Have you ever had to take a day off work due to severe period pain? Or to manage menopause symptoms? Or to attend an IVF appointment? New research reveals it would save the Australian economy billions of dollars a year if employers offered leave specifically for reproductive health.
Have you ever had to take a day off work due to severe period pain? Or to manage menopause symptoms? Or to attend an IVF appointment? New research reveals it would save the Australian economy billions of dollars a year if employers offered leave specifically for reproductive health.
In this episode our host David Karsten talks with the authors of the research, Dr Silvia Salazar and Dr Abebe Hailemariam, from the Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre. They discuss what reproductive health leave is and explore the benefits it could have for both employees and employers, including economic savings, increased productivity, improved mental health and wellbeing, and better workplace equity.
They also discuss some of the risks of implementing reproductive health leave and the cultural stigma associated with women’s reproductive health.
Research Fellow, Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre
Dr Salazar is a researcher in development economics, ethnic and gender issues and public policy. She obtained her PhD at the Paris School of Economics and the University Paris 1, Panthéon Sorbonne, and has presented her research at numerous international conferences and workshops.
Senior Research Fellow, Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre
Dr Hailmarian obtained his PhD in Economics from Monash University, where he and received the Mollie Holman Medal Award for Best doctoral thesis in the Faculty of Business and Economics at Monash University.
Dr Hailemariam’s research areas of interest include energy economics, health economics, housing, gender and inequality.
This podcast is brought to you by Curtin University. Curtin is a global university known for its commitment to making positive change happen through high-impact research, strong industry partnerships and practical teaching.
Email thefutureof@curtin.edu.au
Host: David Karsten
Content creators: Caitlin Crowley and Zoe Taylor
Producer:Emilia Jolakoska
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00:00:00:03 - 00:00:10:00
Sarah Taillier
This is The Future Of, where experts share their vision of the future, and how their work is helping shape it for the better.
00:00:10:02 - 00:00:40:07
David Karsten
I'm David Karsten. New research has found that giving all Australian workers 12 days of leave annually to care for their reproductive needs such as menstrual pain, menopause, IVF and vasectomies, would save the economy more than $21 billion per year. Not to mention vastly improve mental health and workforce retention. Conducted by the Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre, the research was commissioned by the Health Services Union in a bid to have reproductive leave included in the National Employment Standards.
00:00:40:07 - 00:01:02:18
David Karsten
But what actually is reproductive leave and who would benefit? With me today to discuss this topic is Doctor Sylvia Salazar and Doctor Abebe Hailemariam. Sylvia and Abebe, are research fellows at the Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre, and conducted the research into reproductive leave, with Sylvia leading the project. If you'd like to find out more about this research, you can visit the links provided in the show notes.
00:01:02:20 - 00:01:15:10
David Karsten
Well, look first. First of all, Dr Sylvia and Dr Abebe, we must start with reproductive leave as a concept. Can you tell us who does it benefit and why? Is reproductive leave important?
00:01:15:12 - 00:01:46:11
Dr Silivia Salazar
Yeah. Thank you. David. Yeah. Reproductive health leave really is a workplace entitlement that allows workers to take, several pay days allocated to, reproductive health conditions to treat them or manage them. As the name indicates, it actually benefits a lot of people with reproductive health conditions, which is more what we would think because reproductive health conditions cover everything related to menstrual pain, menopause, IVF, things like terminations and miscarriage.
00:01:46:13 - 00:02:06:24
Dr Silivia Salazar
But also for men, things like vasectomies, prostate cancer screenings, some things like that. So it really will benefit a lot of people. And the idea of reproductive health leave is really to provide equal access to leave in the workplace for people with reproductive health conditions. So, as you know, of course, there is difference in gender.
00:02:06:24 - 00:02:33:17
Dr Silivia Salazar
So more women suffer from reproductive health conditions than men, but also between women, there are women that suffer more from these conditions than others. And we can see that there are a lot of people with the private health conditions that take leave. Around 60% of them actually take leave, paid or unpaid, to treat that condition. We actually made a survey about this, and we found that around 44% of the people that take, take unpaid leave to treat these conditions.
00:02:33:19 - 00:02:48:15
Dr Silivia Salazar
And what we try to do or what reproductive health tries to do is really to equalise, the playing field between people with reproductive health conditions and those who do not have one. So it's really about providing equal access to leave, for everybody.
00:02:48:19 - 00:03:01:01
David Karsten
This is, something that's perhaps more than just conceptual and something more than just an area of study for you. This is actively being called for by certain organisations. Can you tell us who who is actually actively calling for this?
