increased retention rates and return to work rates of highly-skilled employees, reduced sickness and improved organisational efficiency through the benefits of long service, institutional memory, industry knowledge, networks and contacts (EOWA 2002; OECD 2002: 131). However, generally the business case provides justification for paid maternity leave for only those with high or unique skill levels and qualifications. The Equal Opportunity in the Workplace Agency (EOWA) suggests more employers are adopting a business case rationale, and provides specific examples and cost savings, but the OECD has noted that in the past ‘such considerations have not been sufficient to lead to extensive use of maternity pay in Australia’ (OECD 2002: 26,131). This may also be a consequence of the dominance of the aforementioned ‘welfare orientation’ in Australia and the lack of a ‘critical mass’ of female managers and policy makers. As it is regarded as a prerogative and responsibility of the company, it follows that the state should be absent from responsibility for providing paid maternity leave. Accordingly, when this orientation dominates debate and policy thinking, it is unlikely that national legislation will be enacted to provide for paid maternity leave.
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Welfare orientation Bargaining orientation Business orientation New equity orientation
Dominant discourse Domesticity, mother and Employment entitlement, Business case, Social justice, equality, child health, family, working condition, competitive advantage, fairness women’s right fertility, population industrial right added value, ‘bottom line’
Principal agency Paternalist government Unions, industrial tribunals HR manager, employers Progressive government, women’s groups, unions, business Primary mechanism Welfare legislation Bargaining, arbitration, Managerial prerogative, Equity or industrial
enterprise agreements, company policy legislation awards
Expected outcomes Partial coverage, Partial coverage, Partial coverage, Universal coverage for minimum/flat amount, income replacement, income replacement, working women, women’s economic contingent on bargaining contingent on employee income replacement, dependence remains power,variable provisions value, variable provisions economic and career
sought in the ‘business orientation’, women’s unique combination of roles is not necessarily explicitly recognised and when combined with other diversity or work family policies, the distinctiveness of women’s dual roles is further obscured. As noted above, the special needs of business, instead of women, are of primary concern in the ‘business orientation’. In neo-liberal thinking, agencies and codes external to the company are neither welcomed nor needed.
There is a tendency to see business case arguments as associated with unilateral decisions of managers and employers, but they can be used to justify the bargaining positions and claims of unions as well. As a result, the business orientation when manifested in business case arguments is not entirely incon-sistent with the ‘bargaining orientation’. Unions can (and do) utilise business case arguments in support of their claim, but caution is necessary as an over-reliance on business case analysis can back-fire: that is, a business case argument can equally be used to argue that it does not make business sense for an employer to intro-duce paid maternity leave for some employees.
As the paid maternity leave outcomes of a business orientation are contingent on the business case, they therefore generally provide for income replacement, but only for ‘highly valued’ female employees on whom business depends. That is, an immediate outcome of the business orientation is variable coverage: some employees do very well, while others may receive nothing. Furthermore, the ‘business orientation’ allows the state to withdraw from responsibility of providing or legislating for paid maternity leave, even more so than with the ‘bargaining orientation’. Consequently, as with the ‘bargaining orientation’, another outcome of the ‘business orientation’ is a passive state model and no codification in the form of universal legislation.
New equity orientation
Given the limited, uneven and insecure outcomes of policy developed according to any of the three orientations previously discussed, it is apparent that if women’s multiple roles and economic interests are to be properly recognised, policy grounded in a different orientation is required. An orientation that places the needs and rights of working women at its core and that better and consistently serves the interests of all female employees is needed. This approach, which is called here a ‘new equity orientation’, takes its shape from the European tradition of ‘social feminism’ (Hewlett 2002). Although this particular strand of feminism does not have a strong resonance in the Australian context, its philosophical under-pinnings are relevant to this discussion. An orientation grounded in social feminist theory and building upon earlier equal opportunity arguments would accept without question that paid maternity leave is a fundamental and requisite entitlement for all working women. If women are to achieve real equality in the workplace and society, then universal access to paid maternity leave that provides for income replacement and security of employment is essential. Without this, there is no way of adequately integrating and addressing women’s dual roles as producers and reproducers.
difference because it acknowledges and integrates the economic and social roles of women. As a concept, ‘social feminism’ advocates the need for equity, justice, independence and economic equality and explicitly recognises women’s status as mothers, workers and citizens, as well as the potentially conflicting nature of these roles at a particular stage of a woman’s life and career. In order to achieve a balance of these roles without disadvantaging women for child-bearing, some compensation is needed. One appropriate form of compensation is to provide for paid maternity leave.
