Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Will the pay equity claim shake-up save us money?

That decision today to stop all those pay equity claims is ballsy - I mean, you know, ballsy is good - and I think I lean towards thinking this is the right thing to do.

Those pay equity claims have been a bit random. I don't know if you know how this works, but basically, if people can prove that they're underpaid because they work in women-dominated jobs, then they can get a pay rise.

And how they prove this is by finding men who are doing a similar job and then showing that there is a difference in pay.

But the problem is, it really isn't. It isn't comparing apples with apples, it's often apples with oranges.

For example, librarians. Librarians are currently trying to get a pay rise by comparing themselves to traffic engineers.

Now, no disrespect whatsoever to librarians, but the Dewey Decimal System is not that hard. I'm pretty sure that most of us could learn to do it and become librarians in about 20 minutes flat.

I think it takes a little bit longer to train up as an engineer who specializes in designing and planning and constructing and operating and maintaining a transport system.

And the same goes with the admin health staff who are trying to compare themselves to mechanical engineers, and the same goes with the social workers who are trying to compare themselves to air traffic controllers. You can see the trouble here, right?

Now, from what I understand, what Brooke van Velden has done today is going to save the country billions of dollars - in the Budget that we're getting in 2 weeks' time.

Apparently, this is one of, if not the single biggest savings in the Budget. And apparently over 4 years, it counts for something higher than $10 billion. That is a significant amount of money.

And as we know, the country is financially stuffed.

However, someone will pay for this, and it's going to be the Government.

They will be punished for this in political capital in the years to come, because this attack basically writes itself.

Heartless Government takes money from underpaid working women - and that is why it is so ballsy, because the pay equity system is clearly, when you look at the detail, deeply flawed.

I mean, it's a lovely idea, let's pay women more, but the system that we use to do that is deeply, deeply flawed and obviously needs this overhaul - but the politics of it is gonna be very, very rough.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Let me tell you that decision today is stop all
those pay equity claims as bullsy. I mean, you know,
ballsy is good. I think I lean towards thinking this
is the right thing to do. Those pay equity claims
have been a bit random. I don't know if you
know how this works, but basically, if people can prove
that they are underpaid because they work in women dominated jobs,
then they can get a pay rise. And how they

(00:22):
prove this is by finding men who are doing a
similar job and then showing that there is a difference
in pay. But the problem is, it really isn't comparing
oranges apples with apples, right, It's often apples with oranges.
For example, librarians. Librarians are currently trying to get a
pay rise by comparing themselves to traffic engineers. Now, no
disrespect whatsoever to librarians, but the Dewey decimal system is

(00:45):
not that hard. I'm pretty sure that most of us
could learn to do it and become librarians in about
twenty minutes flat. I think it takes a little bit
longer to train up as an engineer who specializes in
designing and planning and constructing and operating and maintaining a
transport system. And the same goes with the admin health
staff who are trying to compare themselves to mechanical engineers.
And the same goes with the social workers who are

(01:06):
trying to compare themselves to traffic air traffic controllers. You
can see the trouble here right now. From what I understand,
what Brook Vanvelden has done today is going to save
the country billions of dollars in the budget that we're
getting in two weeks time. Apparently, and I'm going to
check this out with the Minister when she's with us
after five but apparently this is one of, if not
the single biggest savings in the budget and apparently over

(01:29):
four years accounts for something and well well higher than
ten billion dollars. That is a significant amount of money.
And as we know, the country is financially stuffed. However,
someone will pay for this, and it's going to be
the government. They will be punished for this and political
capital in the years to come because this attack basically
rights itself. Heartless government takes money from underpaid working women,

(01:52):
and that is why it is so ballsy, because the
pay equity system is clearly when you look at the detail,
deeply flawed. I mean, it's a lovely idea, let's pay
women more, but the system that we used to do
that is deeply, deeply flawed and obviously needs this overhaul.
But the politics of it, it's going to be very
very rough. For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive, listen

(02:12):
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