The Women’s Budget Statement is a slim, 87-page booklet carrying far more weight than its size suggests. First introduced by the Hawke Government in 1984, it’s a reminder that gender inequality still pervades Australian society to the extent that women require a separate budget. It’s a strange kind of acknowledgment, one that reinforces our place as the “other” who still needs extra attention just to level the field. When the classic navy budget books thudded onto my desk at Parliament House during Budget Lockup, the Women’s Budget was perched right on top, almost too perfectly placed. A gesture visible enough to say: ‘See? We didn’t forget you.’
This year’s Women’s Budget makes its pitch with hard numbers. Finance Minister Katy Gallagher made clear that women’s economic equality is a core political strategy. On the surface, the case is compelling. Since Labor took office in 2022, women have been earning an average of $217 more per week. Treasury modelling predicts an extra 900,000 hours of work each week from women, driven by reforms like cheaper childcare and expanded parental leave.
Gallagher was keen to highlight this progress, even suggesting the gender pay gap had “closed.” But the reality is less triumphant: the gap stands at 11.9 per cent, its lowest point on record, yet women still earn, on average, $246 less per week than men. It’s a reminder that while progress is real, it’s slow, and polished talking points do little to fix the stubborn inequalities beneath them.
Full-time average weekly earnings for select cohorts, by gender
Nevertheless, the broader policy design rests on solid textbook economic logic. Reforms like subsidised childcare, expanded paid parental leave, and investments in women’s health aim to boost workforce participation and productivity. The government is investing $134.3 million to expand access to long-acting reversible contraceptives, expected to save around 300,000 women up to $400 annually. Another $26.3 million will fund new Medicare rebates for menopause assessments, projected to benefit about 150,000 women. Together, these measures bolster human capital and lift national productivity.
Yet there’s always a harder question underneath the headlines: can these measures survive the grind of implementation? Will they genuinely reach the women who need them most?
The broader framing of this year’s Budget was dominated by one word: resilience. Treasurer Jim Chalmers warned of “substantial global uncertainty,” from China’s slowdown, to trade tensions, to surging gold prices, as a barometer of global nerves. Against this backdrop, the Women’s Budget isn’t just framed as social policy, it’s pitched as smart economics.
More women working boosts the labour supply. Better healthcare and safer workplaces raise productivity. Fixing long-ignored market failures, like the economic cost of gender-based violence, frees up growth that’s been stifled for decades.
But when it comes to violence, supposedly a cornerstone of this Women’s Budget, the government has fallen short. Despite the rhetoric about making Australia safer, no major new core funding was announced for long-term prevention. Advocacy groups like Full Stop Australia warn that without serious, sustained investment, the cycle of violence will continue unchecked. One-off payments like the Leaving Violence Payment matter, but they’re no substitute for properly resourced services, systemic education, and real cultural change. It’s another case of recognising a market failure but failing to fund the solution.
The Leaving Violence Payment itself offers up to $5,000 to help victim-survivors establish safety and independence: $1,500 in cash and $3,500 for goods and services. It also offers safety planning, risk assessments, and service referrals for up to 12 weeks. It’s a serious acknowledgment that money (or lack thereof) is one of the biggest barriers to leaving abuse. But, like much of the Women’s Budget, ambition meets reality fast. In cities like Sydney, where a rental bond alone can swallow the full $5,000, the payment barely makes a dent. Strict eligibility criteria have also meant that fewer than half of the applicants successfully receive it. Without deeper investment in affordable housing and frontline services, payments like this risk becoming little more than band-aid solutions.
Childcare reforms are another critical part of the government’s pitch to boost women’s workforce participation. The new 3-Day Guarantee will provide families with at least 72 hours of subsidised early childhood education and care per fortnight, regardless of their work or study commitments, effectively scrapping the old activity test, which tied parents’ access to subsidised care to their work or study hours. Dr Anne Aly, Minister for Early Childhood Education, called the old test out directly: “The activity test locks out the children who can most benefit from access and has not increased workforce participation from parents.” The reforms are backed by a $5 billion investment, including plans to build and expand 160 centres and deliver a 15 per cent wage rise for early childhood educators.
In theory, subsidising childcare lowers the cost of working and brings more women back into the labour market. But these reforms will only shift participation if there are enough centres and trained workers to meet demand. These are not quick fixes: they are multi-year structural reforms that will take time to implement.
Meanwhile, student debt relief emerged as one of the Budget’s smarter and more quietly gendered economic plays. If re-elected, Labor plans to slash existing HECS-HELP debts by 20 per cent, raise the minimum repayment threshold, and shift to a marginal rate system. It wasn’t pitched as a women’s policy, but the gendered impact is obvious. Women are more likely to carry student debt longer, thanks to lower early-career earnings and the stop-start nature of working life when caregiving responsibilities fall on their shoulders.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, 44 per cent of women who were unavailable for work in 2023–24 cited caring for children as the main reason, compared to just 4 per cent of men. Hence, reducing student debt means more disposable income and stronger workforce attachment for women juggling work, study, and care.
Average employer gender pay gap and proportion of female employees, by industry
The University of Sydney welcomed these reforms, noting the likely benefits for women, First Nations students, and first-in-family graduates. But they also flagged a major flaw: students enrolling from Semester 2, 2025 onwards (a sizable cohort) will miss out on the 20 per cent debt cut. As a USyd spokesperson put it, while the Budget made important moves on student debt and cost-of-living pressures, “there is more work to do in addressing the inequities highlighted by the Accord, particularly for women, First Nations, and first-in-family students affected by the former Government’s Job-ready Graduates Package.”
Still, the Women’s Budget fits neatly into the Treasurer’s broader story: using targeted investment to build a more productive, inflation-resilient economy. Spending on early education, aged care, healthcare, and safer workplaces isn’t just moral; it’s economic, designed to lift Australia’s labour supply.
Private sector momentum is already picking up. Business investment is strengthening, domestic demand is rebounding, and real GDP forecasts are being revised upward. If women’s labour force participation continues to rise, productivity gains materialise, and inflation stays under control, Australia could engineer the rare “soft landing” that has eluded other economies.
But those are a lot of ‘ifs.’
Execution risk looms over every line of this Budget. If the childcare sector can’t expand fast enough, if gender pay gaps creep back after subsidies end, or if healthcare bottlenecks aren’t cleared, the promised gains could quietly slip away. Many of the benefits highlighted in this Budget won’t be fully felt until years down the track.
Thus, the 2025–26 Women’s Budget isn’t a finished product. It’s a foundation. The economic logic is sound. The ambition is clear. But the hard part is the slow, grinding work of turning ambition into lived reality.
As any economist (or any woman in Australia) could tell you, ambition alone doesn’t keep women safe and secure.
Graphs by The Australian Government