00:03:01:03 - 00:03:24:04
Dr Silivia Salazar
Yes, yes. So this research actually has been commissioned to us, so we are the Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre, by three different unions. So the Health Service Union, the Health and Community Service Union, as well as the Queensland Council of Unions, as well as US Superannuation Fund, which is called our super. So these are the people that are actually actively involved in this, called for reproductive health leave.
00:03:24:06 - 00:03:37:15
Dr Silivia Salazar
But it's a call that has grown and has been amplified elsewhere. Elsewhere. And now even the Greens, have endorsed the proposal. And they're also pushing for reproductive health leave in the workplace at the legislative, as at the national level.
00:03:37:15 - 00:03:49:16
David Karsten
But it's early days yet in Australia. And, for reproductive health, leave as a, as a policy. Can you tell us about how absenteeism and presenteeism costs the economy?
00:03:49:17 - 00:04:20:02
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Thanks, David. Yeah. So we estimate, total cost of lost productivity in terms of, absence of men in some where absenteeism means where people are taking time off from work, whereas presenteeism means that even if people are attending work, their productivity is reduced because of their reproductive health, conditions. So, taking these factors into consideration, our study estimates that the annual cost of lost productivity is about A$21 billion annually.
00:04:20:02 - 00:04:22:03
David Karsten
A$21 billion?
00:04:22:05 - 00:04:52:09
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Yeah. So that's kind of the majority of the cost, over 80% emanates from, lost productivity due to, presenteeism, whereas, remaining 20% is due to, absenteeism. In terms of the reproductive health component, this is a major costs are from menstrual conditions, menstrual pain and menopause and, endometriosis and miscarriage, constitutes the biggest part of the cost of lost productivity.
00:04:52:11 - 00:05:08:20
David Karsten
With reproductive health leave as a proposal, how many days annually, does this, this proposal sort of include and and and what cost will be attached to that as opposed to the A$21 billion we're losing annually in lost productivity.
00:05:08:22 - 00:05:19:16
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
So depending on the conditions and based on data, the average day needed for reproductive health is estimated, up to 12 days.
00:05:19:18 - 00:05:19:22
David Karsten
A year?
00:05:19:22 - 00:05:21:18
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Yes, 12 days a year yes.
00:05:21:18 - 00:05:23:09
David Karsten
And how much would that cost the economy?
00:05:23:14 - 00:05:43:08
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
That's that's a very good question. Thanks, David. So that depends on several factors. We take several factors into consideration. For example, the big component is workforce structure. Like it depends on how many people are employed and the gender composition as well as the age structure of the workers and whether they are working full time or part time.
00:05:43:08 - 00:06:08:20
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
And also the earning structure. And, we also consider another important aspect about reproductive health conditions, for example, that prevalence rates for each reproductive health condition and how many people with the condition can take days off. And also the, proportion of people affected by the condition and the number of days that people take off, as well as, utilisation rate.
00:06:08:20 - 00:06:32:06
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Based on this information, we consider, different scenarios, especially based on the utilisation rates for the leave rates, like low, medium and high scenario. Based on this, our, medium scenario estimates, show that the annual cost of providing up to 12 days of reproductive health live is A$3.6 billion a year.
00:06:32:08 - 00:06:33:10
David Karsten
A$3.6 billion a year.
00:06:33:12 - 00:07:07:02
Dr Silivia Salazar
I think there is a little figures here. It's a sometimes is really hard to understand them all. So I think I just wanted to probably just kind of try to clarify. So there is something that is really called like the cost of reproductive health, right? Which is basically if you have pain when you have your period where you have, issues and symptoms with your menopause that costs the economy because you have lost productivity at the workplace, or when you go like when you go with a flu at the workplace and you don't kind of work as much as you need or, you know, or you don't go because you are sick,
00:07:07:04 - 00:07:30:09
Dr Silivia Salazar
and that costs amounts to the A$21 billion. And some of this cost can be offset, but not all of them, right? And then when we talked about providing reproductive health leave is really we're just talking about these costs related to people not going into work. So it's really the absenteeism a bit, right where we're looking at people that will take leave, and not go to work.
00:07:30:11 - 00:07:45:17
Dr Silivia Salazar
And that's what is the cost of reproductive health leave, which is A$3.8 billion. But providing that will make people will be more productive and it will make that companies will have lower turnover costs, because people are more likely to stay where they are.
00:07:45:19 - 00:07:46:24
David Karsten
It does. It ncourages loyalty, doesn't it?
