An all-women ALP branch?
The ALP's campaign to recruit women and present itself as the place to be for all feminists with ambition is continuing. In Victoria, an all-women branch has been mooted by Linelle Gibson, secretary of the Williamstown branch.
Gibson claimed the move will help recruit talented women and provide a "training ground to acquaint them with the party's internal processes", according to a report in the Australian on May 23. The proposal is to establish the branch in September, in conjunction with the launch of the "Emily's List" fund to raise money to get more women into politics. The proposal has the backing of Joan Kirner.
The right of the ALP is condemning the idea as a ploy by the left to increase its numbers. It is possibly the case that many women wooed by a campaign of this sort would consider themselves, at least in name, to be part of a left current within the ALP. But is this really a progressive move?
Any move to increase overall participation by women, minority groups and for that matter working-class men in politics would be a progressive step — if it were based on the party defending the real interests of such groups. But that is not what is being proposed.
The launching of a women-only branch may well succeed in its short-term aims — attracting more women into the ALP machine, ensuring a new layer of young feminists become part of the network and so on. It will do nothing to change the ALP from a pro-business into a pro-people party. It may not even improve the situation of women within the party: in a separate branch, they may just be tolerated and ignored by those in power.
Will more women ALP members — however they are organised — reverse the slide in working people's wages that has occurred over more than a decade of Labor? Will they reduce the now increasing gap between women's and men's wages? — aside from the few women who join the ranks of well-paid parliamentarians, that is.
It's quite likely that the women's branch idea is simply a stunt designed to boost the ALP's chances for re-election. In his victory speech after the last election, Keating thanked the women of Australia for what they had done for him. He and his party haven't returned the favour, but perhaps the novelty of a women-only ALP branch will distract attention from that fact for a little while.
By Kath Gelber