Parties speak on women's issues
By Alison Dellit
ADELAIDE — About 50 people packed into the Talbot Hotel on the night of March 10 for a meeting, organised by the Democratic Socialists, to hear and question representatives from the Labor Party, the Democrats, the Liberal Party and the Democratic Socialists on their women's policies.
Rosalie Macdonald from the Labor Party told the meeting they should have confidence that the Labor Party believed in striving towards full equality, even if it wasn't achieving concrete change.
Angela Smith from the Democrats talked about the need to look, not at what parties said, but at what they had achieved for women. She pointed to cases where both the Liberal and Labor parties had supported anti-woman legislation.
Satish Gupta, from the Liberal Party, spoke of his personal commitment to the equality of women, but was unfamiliar with the details of his party's policies.
Melanie Sjoberg from the Democratic Socialists discussed the inadequacy of the proposals presented by the major parties, and also spoke of the need for a strong independent women's movement in order to fight for real change.