While social feminists place ‘motherhood centre stage’ (Hewlett 2002: 140), they also recognise the dilemma in which this places women when it comes to achieving at work and at home. According to Hewlett, the belief of European social feminists ‘is that because women are wives and mothers as well as workers and citizens, they need special compensatory policies in order to accomplish as much as men in the world beyond the home’ (Hewlett 2002, p.140). This is different and preferable to the approach taken in the US where paid maternity leave is regarded, at least at the federal level, as ‘special treatment’ for women and thus contrary to equal rights legislation (Wisensale 2001: 117). Consequently the US, like Australia, has no universal legislation for paid maternity leave. In Australia, however, there is no constitutional limitation to its introduction, merely political resistance. An apparently simple way to introduce paid maternity leave legislation in Australia would be to amend the Workplace Relations Act which already provides for 52 weeks unpaid parental leave (Workplace Relations Act 1996: s.14). Indeed in early 2002, and again in 2004, this is what Senator Natasha Stott-Despoja and the Australian Democrats attempted. Despoja’s proposed amendment to the Workplace Relations Act 1996 provided for a 14 weeks paid maternity leave scheme funded by government (Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, Workplace Relations Amendment (Paid Maternity Leave) Bill 2002; Pocock 2003). To date, nothing has come of this bill.
Paid maternity leave policy developed within this proposed ‘new equity orientation’ would require a progressive government willing to provide leader-ship and accept input from all major stakeholders, including women’s interest groups, unions and business. The primary mechanism for introducing paid maternity leave would be to legislate for a level of payment to working women in explicit recognition of their roles as social citizens and workers. The seeds of a ‘new equity orientation’ are already present in the philosophy of some groups. The National Women’s Consultative Committee, for example, has argued for some time that ‘women won’t fully gain equal employment opportunity if they are simply treated in the same way as men’ (NWCC 1993: 28). A socially progressive, feminist orientation is also present in the HREOC proposal as it specifically targets working women and seeks to provide financial compensation for the time out of work on maternity leave.
CONCLUSION
This debate covered a wide range of issues and aroused a huge variety of responses, but these generally only served to obscure the central issue still further, that is, the inequitable treatment of working women.
The purpose of this paper is to understand the gender implications of the debate and Australia’s current policy predicament by conceptualising paid maternity leave in a systematic and coherent manner. In order to do this, a typology of orientations to paid maternity leave is proposed. The typology identifies three existing orientations: the ‘welfare orientation’, the ‘bargaining orientation’ and the ‘business orientation’, and proposes a ‘new equity orientation’. Each of these orientations is characterised by a different discourse, agency, mechanism and expected outcomes. By analysing paid maternity leave in this way, it becomes clear that the first three orientations have dominated the recent debate in Australia and none has delivered an outcome that provides universal access to paid maternity leave for working women. It is argued that in order to redirect the debate and address the vacuum in policy, a new orientation, based on the principles of social feminism and equity through recognition of difference is required.
The orientations set out here are not in themselves policies, but ways of under-standing how policy could and should be developed if it is to achieve certain aims. The differing orientations are also not mutually exclusive, but some do mix better than others. For instance, it is conceivable that policy based on a mix of the ‘bargaining orientation’ with the ‘new equity orientation’ could work in Australia. Such a mix might result in a policy that provides a minimum level of income for all working women while they are on maternity leave, and which could also be supplemented by enterprise bargaining. Effectively, this is what would occur if HREOC’s proposed scheme were implemented. The logical outcome would be a minimum level of paid maternity leave to be provided through a federal scheme and for unions to campaign and bargain for additional pay and entitlements. Opposition from employer groups to bargaining about paid maternity leave has already been voiced. To argue, however, that women should not be entitled to bargain for paid maternity leave is to deny women their rights as industrial citizens as well as their rights as maternal citizens. This position makes a reframing of the debate in terms that explicitly recognise women’s multiple roles all the more vital.
scheme is available to all working women, compensating them for time and income foregone and recognizing their legitimate and unique contributions to production and reproduction.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
In preparing this paper I have received considerable support, comment and feed-back from colleagues. I wish to particularly thank Deb Brennan, Rae Cooper, Leanne Cutcher, Bradon Ellem, Joan Eveline, Dimitria Groutsis, Suzanne Jamieson, Russell Lansbury, Trish Todd and Gillian Whitehouse. I also wish to thank the anonymous referees for their valuable comments and suggestions. The paper has benefited from the input of these people, but any errors or omissions remain my responsibility.
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