Who we are:
In March 2017, three community-minded, businesswomen co-founded the Honour a Woman movement. Dr Elizabeth Hartnell-Young is an activist, researcher, writer and presenter with experience in schools and higher education. Carol Kiernan is an Intelligence and Communications consultant working to achieve safer and more empowered communities. Ruth McGowan OAM is a community leader with a passion for advancing women’s equality and leadership in politics at all levels of public office.
Our Goals:
We are a movement of volunteer Australians working towards gender equality and greater diversity in the Australian honours system.
We seek an Australian honours system that fairly reflects the extraordinary contributions of women and Australians from diverse backgrounds.
HaW co-founders; Elizabeth, Carol and Ruth
Initially, our goal was to see gender parity in the Australian Honours by 2020. Women finally received 50% of Honours in the 2023 King’s Birthday and the 2024 Australia Day lists. Now, we continue to advocate for gender parity at all levels of the Honours and to ensure that many more Australians from diverse backgrounds are nominated and honoured.
Background
Since the Order of Australia was established in 1975, men have consistently received over 70 per cent of the Australian honours awards. We know that is not equitable. It also denies women the right to be represented accurately on the public record for their achievements and contributions to Australia.
Gender inequality in the Australian honours system begins with fewer nominations for women. Moreover, women are less likely to be a nominator, and both men and women nominate men in greater numbers for an award. Data is not collected or publicised on the number of Australians from diverse backgrounds who are honoured.
Australian honours are predominantly conferred on older men from Anglo-Saxon backgrounds at the higher levels, while women are clustered in the lowest, Medal of the Order (OAM), category. Australians from diverse backgrounds are also underrepresented. This includes people from Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander backgrounds, people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, those with disabilities and folk from the #LGBTIQ+ community. Young people are also underrepresented.
Since 2017, Honour a Woman, a movement of volunteers, has worked to achieve equality in the Order of Australia. However, our advocacy and previous government-commissioned reviews have consistently uncovered serious operational issues and structural barriers that affect the Order of Australia.