Welcome message by Her Excellency, Ms Quentin Bryce AC, Governor General of Australia.

  Welcome to the Year of Women in Local Government 2010.

It gives me great pleasure to accept the position of Patron for this very important celebration of the achievements of women managers and leaders, be they elected representatives or paid staff, participating in the local government sector.

In celebrating these achievements, the Year of Women in Local Government 2010 aims to raise awareness of the strong business case, as well as the representation opportunities of advancing women into senior roles within the sector. Whilst much has been achieved over the past few years, and women now make up almost 51% of the local government workforce, female representation at the highest levels is still unacceptably low. Barely 20% of senior managers and only 5 % of the 565 CEOs or General Managers across Australia are women.

Local Government is the level of government closest to the people. It is now more important than ever that local government appropriately reflects the gender balance and diversity that is found in the community, however so far we have only managed to raise the number of women elected to local government councils to 30% of the total.

The Year of Women in Local Government 2010 seeks to improve these figures by celebrating and promoting the achievements of women who are already actively participating in local government, by establishing networking and mentoring opportunities to help women build their own capacity to enter senior management or elected representation, and to raising awareness of the need to work in different ways – not only to allow more women to participate, but to ensure that local government operates in a truly representative and progressive manner through more family friendly and sustainable work practices.

As Patron of the Year of Women in local Government 2010 I encourage all women and men, to get involved, share your stories, and work toward achieving greater representation of the gender balance within our communities and to tap into the enormous potential that women bring to the workplace.