International Women’s Day (IWD), celebrated on 8 March, is a time to recognise women’s achievements worldwide and to highlight the continued fight for gender equality.
Anglicare WA celebrates IWD because women are at the heart of our work, both in the communities we support and across our organisation.
This year’s IWD theme in Australia is ‘Balance the Scales’, which focuses on the urgent need for a fair, inclusive, and accessible justice system that works for all women and girls. Despite decades of progress, significant barriers to justice continue to shape women’s lives, revealing how deeply inequality remains embedded in our systems and institutions.
At Anglicare WA we see firsthand how gender inequality plays out every day. More than 70% of the people who access our services are women, often experiencing financial hardship, housing insecurity, and family and domestic violence. And at their most vulnerable, they must simultaneously navigate systems and structures that have contributed to or caused their circumstances or contend with systems and structures that limit their safety, access to support, and opportunities to live with dignity.
For First Nations women, these challenges are even more pronounced. They continue to face complex and intersecting challenges, including disproportionate contact with the justice system, intergenerational trauma, and limited access to culturally safe legal support.
At the same time, 80% of Anglicare WA’s workforce is made up of women whose leadership, expertise, and commitment drive our positive impact of safer, fairer, more inclusive communities across Western Australia. Their contributions underscore the important role that women’s leadership plays in balancing the scales.
IWD is a reminder that achieving true justice and gender equality requires us to move beyond awareness and toward transformation and systems change. That is why Anglicare WA will continue to elevate the voices and lived experience of women and girls, celebrate women’s leadership, and advocate for the rights and safety of women and girls.
