General news

Nearly one billion dollars. That’s the price women at Westpac collectively pay for doing the same work as their male counterparts in the very same bank. And instead of closing the gap, Westpac has allowed it to fester and grow. Even the other big four banks, hardly champions of gender equality, have not gone backwards the way Westpac has.

The finance sector as a whole improved its median total remuneration gender pay gap by 4.6%, according to the latest data from WGEA. Westpac’s gap went in the opposite direction, climbing to a massive 29.3%. Workers have repeatedly raised their concerns about this at Westpac’s annual general meetings, yet nothing has changed.

Instead, Westpac announced a major restructure across its senior ranks earlier this year – covering key areas including Consumer, Business and Wealth, Digital, Mortgages and its new Transformation function – and every substantive leadership appointment in the restructure went to a man… in a workforce that is 54% women.

Westpac insists the problem is “structural”, with too many women in low-paid roles and too many men in top jobs. But structure is a choice.  

In fact, when questioned about Westpac’s alarming gender pay gap at the recent House economics committee review, Westpac CEO Anthony Miller suggested reducing the number of women in bank branches would solve the problem.  

Is it any wonder that Westpac’s gender pay gap continues to widen, if this is the attitude of its leader? Critically, Westpac has repeatedly refused to make the changes needed that would genuinely support women to participate and progress in the workplace.

We saw this with Karlene Chandler, a Westpac worker who requested a flexible work arrangement (which she had been successfully doing for years). Without good reason, Westpac refused, and our union took the case all the way to the Fair Work Commission, and won, just to secure a work arrangement that was both reasonable and had been working.

During the last round of enterprise bargaining, Westpac rejected the introduction of reproductive health leave. It rejected gender-neutral paid parental leave. These are the very conditions that allow women – who still carry the bulk of caring responsibilities – to stay in their jobs, manage their health and care for their families.

And when the FSU proposed a simple, practical step that would immediately expand opportunities for women – quarantining as little as one per cent of the best-paid, senior roles to be done part-time, Westpac refused. They wouldn’t even consider how simple job design could open better-paid roles to workers who cannot work full-time.

Senior roles at Westpac are still designed for someone who can devote their entire life to that role. That is not most workers, and it certainly is not most women.

Westpac’s own WGEA report shows that women make up the majority only in the lowest-paid parts of the bank. At every level above that, their representation drops dramatically. So when Westpac continues to concentrate the most influential and best-paid roles in the hands of men, it is not an accident. It is the predictable result of policies and decisions that never change.

Workers have been speaking up for years. They have asked for clear targets, transparent reporting, better job design, and leadership that reflects the workforce. Instead, they have been met with PR lines about “focus” and “strategy” while the numbers keep moving in the wrong direction.

Let’s be clear: a gender pay gap of almost one billion dollars is not a communications problem. It is a leadership problem.

Anthony Miller needs to step up and design a job structure at Westpac that genuinely supports and encourages women into senior roles, not hold them back. This is ultimately what will begin to close Westpac’s enormous gender pay gap.  

The rest of the finance sector is proving progress is possible. Westpac is proving what happens when a major institution refuses to take responsibility, refuses to modernise and refuses to listen to their own workforce.