The minister for women is committed to addressing gender imbalances through leadership and financial literacy initiatives

For Kelly O’Dwyer, federal minister for women, and one of only a handful of women in the Liberal party of 2018 proud to call themselves a feminist in public, the conditioning began with her mother.

“My mother said to me when I was a very young girl – always be financially independent,” O’Dwyer tells Guardian Australia in an interview this week. “If you are financially independent you will be able to have choices in your life.”

“That is the message I want to take to Australian women. I think building economic security ... actually gives women options and choices, and I want people to live the best life they can live, and make choices and have opportunities open to them.”

As well as looking outwards at the community, empowering women also means shifting the culture and enlarging opportunity in the world O’Dwyer now inhabits – the masculine domain of politics.

O’Dwyer had her two children while resolutely occupying her cabinet portfolio, determined to show colleagues and the public that the world would not end as a consequence of juggling work at the highest levels of a government and family responsibilities.

She has skipped through the minefield on her own side of politics about affirmative action. Given the Liberal party won’t do what obviously needs to be done to mend its gender imbalance – implement quotas – O’Dwyer has embarked on her own program of practical action.

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O’Dwyer has contributed $50,000 to a new fighting fund named in honour of Enid Lyons – the first woman elected to the House of Representatives and the first woman to serve in federal cabinet – to get more Liberal women elected to parliament, and keep them there, and has challenged her cabinet colleagues to chip in.



O’Dwyer is also about to launch new regular networking sessions in Parliament House for her female parliamentary colleagues, and the women who power the backrooms of the Liberal party. Malcolm Turnbull will kick off the first event.

You wouldn’t think meeting other women would require any sort of structured session, but O’Dwyer says when women arrive in Canberra for the frantic parliamentary sitting weeks, they are so flat out, mixing doesn’t happen organically. “There are a lot of women who come to Canberra and do their job and don’t get a chance to get to know a lot of other people. We wanted to create an environment that would be welcoming.”

I want to focus on the policy question. I don’t want this to be about me. Kelly O'Dwyer

She also wanted to do something more inclusive for female staff working for all political parties in parliament house, not just Liberal women, so she has pursued a new course to add to the existing professional development opportunities political staffers can access during their tours of duty.

The workshop, Leadership for Women, is being run in all state capital cities, kicking off in early July. She wants the course to zero in on “how women can actually reach those leadership positions” in political offices, getting women to focus on strategic planning for career progression and developing the skills for effective mentoring, coaching and leading others.

This week, O’Dwyer, along with the sex discrimination commissioner Kate Jenkins, kicked off a national inquiry into sexual harassment in Australian workplaces. Some of O’Dwyer’s colleagues have suggested to me that some eyebrows were raised internally about the foray, but she evidently prevailed, committing $500,000 to ensure the Australian Human Rights Commission can provide comprehensive data about the problem.

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Survey data suggests the incidences of workplace sexual harassment is increasing. O’Dwyer wants to know why, and she wants a framework for considering what can be done to counter the problem.

“I think a lot of people have discussed sexual harassment as a ‘be nice to women’ issue,” she says. “I think it needs to be reframed as an economic issue, because sexual harassment not only has very significant personal consequences for the individuals concerned but it also has financial consequences.

“It means a woman might be denied hours of work, might be sacked, might be forced to look for another job because it is unbearable in the workplace, might not be able to get a reference from her former employer because she’s been harassed by them or because she’s made a complaint within the organisation.

“It can have very significant personal and economic impacts for that individual and obviously goes to their financial security, and it also has impacts on the business, there’s absenteeism, there might be compensation claims ... I wanted with this inquiry to have some practical solutions.

“We can all admire the problem or we can focus on what some of the solutions are. I look forward to understanding this issue better.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Kelly O’Dwyer and sex discrimination commissioner Kate Jenkins announcing the national inquiry into sexual harassment in the Australian workplace. Photograph: Mike Bowers/The Guardian

While openly acknowledging the new inquiry is in response to the shocking revelations associated with the #MeToo movement, O’Dwyer won’t answer whether she has been sexually harassed during her periods in politics or in the private sector. “I want people focused on the issue. I don’t want to be a distraction to the core of the issue which is sexual harassment. I want to focus on the policy question. I don’t want this to be about me.”

Looming later in the year is a women’s security statement, another initiative she has spent some time working up. Given her treasury and financial services portfolios, and her own professional background as a lawyer and a banker, she’s focused on improving financial literacy for women.

She says surveys suggest women do not feel confident, and if women are to safeguard their own futures, this has to change. “Whether we like it or not, from the moment we enter this world until the moment we leave it, we are engaging with the financial system. At every point I want women to be empowered to make the best possible choices for themselves.”

She says a standalone not-for-profit she unveiled in the May budget with a focus on improving financial capability has now got a budget of $65m. “I want this to be for financial literacy and capability what Beyond Blue has been for mental health.

“It is going to live beyond governments and its going to have a very clear mandate. It’s going to be very important. It’s not going to solve all the issues with women’s financial literacy but its just one example that will help.

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Given the murder of the young Melbourne women Eurydice Dixon, and the public outpouring after her death, O’Dwyer shared a few thoughts about the furious debate about victim-blaming that followed comments by a senior police officer on the day Dixon’s body was found – and before an arrest was made – that people needed to “take responsibility for ... safety”.

“This crime is so horrific. All of us can relate to walking home in the dark, I think most women have done that at one stage or another,” O’Dwyer says. “It was just a senseless violent crime committed by a violent man.

“There is no one to blame apart from the man who perpetrated this crime. I want to be absolutely clear about that.”

But she says she understood why police felt compelled to give the public warnings about situational awareness. “We tell our kids to look before they cross the road. We don’t let them just step out.

“Now that’s not to blame victims. I am not saying that. But it has to be common sense. I’m always very conscious that if I’m getting into my car late at night I have my keys ready if I’m in a deserted carpark. That’s not to say I’m responsible if I don’t have my keys ready, but I’m aware.

“I can understand why a lot of women got angry at the police comments. I do understand that anger is genuine and heartfelt, but I don’t think there was a bad motivation.”