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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 10 Hansard (25 September) . . Page.. 3726 ..

MS GALLAGHER (continuing):

speeches, there is probably one area on which we are all in agreement-that is that we would all like more male teachers in child care and in schools.

This is not something peculiar to the ACT-it is something every jurisdiction around Australia is looking at. The statistics Mr Pratt read out are reflected in every other state and territory and in every other country. In looking for solutions in both those speeches, if we could solve it in the ACT, we would be in a great position, because we would then be able to solve this very complex issue nationally and internationally.

It is outside of the education system. If you look at the human services industry as a whole, you will see the same statistics. The gender imbalance exists for reasons that not everyone understands. However, it is certainly due to the nature of the work, the difficulty of the job and the wages attracted to it.

I refer to some of the comments made by Mrs Burke. I always enjoy working with Mrs Burke and, for the most part, agree with her. However, some of the arguments she is running in this MPI have disappointed me. She has made comments about men being discriminated against.

People have choices about their employment options. I worked in child care for a number of years and the child care centres sought males to work in their centres. However, in large part, men do not apply for jobs in those centres, so I do not know how they are discriminated against.

Are we discriminating against them by not forcing men into these jobs? Perhaps we should impose a quota and say, "In order to be licensed, you must have five blokes working in your centre"-because that is going to deliver it. Discrimination is just not going on. If there are centres in the ACT that are discriminating against men, then I would like to know about it. There is legislation in place to stop that sort of discrimination.

In respect of some of the lines Mrs Burke was running, about men being sex fiends and paedophiles, and that that is turning them away from careers in child care, I think that is way down the list. I believe it is the nature of the job, and the wages. Men do not choose to study for three years, get a qualification and, after eight years in the job, earn $40,000. It is well established that women make choices about the jobs they choose, for different reasons from men. She runs the line of the answer being that we need to deal with this sex fiend and paedophile perception problem, and that that will encourage men into the jobs, but that is simply not the case.

Mrs Burke: Read the research, Minister. There are pages and pages of it!

MS GALLAGHER: I have read the research and I have worked in the area. I understand the issue-and it is not about sex fiends and paedophiles. There are enough policies and procedures in child-care centres to make sure that, if those unfortunate perceptions do exist, they are dealt with appropriately.

You are perpetuating this by putting out media releases saying this is the problem-that the reason men do not choose these jobs is because they might be seen as sex fiends or paedophiles. There is also the view that children from single-parent families, where the

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