Centre for Policy Development

There is an urgent need for workable solutions to the many persistent problems which plague children's services in Australia. Unfortunately after an 18-month parliamentary inquiry on ‘Balancing Work and Family', the Federal Government still has not managed to address many issues

Neo-liberalism is passé; a set of precepts promoted in the eighties that started failing as a government strategy by the early nineties. Often misleadingly called economic ‘rationalism’ in Australia, neo-liberalism dominated policy agendas just long enough to undermine the welfare state and the idea that the government was an appropriate provider of services.

There are many changes in the Industrial Relations (IR) and welfare system that will differentially affect men and women in their work places and homes. Women workers in a range of areas will be disadvantaged because of their domestic responsibilities, the types of jobs they hold, the particular conditions of their work and their different types of workplaces.

Policy making is closely related to politics, the polis and the rule of the state. It is usually governments that people target when they want policy change, particularly in Australia where we have traditionally expected them to fix our public ills. We have a long tradition of expecting state involvement in areas such as wage fixing, dispute resolution, utilities, transport and creating fairness.