This module is going to look at what exactly is a Gender Impact Assessment.
So, just a little bit of context for the GIA journey so far. For many of you it may feel like this has come out of the blue, but we want to reassure you that this is not a new initiative.
The Gender Equality Act 2020 itself has come about through the recommendations of
Safe and Strong, the Victorian Gender Equality Strategy, which came about through the Royal Commission into Family Violence, and this real recognition to mainstream gender equality across the public sector. The GIA, as a key part of the Act has also been developed really carefully over the last few years and The Equality Institute has had the pleasure of working on this with the Office for Woman and PwC, since 2018. We first developed a global evidence review of best practice, by looking at different jurisdictions around the world to see what they were doing, see what worked well in practice, and to see what really needed to be done to implement GIAs well in different contexts. From that we were able to draft a toolkit, and able to pilot it in six areas of the VPS and we were able to see how that worked in practice and really evaluate quite strongly those pilot learnings. Based on the evaluation we were able to strongly revise the toolkit and engage in a second pilot, where we found we were able to simplify and really strengthen those GIA tools based on those pilot learnings. So, you can see it's gone through a really rigorous process of development, testing, evaluation and so on, just to get to the point where we are today. Where we are today is now where The Gender Equality Act 2020 is in force, and you're engaging at the very beginning of your GIA trainings.
So, another mantra we want to give you, for the GIA toolkit, and the GIA process more generally, is that at its most basic level conducting a GIA is just good policymaking. If we ignore gender, as we saw in some of those examples in the previous module, like not designing cars with different gendered bodies in mind or ignoring the signs of different gendered (bodies) and heart attacks and so on. We actually aren't developing good policies that are equitable, and that support women, men, and gender diverse people.
So, this brings us to a really great resource that we'd like to share with you. It's a short video around Gender Impact Assessments in the Canadian context. Because this work is so new in Australia, we don't have resources yet, with the Australian context in mind. But this is a really great resource that will really show you what it means to apply a gender lens to policy, planning, and service delivery. In Canada they call it a “gender-based analysis plus”, but it is, it is exactly the same thing as a Gender Impact Assessment, and this hopefully is a really good resource for you to share with your colleagues and something that you can return to again and again, to really strengthen your understanding about what it means to apply a gender lens to your work, so we'll watch that video now.
[Video voiceover]
Imagine a busy street that you know. A place with shops and restaurants, maybe there's a condo [apartment] or two, park or school nearby. It's a place that is very familiar. When you look at it, you pay attention to the buildings, the people, and the traffic, but you probably noticed less obvious things too. Your favourite restaurant stands out, that new shop seems intriguing. You also see the cracks in the sidewalk that are going to widen after the first freeze. And that business that never shovels after a snowfall, making the sidewalk an icy hazard. You notice these things because of your experience, your knowledge, and your reality. This is your lens. We all have one, your view of the world is shaped by your life story. The funny thing about lenses, is that we often don't know we have them, they are invisible to us because they have always been there. Lenses can be powerful. They can make things instantly visible to you that others might not see without having them pointed out. But different people have different life stories, and therefore different lenses. And different groups of people have common experiences that allow them to see similar concerns. People of different genders, for example, notice things other genders may not see. This is what we mean by ‘gender lens’. A gender is an important feature of identity that impacts what we see, notice, and feel when we look at a situation. People of different genders may not see the things that you do, but they will also see things that you don't. Just because we don't see something with our own lens, doesn't mean it's not there, and that it doesn't affect people. So, when someone makes decisions affecting our city, like our mayor, councillors, city employees, planners and contractors, they need to be able to see things through many lenses. This takes training. We are all experts at seeing things through our own lens, but we're not naturally good at seeing things through others. That's why the city of Edmonton employees are now taking “gender based analysis plus” training or GBA+ for short. It’s a way of making sure that different perspectives are included for good decision making. It's about training people to add lenses to their collection to make sure our city works for everyone, and that includes the lenses of men, women, non-binary folks, Edmontonians who have different accessibility needs, as well as people from different cultures, ages and income levels. All these lenses need to be considered too and is why it's called “GBA plus”. The plus refers to other identities, experiences, challenges, and realities. Though GBA+ training starts with gender, it doesn't end there. It opens the door to viewing our city through many lenses and considering many perspectives. The important thing is lenses aren't swapped. They are added. We're not trying to replace one point of view with another, we are including them all. The more lenses we add to our analysis of a situation, the more citizens we serve when we solve the problem. Changing your viewpoint from your own lens to multiple lenses can be challenging, and adding lenses can make situations that used to seem simple, a whole lot more complex. But it's important to address the complexity. Humans are complex beings, and cities are complex systems. When we oversimplify decisions or prioritise the needs of one group over others, we don't create spaces that work for everyone, and it's also the standard we hold our leaders to. They have a responsibility to represent all Edmontonians and GBA+ is how we ensure that they are prepared to do this. So, let's look at that street scene again, you may see the cracks in the sidewalk, your favourite restaurant, and that inviting park. Susan might see a lack of bright lighting.
