Census for Women's Participation, part 2
Tables referred to in this discussion are available on the PDF version of the full report here or you can order the full hard-copy report here
An increased focus on women in trade unions has occurred internationally. In 2004 the International Council of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) urged the development of gender audits in national unions. The New Zealand Council of Trade Unions set up a committee in 2003 to monitor women’s participation and to develop strategies for improvement.
Trade unions are important social partners along with the government and employers and their representative organisations in the promotion of equality at work. The International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) global report “Time for Equality at Work” in 2003 urged that “trade unions and employers’ organisations acknowledge the existence of discriminatory practices and combat those practices starting from within their own institutions. If no deliberate action is taken they, like other organisations, are destined, like any other social institution, to mirror and sometimes reinforce the sexist, racist or other discriminatory practices prevailing around them.”
The rise of women in labour market participation has been one of the most dynamic business trends of the past quarter century. The ILO reports 1.1 billion women are employed world-wide representing 40 percent of the world’s workforce. In just 10 years 200 million more women joined the global workforce.
Women’s labour force participation rate in New Zealand increased from 39 percent to 60 percent between 1971 and 2001, compared with 74 percent for men in 2001. In the September 2005 quarter the female participation rate remained at the highest level ever recorded, 61.4 percent, compared with the male participation rate of 75.3 percent over the same period. Employment growth has been much faster among women than among men, with almost 200,000 more women in jobs in 2001 (the last Census) than in 1991.
The Human Rights Commission contracted the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions to undertake a gender audit of its affiliated unions in 2005 for inclusion in this Census. A summary of the results is reported here. Carol Beaumont, secretary of the CTU, says one of the goals of the CTU’s Women’s Council “is to increase the participation rates of women in all levels of the union movement, including governance and leadership structures.” The results will allow the Women’s Council to more effectively work with unions to raise gender issues about governance.
The results reveal a mixed picture for the trade union movement with some positive news about participation and room for improvement in terms of representation of women at the top in elected and paid positions. New Zealand women are more likely to be unionised (22 percent compared with 16 percent for men) and represent more than 55 percent of CTU membership. This compares favourably with British research in 2004 showing women make up 42 percent of union membership in the United Kingdom. But overall New Zealand women are under-represented in elected positions and at the top of union structures as national or assistant national secretaries.
Individual Unions
The data reported here was collected from a questionnaire emailed to 33 unions affiliated to the CTU. The response rate was 27 unions (82 percent) including larger unions, representing around 93.6 percent of all CTU membership. As five of the six smaller unions which did not respond are male intensive, the reported figures may slightly overstate women’s involvement in unions. Some unions do not have a structure that encompasses national secretary and assistant national secretary positions and in those cases the unions supplied the equivalent senior management structure.
Women's Unionisation
The higher rates of unionisation for women than men is significant, given the difference in the numbers of women and men participating in the labour market. The latest Quarterly Employment Survey lists total filled jobs for men at 826,900. But 84,600 of these are working proprietors who are not eligible for union membership. Similarly, total filled jobs for women totalled 818,900 of which 47,100 are working proprietors. The table shows revised figures of those eligible for union membership.
Women make up more than 60 percent of the membership of three of the four largest unions. These three unions are public sector unions and this may be a contributing factor to the differing rates of unionisation above. This pattern is very similar to that in the United Kingdom with women making up a higher proportion of the public sector unions (in particular UNISON 72 percent, NUT 76 percent and NASUWT 69 percent).
Women’s structures
Women’s structures within the trade union movement are generally considered to advance equality at work issues both inside the trade union movement and in the labour market generally. Less than a third (8 out of 27 unions that responded) had some kind of women’s structure although in one union it was not active. A total of 90 women from the seven unions with active women’s structures were involved in the national women’s structure and 321 women participated around the country at a local level.
Female delegates
The survey results report 12,354 female delegates and 7,362 male delegates. The higher percentage (63 percent) of female delegates is partly the result of a single union having a very large delegate structure and a higher proportion of female delegates than other unions. Most of the 10 biggest unions have either the same or proportionate number of women delegates as women members. And for those that have a lower proportion, it is only a slight difference. This shows that in general women are well represented in delegate structures.
Table 24 / Women’s Unionisation
| Gender | Filled Jobs (March 05) | Union Members | Rate of Unionisation |
| Male | 742 400 | 120 317 | 16.2% |
| Female | 771 800 | 172 751 | 22.4% |
Women in Elected Postions
Overall women are under-represented in elected positions. This is a pattern consistent with recent United Kingdom research on TUC-affiliated unions.
