From Schwartz Media. I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven Am. When Scott Morrison lost his job as Prime Minister, it was women who sacked him. A review commissioned by the Liberal Party after the twenty twenty two election found that a decline in support among women was a decisive factor in their loss. The report outlined ways that the party might win women back, but three years on that has
not happened. Today. Contributor to the Saturday Paper, Breeley on what women want and why they're not getting it from the Liberal Party. It's Thursday, April twenty four so, Brie, thank you for joining me on seven am. Again, thank you for having me back. It's good to be back. So I wanted to start in twenty eighteen with the leadership spill that saw Scott Morrison Oltimle assume the top
job within the party. So tell me a bit about how it unfolded and what it tells you about the Liberal Party's attitude towards women at the time.
So three people went for the leadership position. That was Julie Bishop, Scott Morrison and Peter Dutton. Obviously, in every political party you've got sort of factions. In the Liberal Party at that point in time. Obviously there was the sort of moderate faction and the hardline faction. Julie Bishop and Scott Morrison were both in the moderate faction. Peter Dutt was in the hardline faction. And at this point
in time. The other thing you need to know is that Julie Bishop was one of the most popular politicians in Australia with the general public. She'd been working in the Foreign Affairs Department. There was a perception that she was a professional and moderate conservative, kind of reliable, bankable
politician as far as politicians go. But the moderates in the party were not confident that there would be enough votes for Julie Bishop versus Peter Dutton, and they took a position of anyone but Dutton, and then the result was that they kind of got Scott Morrison by default.
Where there was a ballot producted in the party room for the leadership of the Liberal.
Party, the successful candidate was Scott Morrison.
Julie Bishop has subsequently said that she would not have put her thrown her hat in the ring unless she had been assured that she would have enough votes, but the people in the party just could would not vote for a woman to be the leader. And I think with hindsight, in my opinion, that's become a bit of a sliding doors moment for the party because shortly thereafter me too hit Parliament House.
Scott Morrison is presiding over this toxic culture, not just in his own party, but clearly in ministerial offices and in the Parliament itself. Over half, that is, fifty one percent of all people currently in Commonwealth parliamentary workplaces have experienced at least one incident of blean sexual harassment or actual or attempted sexual assault.
Like anyone who works in this building, I find the statistics that are presented there, of course appalling and disturbing. I wish I found them more surprising, but I find them just as appalling.
And in twenty twenty one, a bunch of National MPs in particular referred to the funding of early childhood education and care as outsourcing of parental responsibility, worried that it would act as a disincentive for mothers who should otherwise be caring for their kids at home. And that's around about this time where you're then getting also all of
the me too stuff hitting Parliament House. There was just what felt like wave after wave of roiling sort of gender specific issues and the party's problems with women just got worse and worse and worse.
And what about if you were to look at it over time, I suppose before Scott Morrison when it comes to the Liberal Party and the way that they've approached representation and also just policy issues.
So what's really interesting for this article? I interviewed Rebecca Huntley.
She's a demographer. She's been doing research and strategy for a couple of decades now, and she said that until about the eighties, the Labor Party was considered to be men's preference and women would vote for the Liberals because the Labor Party was concerned with rights at work trade unions and there were not that many women in the workplace, and the Labor Party responded to that over the decades by instigating goals and quotas for how many of their MPs would be women.
Well, Prime Minister Anthony Albanizi has made history this morning swearing in a record number of female MPs into his front bench.
Now, certainly on average, women in Australia think that the Labor Party the one that's more in tune to their needs and understands what is important to them. The Liberal Party, by contrast, have just consistently taken this sort of hardline against quotas and the result is that they are almost eighty percent men. And what has happened as well since the last federal election where the Teal Independence won a lot of the seats from the more moderate members of the Liberal Party.
The moderate wing of the Liberal Party has been decimated by that Teal tidal wave. In Sydney and Melbourne seats, at least five climate two hundred back challengers have turfed out high profile Liberals and electorates once considered the safest of seats.
Kate Cheney and allegris Bender come from proud Liberal families and those are very talented, very effective politicians. Those were assets that the Liberal Party just lost. It means that the only people sort of left in the Liberal Party are from the hardline faction, and there's just been this
snowball over the last decade. In particular, that means they are currently at the worst possible levels of representation in terms of just numbers of MPs in Parliament and they are now, without a doubt they have fallen behind average Australian's sort of values and where we think we're at in time, and that is something that the party itself is aware of and seems to be kind of unable or unwilling to shift.
Coming up after the break, how the Liberal Party is trying to win back women.
Hi, I'm Daniel James. Seven Am tells stories that need to be told, how journalism is founded on trust and independence, and now we're increasing our coverage. Every Saturday until election, we'll bring you an extra episode to break down the biggest political moments of the week. If you enjoy seven Am, the best way you can support us is by making a contribution at seven am podcast dot com dot au slash support. Thanks for listening and supporting our work.
