Our regular Business Women’s Network (BWN) Networking at Lunch got a makeover this month, with a new venue and new format.
We were honoured to be able to secure Hon Jan Tinetti for today’s lunch – a timely occasion too as she had just launched the rollout of free period products in schools in her roles as Associate Minister of Education and Minister for Women.
The event was held at Chamber Member Fire (Mount Maunganui) in their upstairs lounge area, a gorgeous space that looks out over Te Papa o Ngā Manu Porotakataka and features a lux retro theme that would make Don Draper proud.
Our sell-out lunch saw our women in business seated around tables set up for shared platters and bowls, making for a fun, informal vibe. The banquet menu was Asian-inspired and included tasty morsels such as steamed wontons and dumplings, pork belly and tempura eggplant.
After a chance to chat and chow down, we heard from our speaker Jan, who, despite her immense number of portfolios and high ranking within Parliament, was incredible gracious, approachable and down-to-earth.
She first spoke about her life prior to become an MP, which includes her most well-known role as principal of Merivale School – a position she held for more than 11 years. Jan then explained her portfolios and what they entail, including Internal Affairs, which is a portfolio she says is still a work in progress to understand all its nuances (did you know it includes Taupō Harbourmaster?!)
But on to the reason why we were all there: Women’s affairs. It’s something Jan said she is very passionate about, particularly having seen first-hand instances of gender inequality and its impact on our women and girls at an educational level.
When Jan was speaking about her work to secure free poverty products in schools, you could immediately see her passion for the project. She discussed at length the bigger picture of how opening a conversation around periods will help not only young women, but their sisters, mothers, fathers, brothers and life partners. As she said, when she was at school, you would never have someone standing in front of a crowd talking openly about periods.
One story she shared was from a girl at Auckland Grammar, who was being raised by a solo Dad. This girl never knew how to have a conversation about periods with him and felt awkward about getting products, so she would get them from her friends. Now, she doesn’t have to worry. Jan said it’s stories like this that get her going – “This is why we do this and I’m incredibly proud”.
Jan attributed a large amount of this recent change to improve women’s wellbeing to having more women in Parliament – just over 50% of the caucus are women, and she said it has changed the dynamics, the work programme and the legislation.
“Some of you will know of the legislation around bereavement leave for miscarriages. It has come through because we’re women and we can say, ‘This is important’. As someone that had two miscarriages, I know how important it is to take that time to heal. That small bill will mean so much.”
When it comes to women in the workforce, it’s an area Jan and her team have been working to improve. One project was to increase the number of women on public service boards. Amazingly, the team set a target of 50% women’s representation on public service boards by next year and they have reached it already – a revelation that was met with claps from the audience.
But, she quickly added, there is still work to be done, as the boards are still very Euro-centric and it’s important to ensure they have diversity.
“Our boards need to look like the communities they serve because otherwise they can’t make the best decisions for our community”.
No doubt the audience could have listened to Jan for hours, given her passion and enthusiasm for meaningful change. Throughout her presentation, the biggest overarching theme was about making decisions that empower women to have a choice in their lives, helping them make all facets of their wellbeing better.
We then opened the floor for a short Q&A, in which an interesting question was raised around bridging the gap in education and training for women returning from maternity leave / raising their children. To this Jan shared a great story about a friend of hers, a physio who took 10 years off working in her chosen field to raise her children.
When it came to returning to the workforce, she didn’t have the relevant qualifications required and didn’t know what to do to get back to her profession. Jan, the good friend and advocate she is, wasn’t having a bar of that so helped her friend discover the right pathways and after a year study the friend was able to return to her former career path. She is now the partner in a physio practice.
So, Jan said, while she doesn’t have the answer now, it is something she feels strongly about and wants to put plans in place for the Government to help women like her friend – again, it’s all about creating a choice for women.
Thank you to everyone who attended and special thanks to Jan for taking the time to spend a few hours with our BWN women. It was much appreciated!
Our next BWN lunch event will feature a presentation from Coroner Donna Llewell, a fascinating woman with an interesting career. You can book your tickets for this here.
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