Women in paid positions
In paid positions women again appear to be under-represented in comparison with female union membership. Overall, 11 of the 32 union secretaries (34.4 percent) were women and 21 were men. Of 27 unions who replied, 25 had one secretary only and 9 of the 25 (36 percent) were women. Two other unions had three or four secretaries respectively and a women held one of the positions in each union. A slightly higher number of women, 8 out of 18 (38.8 percent), filled assistant national secretary positions.
New Zealand is ahead of the United Kingdom in women’s representation in paid positions. The TUC has 12 of 71 (17 percent) females who are general secretaries.
This Census brings together an extensive range of material about women’s participation in public life in New Zealand. The breadth of this information is possible by drawing on a variety of primary and secondary sources. These sources and the verification processes used are identified and described below. Where use is made solely of information supplied by other agencies, this should be regarded as the best available data rather than independently verified material.
NZX
The 2006 Census data on women on boards of directors is based on a database purchased by the Human Rights Commission on 15 November 2005 from NZX, which detailed company information including the names of directors of companies listed in the New Zealand Stock Exchange (NZSX), New Zealand Debt Market (NZDX) and the New Zealand Alternative Market (NZAX). This material was verified by checking the directors’ names against company details on the NZX website. Letters were then sent to each company (top 163 of the NZSX and all of the NZDX and NZAX) asking for confirmation of numbers, names and gender of the board of directors as at 15 November 2005. Clarification was sought about discrepancies between the purchased data and the NZX website. Companies which did not respond to the letter were later emailed, and those who did not reply to any of this early correspondence were followed up by telephone or facsimile. The final stage of verification involved checking with the companies’ websites and examining on-line annual reports.
State sector statutory boards
The first stocktake of the membership of all state sector boards and statutory committees by gender has recently been completed by the Nominations Service of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs.
The tables list the government agencies (ministries, departments or other state agencies) which are responsible for appointments; the statutory bodies each agency administers; the representation of women on each board by number and percentage; and the aggregated totals for all the statutory bodies for which that agency is responsible.
The stocktake recorded only Ministerial appointments that are approved by the Cabinet Appointments and Honours Committee (APH). This includes the Ministerial appointees on bodies that also have elected members, such as District Health Boards and tertiary education institutions. It excludes elected members, members appointed by professional groups without ministerial involvement, and ex-officio members (i.e. all membership that is outside the influence of the APH process). As mentioned in the Results and Discussion section the District Health Boards and CCMAU companies are reported within the aggregated table as at 20 December 2004 and then separately at later dates.
Universities
Information about professors and associate professors was gathered from the staff listings provided in the 2005 university calendars. Where necessary, gender was verified by website search or a telephone call to the relevant university. The universities have slightly different structures and use a different range of position titles. The Census figures incorporate all those variously identified in academic listings as professor, chair, associate professor, clinical professor/associate professor, and research professors/associate professors. Honorary, adjunct, emeritus, and visiting professors/associate professors, and professorial fellows or readers, were not included in the Census figures. Similarly, deans, vice-chancellors, and any other senior administrative leaders with professorial titles were discounted, unless they were also included in academic listings (i.e. under school, department, institute, or research centre staff).
Law
The figures on legal practitioners and partners by gender were provided by the Law Society (as at 22 December 2005), and reflect practitioners with current practising certificates. This information comes from a database which relies on material provided by the district law societies who issue these certificates. Information about judges came from the Ministry of Justice, as at 31 December 2005. Legal firms with 10 or more partners, listed in the previous Census, were contacted again for the 2006 report (even though one of the original companies had subsequently dropped to nine partners). These firms were asked to verify whether the number of women partners and total number of partners had changed (as at 1 January 2006). The initial contact was made by email and followed up by telephone.
Media
The figures showing women’s representation on boards of broadcasting and newspaper companies, and as newspaper editors, are drawn from figures collated by the Human Rights Commission and reviewed by the New Zealand Journalists Training Organisation. The data are based on company websites as at 26 September 2005, and media directories.
Politics
The percent of women Members of Parliament (MPs) was established using information downloaded from Parliament’s official website, on 11 November 2005. The gender breakdown of select committee members and chairs is based on information provided by the Office of the Clerk as at 11 November 2005. The information about Cabinet Ministers comes from the list announced on 19 October 2005, published in MAF Policy’s November 2005 Rural Bulletin.
Local government
The local government statistics come from a Local Government New Zealand working paper, published in September 2005, titled Description and analysis of the overall profiles of elected members following the 1998, 2001 and 2004 local government elections. This paper, written by Yanjie Shi, draws on survey material and statistics from the Department of Internal Affairs.
The Ministry of Health provided the gender breakdown of District Health Board members, taken as at 31 December 2002, 2004 and 2005.
Defence
The information on women in the Services was taken from the Review of Progress in Gender Integration in the New Zealand Defence Force, published in August 2005.
School boards of trustees
The information and figures on school Boards of Trustees came from the Ministry of Education.
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