So Bree, we've talked a little about the tier independents who I suppose could have been Liberals if you know, perhaps the party had worked harder to recruit talented conservative women for people like Alec Respender and Kate Cheney. And that story, the story of till women taking Blue ribbon seats in the last election. You know, it's well known, but I'd like to talk a bit about what happened after the election. After the coalition lost office. What did
the Liberal Party do about what had happened? How did they try and course correct?
Well, first of all, they commissioned a report that was co offered by two of their own people, one of whom was Senator Jane Hume, and that came out in twenty twenty two. It was a sort of you know, looking through the ashes for any possible learnings. And the report had forty nine I think recommendations. It was four of those recommendations were explicitly about women or.
The Liberal Party have a women problem. It's most obvious when you look at the House of Representatives chamber. The forty seventh Parliament has a record number of women, but in the Liberal Party just nine of the forty two seats are held by women.
In that twenty twenty two report that the Liberal Party commissioned, they found that a majority of women preferred labor in all age segments. And the report noted, and I quote here verbatim, liberal defectors in teal seats were highly likely to agree with the statement that the treatment or attitude toward women within the Liberal Party had a strong influence
on my vote. One of the things they recommended was a regular kind of internal party reporting on the talent was being identified, you know, talented women were being put up for pre selection. One of the recommendations was the establishment of a kind of you know, networking experience, knowledge sharing groups specifically for women that was called the Margaret Gilfoil Network. But I approached Senator Jane Hume, and I approached the Deputy Liberal Leader Susan Lee, who is also
the Shadow Minister for Women. I asked them whether the Margaret Gilfoyle Network had run any internships, mentorships, exchanges, etc. I asked whether the Liberal Party had been doing those internal reports about identifying women talent or putting them up for pre selection. I asked basically if they had any comments to make about the gendered components of this twenty
twenty two report. And there was certainly no specific response about the Margaret Gilfoil Network, no response about those internal reporting mechanisms, And the one reply I did get from Minister Lee's office responded with a statement that was about three paragraphs long that barely mentioned women at all, and the first sentence was this election is a choice about who can better manage the economy and help Australians get ahead.
It sort of mentions that women bear the brunt of economic distress and then continues to just talk about cost of living, tax offsets, and home ownership. So yeah, I felt like the message was very clear in that response. And the impression I'm given when I sit down and do this research now is that this report was commissioned
by the Liberal Party in twenty twenty two. It made a lot of recommendations, none of those have been meaningfully acted upon, and we are now at yet another election cycle where none of these problems have been addressed.
And what about Peter Dutton specifically, can you talk to me about his record on speaking on issues that affect women.
Well, what's in interesting is that pretty much the only angle he's tried for to sort of appeal to women is that he's tough on crime. It would be tempting to think that that never works, but what we know is that for a lot of people, the tough on crime angle is compelling. What it just doesn't work for
are the people who already don't like him or that party. Because, on average, the research shows that if you are a woman, and if you are a woman with a university education, you are not going to want to vote for the Liberal Party. Those are the sort of generalized gendered stats
that Huntley's research, for example, shows for sure. But apart from that sort of tough on crime cop angle, which in my opinion still comes through as incredibly patronizing, he's still making that sort of fundamental mistake that Morrison kept making where women are to be protected.
Okay, so it sounds like something much bigger would be needed for the Liberal Party to shift its appeal and turn around, and it's fortunes with women.
Yeah, I mean, my opinion on the situation is that they're not going to get anywhere while they keep thinking of women as a problem to be solved instead of an asset to be tapped. Every time people like Peter Dutton come out and say that, you know, they would like to see more women in the party, but they're not going to do it at the risk of compromising
people be deserving to be there on merit. They just still, i think don't understand or appreciate how profoundly offensive that is to suggest that if you act on meaningful goals or quoters, to suggest that doing so means you will automatically get subpar lacking in quality candidates. Is it just shows a yeah, I think a fundamental lack of understanding.
Free Thank you so much for your time, Thank you.
For having me.
Also in the news today, Elon Musk will start pulling back from his role at the Trump Administration's Department of Government Efficiency to focus on Tesla. In an investor call, Musk acknowledged there have been rocky moments at the electric car manufacturer. This year, Tesla reported a seventy one percent drop in first quarter profits compared to the same time
last year. The massive dip is widely seen to be a backlash against Musk's political activity, and a record number of votes were cast on the first day of early voting on Tuesday, with more than half a million people heading to the polls. The turnout smashed the previous record set in twenty twenty two of about three hundred and
fifteen thousand votes. The Australian Electoral Commission has asked voters to be patient, as the strong first day showing led to some voters waiting in long queues at polling centers. I'm Ruby Jones is a thanks for listening