International Caucus: Lifting New Zealand’s last CEDAW reservation

The Beehive
Wellington

Rau rangatira mâ, tçnei te mihi ki a koutou i runga i te kaupapa o te râ – mana wahine. Tçnâ koutou, tçnâ koutou, tçnâ râ tâtou katoa.

I want to begin by thanking all of you for the important role you played in the development of New Zealand’s sixth CEDAW report. I would also like to acknowledge the International Caucus’s wider help and support over the years as we have worked to improve New Zealand’s compliance with its international obligations in relation to women, in order to protect and promote the status of women around the world.

Sometimes that seems like a ‘two steps forward, one step back’ process. Sometimes success is merely holding on to gains previously made in the face of pressure from some conservative quarters to roll back women’s rights. And sometimes you can point to a milestone that marks real progress.

Today we can celebrate such a milestone. New Zealand can now fully embrace CEDAW, without any restrictions resulting from New Zealand law.

This brings to an end a process that began with the Police, and then the Armed Forces – changing their policies and practices to ensure equality in employment opportunities between men and women.

This policy change was the most important development because it made us fully compliant with CEDAW where it matters most – on the ground. Like most things involving international agreements though, the practical change was only the start of a chain of events that were necessary in order to change New Zealand’s status in relation to the CEDAW treaty. This has taken time – but to lift the reservation we had to go through all the steps.

So changing the policy was the first step, but before the reservation could be removed:

• Parliament had to amend the Human Rights Act
• Cabinet had to approve the lifting of the reservation
• the change had to be considered by the House through the International Treaty Examination process, which involves referral to the Foreign Affairs and Defence Select Committee
• the New Zealand Government had to formally request the Secretary General of the United Nations to lift the reservation

All this has now been done, and for the first time, New Zealand can say we are committed to CEDAW, without reservation.

A lot has changed since the Human Rights Act was passed in 1993. At that stage the New Zealand Armed Forces still had a policy of not allowing women to serve in combat roles and the Act provided an exemption for the Armed Forces covering sexual discrimination in employment matters.

In March, I had the privilege of seeing through the final stages in the House of an amendment to section 33 of the Human Rights Act which removed that exemption and legally committed the Armed Forces to what they were already doing in fact, which was enabling both men and women to undertake all roles within the services.

I am indebted to my colleague Lynne Pillay, MP for Waitakere, who deserves full credit for bringing the proposed change to the House in the form of a well-crafted Member’s Bill, which was subsequently adopted as a Government Bill.

I was also pleased that the Bill gained cross-party support and was passed unanimously by the House. New Zealand has a much stronger voice internationally when we are united in supporting the rights of women.

And I am proud of the fact that the Police and the Armed Forces did not have to be forced into change, but rather set about not only changing their policies, but also addressing the practical barriers to the full participation of women within their organisations.

While the Police were also covered by our CEDAW reservation, the fact is that at the time the reservation was registered, Police were already changing their policies to ensure equal employment opportunities for women and men, and the New Zealand Parliament chose not to give the Police the same legislative protection under the Human Rights Act as it gave to the Defence Forces back in 1993.

In the 1990s the Armed Forces were also working to give women a greater role and in 2000 the Armed Forces formally abandoned the policy that prevented women from undertaking some front-line duties. Like the Police, they have also been working to remove the physical and cultural barriers to women being employed in all front-line roles, which included a programme of equipment modification to remove the ‘women aren’t strong enough’ objection.

So by early in this decade all formal discrimination against women in employment had ceased, but the right to discriminate against women remained on our statute books. While that was the case, New Zealand was not fully compliant with the most important international agreement we have signed in relation to the rights of women. Following the amendment to the Human Rights Act we can lift our last remaining reservation to CEDAW.

That is a great message that I will be able to take to the CEDAW Committee in New York in a couple of weeks. It will strengthen New Zealand’s voice internationally and help us focus on the issues where we still need to do much more to ensure New Zealand women enjoy real equality in all areas of their lives.

Because, while we are right to celebrate this milestone, we need to acknowledge that equality in law and equality in reality are two different things. As a nation we still have a long way to go to achieve pay and employment equity; to enable women to succeed in some male-dominated trades and professions, through vehicles such as the Modern Apprenticeships programme; and to end the terrible scourge of domestic violence – to name three areas of particular focus.

So today, I think we can allow ourselves to celebrate. Tomorrow we need to get back to the task of changing hearts and minds, which is much more important when we want to change attitudes and behaviour.

Discrimination will only end when we, as communities and as individuals, no longer tolerate it in ourselves or in others. Achieving that is much more difficult than passing a law, but it is possible, and it will happen.

Finally, I acknowledge the important role played by NGOs in the accountability process. It is important that CEDAW does not just hear from government, but that it also benefits from hearing the independent views expressed in the shadow reports by NGOs. I am pleased that the government has been able to again fund NGOs to travel to New York and present those shadow reports, and to be part of providing a complete view of the status of women in New Zealand. It think that it is one of New Zealand’s great strengths that government and NGOs can both work closely together to achieve positive change and also have the maturity to debate and even to disagree about how best to achieve that change. I have also invited Diane Mara of Pacifica to attend as part of the government delegation.

The Ministry has three social partners – NCW, Maori Women's Welfare League and Pacifica. Since becoming Minister I have felt that there are two other groups that I would like to see achieve that status and they are ethnic women and rural women. This has been reinforced for me in the process of developing the government's CEDAW report and the presentation I will be honoured to give on behalf of New Zealand. The Convention is attuned to the possibility of different layers of disadvantage and I believe that New Zealand is no exception in this regard.

I have been acutely aware that Pacifica has not yet prepared and presented a Shadow Report and this has been my motivation behind inviting Diane to attend as part of the government delegation. An NGO that has presented a Shadow Report cannot be a member of the government delegation, so this is my way of doing some capacity building and hoping that Pacifica will take up the challenge of presenting a Shadow Report in the future.

In closing I am pleased that I could share with you my immense personal satisfaction about the lifting of the last remaining reservation to the Convention.

I can assure you that this will not divert my attention from my ambition that all New Zealand women are personally and economically secure, with positive choices in all aspects of their lives, in a society that embraces both diversity and equality.

Thank you.