00:07:47:01 - 00:08:17:19
Dr Silivia Salazar
Exactly. People will have, better well-being. And all these sorts of things have been shown in our survey. So all these so they will have benefits coming out of this reproductive health leave. And those benefits are what we estimated to be about A$1.7 billion. So that's why the overall cost of the measure actually per employed person is only around one, A$140 per employed worker per year, which is really, really low when you're really thinking about, well, you always talk a billion and it just seems so high.
00:08:17:19 - 00:08:22:17
Dr Silivia Salazar
But if you really bring that per worker per year is just 140 per people.
00:08:22:19 - 00:08:45:02
David Karsten
Doctor Sylvia, some listeners might be sitting listening to this podcast at the moment and wondering, well, look, if if reproductive health, leave is, is actually probably, going to benefit mostly women then then why not just give all women more personal or sick leave? What is the need there for having designated leave for reproductive health?
00:08:45:04 - 00:09:10:21
Dr Silivia Salazar
I think when you talked about having this reproductive health leave, it's actually legitimises the issue. And it's not a women's issue. You know, this I don't really think that we're always thinking about it's a women's issue and then women are the problem. And then, you know, more discrimination and so forth. And men will actually use a lot of this leave because as I say, you know, there is left right provisions for vasectiomies, but also prostate cancer screening and so forth, so men will also benefits of that.
00:09:10:23 - 00:09:30:11
Dr Silivia Salazar
But we want to everybody to know that this reproductive health is a couple issues because women's are the ones that are childbearing. But it doesn't mean that men are not getting anything out of, the children that the woman had. You know, it's really it's a couple things. And for instance, IVF, you know, like IVF, a lot of women do do IVF.
00:09:30:11 - 00:09:52:03
Dr Silivia Salazar
Men also also have to play their part in the IVF journey and then if men are will able to go with their partners to all these appointments that they have to go. We know that woman's going through IVF have a huge mental toll. A lot of ... and so forth, and having their partners with them will definitely alleviate these sort of issues.
00:09:52:05 - 00:10:02:08
Dr Silivia Salazar
So having that designated as a reproductive health for everybody is not just for women will with also reduce the stigma at work and also avoid discrimination.
00:10:02:10 - 00:10:28:06
David Karsten
Well this is this is relatively new for Australia as an idea and as a concept. But but it's been around for a while elsewhere. The Soviet Union and Japan introduced menstrual leave in the 1920s, and Spain also made headlines in 2023 for approving 60 days of paid leave for period pain. Now, how successful have these countries been in introducing menstrual leave and and did their approaches help to inform your research?
00:10:28:08 - 00:10:46:04
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Thanks again. David. So yeah. So as you are right, it's not a brand new concept, in terms of overall reprodutive health concept, but it's important to be mindful that no country so far has implemented a comprehensive reproductive health leave.
00:10:46:04 - 00:10:47:03
David Karsten
Right? Right.
00:10:47:03 - 00:11:04:09
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Yeah. So that is an the main point here in terms of overall reproductive health. But yeah, like several countries implement their version of it. And mostly in terms of menstrual leave, period leave. In terms of the success stories, the evidence shows mixed results.
00:11:04:11 - 00:11:05:14
David Karsten
Mixed results you say?
00:11:05:15 - 00:11:35:08
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Like yeah. Yeah. So, of course the advantages or benefit is that workers benefit from those, reproductive leave. But then when I say the mix, it is the biggest challenge for those countries implemented this, special menstrual leave is that there's no utilisation of the leave provisions. And one of the main reason is the stigma or discrimination, associated with the reproductive health leave.
00:11:35:10 - 00:11:52:24
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
And another reason is, requirements, for example, for a Spain, for example, implemented in 23. And employees are required to provide medical certificate if they have to access the leave. And that becomes a big barrier for employees to access leave, because of the requirement.
00:11:53:05 - 00:12:13:07
David Karsten
So so just just to recap there, one barrier is having to get a medical certificate to to access this leave. But the other thing is you're saying it's the optics for people wanting to utilise this, this leave. They're concerned about how that is received by what their management or the rest of the workforce in their workplace.
00:12:13:09 - 00:12:43:18
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
That's a very good question, actually. That is where it actually also informs our, research. So we implemented a, a survey. And so about 70% of the respondents, as they say, they are not comfortable to tell their managers. Right. And the main reason is because most of those, introduced leaves are about menstrual leave. Therefore people are not able to talk to their managers and tell about it.
