Government of Western Australia launches Grants for Women

Deadline: 26-Nov-20

The Government of Western Australia has launched the Grants for Women Program 2020/2021 to provide funding support for initiatives based in Western Australian that address the unique issues faced by women.

Western Australian women remain at considerable risk of violence and abuse in their homes and their workplace.  Western Australia also faces the nation’s biggest gender pay gap of 22 per cent (compared to 14 per cent nationally), while often being overlooked for leadership roles, and bearing most of the domestic work.  These factors contribute to progressively limiting women and girls’ participation in economic and social life, which can have long term, negative impacts on life outcomes.

Initiatives funded under the Grants for Women Program will contribute to women and girls reaching their full potential in all aspects of life: at school, in the workplace, in retirement and in their homes and communities.

Priority Areas

Applications to the Grants for Women Program must align to at least one of the following four priority areas of the Plan:

• Health and wellbeing
  • Goal: Women are healthy, active and lead fulfilled lives. Gender is a social determinant which can have a negative impact on women’s health and wellbeing outcomes.
  • Risks include
    • women’s participation in social and economic life is limited;
    • women unable to prioritise their own health needs due to unequal share and responsibility for family caring roles and domestic work;
    • Women and girls unable to manage mental health such as anxiety, depression, self-harm, attempted suicide and eating disorders.

Applicants are encouraged to refer to the Plan to consider initiatives that support women and girls lead healthy, active and fulfilled lives.

• Safety and justice
  • Goal: Women live safely and have appropriate access to adequate legal protections.
  • Women continue to experience unacceptable levels of family and domestic violence and abuse in their own homes, at the hands of their partners. There are substantial costs to the community in relation to family and domestic violence, but it is disproportionately women who bear the social and financial costs.  Some of these costs include:
    • increased risk of poverty and homelessness;
    • Contribution to negative health outcomes.

Applicants are encouraged to refer to the Plan to consider initiatives that raise awareness and contribute to preventing gender-based violence in the community and the workplace.

• Economic independence
  • Goal: Women can be financially independent throughout all life stages.
    • A range of social and cultural factors contribute to many women having a more precarious financial situation than their male counterparts.  This can mean that women’s cumulative earning power is severely compromised throughout their working lives.  The gender pay gap in Western Australia is the highest of all states and territories in Australia and has been for many years.
  • Contributing factors include:
    • time taken out from work to care for children;
    • broader caring responsibilities for ageing parents and relatives;
    • The gender pays gap and its effects on superannuation;
    • Applicants are encouraged to refer to the Plan and consider initiatives that contribute to women’s economic independence.
• Leadership
  • Goal: Women’s skills, achievements and strengths are valued, enabling equal participation in the community, including at leadership levels.
    • Research demonstrates the economic benefits for organisations that have greater gender balance in leadership, including improved strategic decision making, better financial performance and client relationships.  Despite this, many women are overlooked or face barriers to accepting leadership roles in the workplace.
  • Some barriers include:
    • Inflexible workplaces;
    • Lack of access to support for managing caring responsibilities;
    • assumptions about women’s capabilities, career ambitions and cultural norms;
    • biases which undervalue women’s experience and potential;
    • Unconscious bias and affinity bias in the recruitment process resulting in hiring more of the same (gender).

Applicants are encouraged to refer to the Plan and consider initiatives that contribute to women gaining leadership opportunities and experience.

Funding Information

• Grants of up to $5,000 are available for one-off initiatives with a duration of up to six months that contribute to the program’s priority areas.
• Grants of up to $10,000 are available for longer-term (six to twelve months), strategic initiatives involving a range of partners that will contribute to creating sustainable or systemic change in the program’s priority areas.

Items eligible for grant expenditure

The following items are eligible for funding:

• Resource materials and publication costs;
• Equipment and venue hire;
• Publicity, communications and marketing;
• Food and non-alcoholic beverages for community engagement activities;
• Project staff and consultants, directly related to the project;
• Intrastate travel;
• Project evaluation;
• Childcare provided by qualified providers in an accredited setting for women participating in the project.

Eligible Applicants

Eligible organisations must be:

• an incorporated, not-for-profit, community sector organisation;
• a Western Australian local government authority;
• an unincorporated organisation or community group, applying through the auspice of an incorporated body or a local government authority.

A group or organization is not-for-profit if its governing documents prohibit distribution of profits to individual members while the organization is operating and upon its wind-up.

For more information, visit https://bit.ly/3m5It84