Young Liberals spearhead drive for women

Liberal Party state divisions will set ‘achievable targets’ to increase female members in the youth wing.

Gladys Liu, left, Fiona Martin, Bridget Archer, Celia Hammond, Katie Allen, Angie Bell and Melissa McIntosh represented 50 per cent of newly elected lower house Liberal MPs at the 2019 election. Picture: Sean Davey

Liberal Party state divisions will set “achievable targets” to ­increase female members in the youth wing and women will be surveyed annually on how to ­improve internal programs and structures, as Scott Morrison ­attempts to contain a backlash over his government’s treatment of women.

The party’s federal executive approved six reforms on March 18 — before the Prime Minister said he was open to quotas because “the other way” wasn’t working — to boost female representation in the grassroots organisation and party leadership.

After a Menzies Research Centre report warned the party’s lack of female participation started at the entry level, the federal executive agreed each division would set achievable targets to boost female membership in the Young Liberals and that a digital advertising campaign would be launched “aimed at encouraging more young women to join” the youth movement.

The Young Liberals had just 35 per cent female members in 2019, while in the senior party the gender breakdown was 57 per cent men and 43 per cent women. Only 23 per cent of party presidents were women.

Under the federal executive’s changes, the states must have dedicated forums that connect with “professional women” and they will be asked to conduct annual membership drives with a particular focus on recruiting females. They will have to report to federal executive on their outcomes.

State and federal MPs will also be provided data from the state ­divisions on female representation at every level of the party, including endorsed candidates and branch presidents, and a ­national survey of female members will be conducted for input on “how to strengthen the party’s ­existing programs and structures to support and encourage women”. The survey would be used to “identify opportunities for better recruitment and retention of women” to the party.

While party sources stressed the measures were not an attempt to solve all of the Liberals’ gender imbalance problems, they were an important step alongside preselecting more female candidates.

“At the last election, 50 per cent of new Liberal members of the House or Representatives were women. However, much more needs to be done, and that work is under way,” Liberal Party federal director Andrew Hirst said.

“The federal executive recently endorsed a number of additional measures focusing on increasing female membership and the number of women in leadership roles in our party organisation.”

Anthony Albanese on Tuesday said Mr Morrison “doesn’t quite get it yet” after he controversially labelled Marise Payne his “prime minister for women” as part of a reshuffle designed to neutralise increasing attacks over his government’s handling of rape and sexual harassment allegations.

Mr Morrison is also under pressure to direct outgoing Liberal National MP Andrew Laming to quit the party and move to the crossbench after he took a photo of a woman bent over that showed her underwear and of trolling female constituents.

Labor deputy leader Richard Marles said Dr Laming remaining a voting member in the Coalition showed “this government has not dealt with the issues that it needs to deal with”.

Senator Payne said she understood some colleagues felt uncomfortable sharing a partyroom with Dr Laming but insisted he had “taken responsibility for his actions” by committing to undertake empathy training while on medical leave and announcing he would not contest the next election.

While there is growing support among Liberal politicians and within state divisions for quotas, some MPs are hopeful the party will end up adopting different measures that comply with merit-based selection to bolster women within party ranks.