00:12:43:21 - 00:12:49:21
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
So that is where the, the stigma because that's because of stigma and discrimination. Yeah.
00:12:49:23 - 00:12:58:17
David Karsten
So could that be a cultural thing in other, I guess, other contexts where this has been tried and would it be different in Australia, do you think, Doctor Sylvia?
00:12:58:20 - 00:13:20:23
Dr Silivia Salazar
Yeah. And I think that's I think that's an important point that Abebe was making, is just having that name as reproductive health leave and not having to provide the exact reasons to access that leave, it’s important because then, basically you are if you have to go to your boss and say, I'm taking menstrual leave, you don't want your boss to know that you're actually having your period at this moment.
00:13:21:00 - 00:13:43:03
Dr Silivia Salazar
So it creates a lot of stigma. So having it branded as reproductive health leave is also important because of those reasons, because it would allow, you to not exactly disclose which condition you are kind of having. So they would allow that people that the uptake of the leave is important because that's the main concern. As I was saying, it's not so much that it doesn't excuse, but you want people to use it.
00:13:43:05 - 00:13:56:19
Dr Silivia Salazar
Having it accessible to you without having to provide an explanation or trying to tear down as much barriers as possible. It's important for that, for the leave to be really utilised. So you want them that you want it to be.
00:13:56:22 - 00:14:02:12
David Karsten
So you're also suggesting that there shouldn't be a need for a medical certificate as well. In an Australian context.
00:14:02:12 - 00:14:19:12
Dr Silivia Salazar
Our report is not really about the legal aspect, obviously the most about the economic aspect. But somebody was pointing out, you know, like in Spain from day one, you need the medical certificate, you know, and imagine you when you have a cold, right? You know, you have a cold, you're not going to go to your doctor because you have a cold, right?
00:14:19:14 - 00:14:38:10
Dr Silivia Salazar
So if you if you had to ha you had to provide a medical certificate at the beginning of your cycle because you have a cold, then a lot of people will not take that leave because you have to paid for that to go to the doctor and you have to find an appointment, which is not easy nowadays. So the whole thing just becomes more burdensome.
00:14:38:10 - 00:14:58:15
Dr Silivia Salazar
So if at least you have like sick leave where you have three days in which you can take them without a medical certificate, that will already be quite significant. Right. And if after that you need a medical certificate, then you know, why not? But at least have some flexibility at the beginning, not being able to provide that medical certificate will go a long way.
00:14:58:17 - 00:15:19:19
David Karsten
A lot of positives attached to this, but are there potential negatives as well. If you were to establish reproductive leave in in Australia, I mean, a cynic could say that perhaps it could open employers up to gender discrimination, invasion of privacy, those sort of issues. I mean, would employers become reluctant to hire women on that basis as well?
00:15:19:21 - 00:15:38:07
Dr Silivia Salazar
That's a really good question, David. And I think it's something that you can't always argue for, for this to be true or not. I think there is a lot of there is actually some sociologists that are concerned about whether that will perpetuate stereotypes, because women are always seen as weaker, less reliable, more expensive than men.
00:15:38:10 - 00:16:16:07
Dr Silivia Salazar
And that can lead to discrimination. Really. And our survey when we actually run a survey about this, we found that, there is a real concern from employees. About 70% of the employees actually think that, the employers will use reproductive health to discriminate against women because, as you were saying, women are the ones who are more likely to benefit from it, but also things like, they may if you say, maybe you're going or you're close to menopause, maybe some of the employers, we're not promote you to that really good position because you might take more leave or so forth.
00:16:16:07 - 00:16:37:14
Dr Silivia Salazar
So there is some concern there. And we can see that among the people who didn't tell their managers over that condition, which is, about 70% of them, which is a lot. So I guess there is some people that have those people who didn't tell their managers, about half of them didn't do it because they were scared.
00:16:37:14 - 00:17:03:07
Dr Silivia Salazar
they will have negative consequence in their workplace. So it is a real concern, however, whether that actually translate into discrimination, that's something that we still need to see. We know that parental leave, which is a significant amount is six months per year. Has not led to the discrimination that we thought it would. It’s still there, but I think we can always think it might lead to some discrimination.
00:17:03:07 - 00:17:22:18
Dr Silivia Salazar
But, really, 12 days is not that much as six months on so forth. So I think there is a case of saying, yeah, maybe there is probably that wouldn't make that much of a difference and the not and it's not because you're a woman you will use it. Actually, a lot of the companies that have put that in place in Australia have a very low uptake of leave as well.