Rachel might notice the lighting too, but she also sees that the curbs don't have cut outs. Ahmed might also notice the curbs, because they make it harder for him to walk with his daughter in the park, and he also sees the lack of police presence on the street. All these perspectives are valid. But if you only asked one person or group what they see, you wouldn't get the whole story. GBA+ analysis helps us all to see the big picture and make better decisions for all Edmontonians.
So, hopefully you enjoyed that short video and got a lot out of how they very simply and easily explain what it means to conduct a Gender Impact Assessment but also what it means to add and adopt different lenses to our policy planning, when it comes to the policies, programs, and services that we want to plan with this gender lens in mind.
So, a little bit of Gender Impact Assessment 101. Applying a gender lens, essentially means to actively assess an issue for gender equality issues and outcomes. So, applying a gender lens to policies requires policymakers to examine those key disparities and gaps between men, women, and gender diverse people in all aspects of society, and it provides us with the starting point for policies and programs to redress gender inequalities. So, we want you to think about Gender Impact Assessments really as a process. A GIA is a process of critical reflection to analyse and assess how proposed policies, programs and services might be experienced, but also how they might affect women, men, and gender diverse people differently. A GIA has broadly a number of goals. Firstly, it seeks to broaden the focus of economic analysis to inspire different questions to be asked and issues to be raised.
It also seeks to improve the accuracy of costings and projections in relation to uptake of programs or benefits. It also helps us to systematically analyse whether outcomes are truly equitable, and it also helps us to challenge our assumptions, particularly gender assumptions.
It will also become really important for you to understand the benefits of Gender Impact Assessment, particularly if you're facing resistance in your organisations. You really want to be able to display for people and understand the benefits of a GIA and why we really want to do it. So, making sure we understand that a GIA means improved policymaking and service delivery and recognising and addressing those unintended consequences that we know our policies, services, or policies, services or programs that can have on women, men and gender diverse people.
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It helps us to achieve gender equality, more broadly. So, when we can provide data and evidence of what works to improve gender equality and to improve outcomes for all members of the Victorian community, it helps us to achieve those broad objectives of The Gender Equality Act 2020. It can also help us to prevent those unintended negative consequences where a policy, program, or service might inadvertently reinforce or contribute to inequality, even when we don't mean it to.
It also helps to challenge those harmful gender attitudes and social norms that underpin drivers of violence against women, girls, and gender diverse people. It's also arguably a better use of resources. So, the more tailored our services are based on gender and sex disaggregated data research and those direct insights from the community, the more accurately we can build our understanding of the problem and context, and therefore create better solutions for people in our communities. If you're interested in pulling out those benefits later on down the track, you can find them on page 12 of your GIA toolkit.
Just another quick example before we close off this module, it's an example of when a Gender Impact Assessment was responsive to the findings in terms of a superannuation policy in Aotearoa/New Zealand. So, when a Gender Impact Assessment was undertaken to inform the review of a state funded superannuation, it actually revealed that the proposed shift to assess eligibility for state superannuation from individual income to joint couple income would adversely affect the entitlements of the higher income earner in the relationship. What this actually ended up doing was creating a disincentive for the lower income earner, which usually was younger women, to remain in the workforce. So, upon these findings of the GIA, the preferred policy option actually became the retention of the individually-based state funded pension. And this provided women with retirement income, regardless of their earning history and provided some recognition for their unpaid caring work that had prevented some of their accumulation of savings. So, this is just a really great example where you can see that a policy was responsive to the findings of a GIA, and it's something we really want to encourage. There's lots of great examples out there. But if you're interested in that one, there's the source for that one, the New Zealand Ministry of Women's Affairs.
That's the end of this module. The next module will take you through intersectionality.
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