Budget 2020: Funding to open doors for female workers

Women are among the budget winners in recognition of the hardship caused by COVID-19.

Changes to the parental leave payment will give more people access to the payment in the next three years.

The hardship experienced by women in the COVID-19 crisis has prompted the development of a $231m package to increase job opportunities and tackle sexual harassment in the workplace.

Josh Frydenberg said the government was aware women made up the majority of those who lost their jobs in the COVID crisis.

“As the health restrictions have eased, these jobs have started to come back, with 60 per cent of the 458,000 jobs created since May filled by women, but challenges remain,” the Treasurer said. “We are determined to see ­female workforce participation reach its pre-COVID-19 record high.”

To that end, the budget would provide $36m over five years to increase the number of grants to women-founded start-ups under the Boosting Female Founders ­Initiative and to provide access to expert mentoring.

A further $48m worth of grants would be provided for women’s leadership and development programs, including funding for the Academy of Enterprising Girls and Women Building Australia.

Just over $2m was committed for a Respect@Work Council to assist in addressing sexual ­harassment in the workplace, and a number of programs aimed at increasing women’s participation in science, technology, engineering and mathematics were promised almost $40m over five years.

Access to paid parental leave would also be improved in an initiative worth $90m over three years. Specifically, the paid ­parental leave work test would be relaxed for births and adoptions that occurred between March 22, 2020 and March 31, 2021.

The changes meant that parents would qualify for the payment if they had worked in 10 of the past 20 months, instead of 10 of the past 13 months before the birth or adoption of a child.

Mr Frydenberg said the various initiatives would “create more opportunities and choices for women, not just for the recovery but for generations ahead”.