00:17:22:20 - 00:17:37:10
Dr Silivia Salazar
And that's just because, you know, like you think that people will take that the more than they actually do. So it's you can argue that and it's it's a fair point. But whether we will actually turn the discrimination, this is something that we will see probably.
00:17:37:12 - 00:18:05:16
David Karsten
Well, it's interesting you say that, that it's not necessarily taken up even though it's, it's it's available to some Australians, that obviously leads us onto the fact that it has been implemented in one state already, hasn't it? Can you tell us a little bit about, what's happening in Queensland? How is, reproductive health leave working in that state and what is the, the uptake and, and a bit more on the response to that so far.
00:18:05:18 - 00:18:20:04
Dr Silivia Salazar
So yeah. So Queensland actually legislated ten days of reproductive health leave, last year and it was implemented from September, October last year. So it's a bit early for any evaluation to, to be made out of what has happened.
00:18:20:05 - 00:18:21:22
David Karsten
Firstly how was that. How was that received.
00:18:21:22 - 00:18:45:06
Dr Silivia Salazar
Yeah. So I think it was so it was really a push from a lot of organisations in Queensland. Among them, one of our partners in this research, the Australian Council of Unions, they really wanted to try to bring this and I think it was really well received. Overall, I think, of course, some companies were always a bit concerned about especially small companies that what that will bring to them.
00:18:45:06 - 00:19:11:00
Dr Silivia Salazar
But I think overall it was very well received. There hasn't been much pushback when that came out. So that ten days, it's, for those conditions that I just mentioned. But they also have additional conditions like, mammographies or prostate cancer screening or things like that. And yeah, so, so far with there is not much we can say about the actual whether people are really taking it now because it's really early days.
00:19:11:00 - 00:19:42:14
Dr Silivia Salazar
But I think it's shows that it can be done and it can be. And this is just as you were saying in Queensland, but there are many other companies that have put this in place, as well as, through EBAs. That's the main push. So for instance, the health service union has strength, actually through the EBAs to push the, the Victorian public servants to have I think it's only five days of reproductive health leave, but they managed to push it through the EBA.
00:19:42:16 - 00:19:52:03
Dr Silivia Salazar
So I think this is, is showing that there is appetite for this. So yeah, hopefully, is something that could be, generalised to the whole country.
00:19:52:08 - 00:20:06:19
David Karsten
Now, your research centre the Bankwest Curtin Centre for Economics, is based here in WA. Have you seen any interest by our state government, such as the Minister for Women in the report that might inform future policy changes?
00:20:06:21 - 00:20:25:01
Dr Silivia Salazar
That's a good question. Ahh, not not so far. I think the elections we were a bit concerned when the report was delivered. And then there was the WA elections and the federal elections. But hopefully there are some thing that they will become interested in, on. We’re hoping to direct that at the national level.
00:20:25:01 - 00:20:50:10
Dr Silivia Salazar
But of course, if that's not possible, of course, the state level, it's, it's a way to go like Queensland. Yeah. That that would be great. And I think especially in WA because there's so many FIFO workers. You know, they’re always saying we need more women in mining. But then you know when you are in mining and you don't have access to things like that, that can prevent some women from going into that, mining sector.
00:20:50:10 - 00:20:58:14
Dr Silivia Salazar
But maybe putting that in place may help them to just cross the bridge and just take that additional step to get into the mining.
00:20:58:16 - 00:21:12:03
David Karsten
In terms of the numbers that you gleaned from from your research, I mean, we covered them earlier on in the conversation, but did those numbers surprise you in terms of, I guess the sheer depth and breadth of, of, lost productivity in particular?
00:21:12:05 - 00:21:33:06
Dr Silivia Salazar
I think. So it was really interesting working on this with the team because I'm a woman myself. But I think you don't realise what other women go through, you know, like in a way, you know, like I've been very lucky and a very healthy person, but, just realising how much, those conditions affect people...
00:21:33:06 - 00:21:47:07
Dr Silivia Salazar
It was kind of what it really shook as the most. I think we talked about the prevalence rates. We thought there would be a lot of research about menstrual pain and menopause and so forth. So we thought like, okay, so we just take the research that is out there and we just kind of find out the cost.
00:21:47:09 - 00:22:04:03
Dr Silivia Salazar
But there was almost no research. And that was what there was. That's why we were, led to do this survey because we do realise, well, there is no data that we can work with. We have to run a survey. And then once we get the data back from our surveys, we were always discussing these prevalence rates.
00:22:04:03 - 00:22:25:08
Dr Silivia Salazar
Like how many people suffer from these conditions? Are we saying like this can't be true? Is that true? Because it was so surprising how much of those, I mean, how significant, how many people suffer from these things and we don't realise them because, you know, this is because of the stigma that nobody talks about these things. Right? Even though, like all women go through menopause, all women have their periods.
00:22:25:14 - 00:22:44:20
Dr Silivia Salazar
But we never really talk about it. So I think for us, once we realised that the prevelance was so high, that also brings those numbers into productivity and lost productivity to become really high as well. So yeah, so I think we were really surprised about first the lack of research and second, like how how we how many people are affected by these conditions.
00:22:44:22 - 00:23:00:22
David Karsten
Well, you did mention earlier too, that one of the stakeholders that that, was supporting you in, I guess, commissioning this research is the Health Services Union. What's next for this research that you've completed? Will this be part of, of mandating, reproductive health leave more broadly?
00:23:00:24 - 00:23:26:06
Dr Silivia Salazar
That will be the idea. So as, as as I was telling you. So, for most of this, you know, they are trying to push this through EBAs as much as they can. But the next step is definitely having a national legislation about reproductive health leave. The Greens actually endorse our proposal. They introduced in March of this year a legislation to provide reproductive health leave.
00:23:26:06 - 00:23:46:08
Dr Silivia Salazar
So I think then now the now Greens leader is Larissa Waters. She introduced that legislation. So what we're hoping to achieve with this is actually help provide all Australians access to reproductive health leave, especially for those people who suffer these conditions and are really having it tough at the workplace, without having access to this leave.
00:23:46:14 - 00:24:00:22
David Karsten
So for both of you, is is your work in this space done? You know, you've done the research, you've you've supplied the numbers and you've made some recommendations. Is that it or is your work, going to continue in this space, perhaps, as an extension to this research.
00:24:00:24 - 00:24:22:00
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
In terms of some of the commissioned work by the Health Services Union, so we delivered the report, but definitely there will be probably a continuation of the research. For example, once the policy is implemented, another important step is evaluation of how effective the policy is. So could it be a potential for continuing the research on line.
00:24:22:04 - 00:24:24:03
David Karsten
And that's something you definitely want to be involved in, Dr Abebe?
00:24:24:03 - 00:24:26:03
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Certainly yeah I love it.
00:24:26:05 - 00:24:26:10
David Karsten
Yeah. Dr Silvia?
00:24:26:10 - 00:24:44:05
Dr Silivia Salazar
Yeah, definitely. I mean, I'm we actually both do research in gender. We, we are not health researchers in particular, but we do a lot of research in gender, especially gender in the workplace. So that's our, some of our expertise. So this is something that, of course, we have a lot of appetite for it.
00:24:44:07 - 00:24:57:18
Dr Silivia Salazar
We definitely want to continue. Like, to be honest, I just thought the scoring of this figure just made me think about and realising how how much there is a lack of research for it. Just to continue my own academic research on this. Just a really interesting topic for sure.
00:24:57:23 - 00:25:19:02
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Yeah. Just to add, from our experience, from our previous work, as for example, we all we were also involved in to the estimation of the cost and benefits of providing ten days of family and domestic violence. leave. We did that and that was also commissioned by the Australian Council of Trade Unions.
00:25:19:03 - 00:25:40:23
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
ACTU. And so that was, that was successfully delivered, as you see, like the policy was already implemented. And, in terms of continuation of work. And then what we did also like we extend that into, scholarly research. And that report was published in the journal, a prestigious journal. So that's how when we have a project, it has a continuation.
00:25:41:02 - 00:25:49:11
Dr Silivia Salazar
And the research led to the legislation of, family and domestic violence leave, which was very significant for for the Centre and for the Union as well, of course.
00:25:49:17 - 00:26:06:21
David Karsten
And what an impressive record for the two of you. I mean, like a couple of very unsung heroes, in, you know, for, I guess the work force across Australia. And, look, it's been an absolute pleasure having two really articulate researchers come in to talk to us about a topic that, a lot of us would like to know more about.
00:26:06:21 - 00:26:09:07
David Karsten
So thank you very much for spending some time with us today.
00:26:09:09 - 00:26:10:00
Dr Silivia Salazar
Thanks for having me.
00:26:10:00 - 00:26:12:12
Dr Abebe Hailemariam
Thank you very much for having us.
00:26:12:14 - 00:26:25:23
Sarah Taillier
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