The first national Women’s Convention in thirty years was held in Wellington, NZ, last weekend. This is marketed as an opportunity for women and the feminist movement to assess their achievements and plan for the future. However, the organisers have priced the event well beyond the means of working class women.
For a woman to attend, she (had) to pay a registration fee of $337.50. While this price tag might seem little more than "pin money" to some, it is nearly two weeks worth of the mean woman’s income in New Zealand.
"Don’t be shy" though, informs the convention’s website, the organisers ...generously established a poor fund for those earning less than $30,000, which working class women (could) appeal to for exemption from fees and travel costs.
This attitude to working class women’s participation makes a mockery out of the convention’s proffered themes: "Changing Faces" and "Changing Workplaces." Convention chair, Hon Margaret Shields’ "Welcome Message" further reinforces this sort of soup-kitchen style democracy, ridiculing any real integration of the issues salient to working class women in New Zealand.
The stage, then, is set for plenty of pats on the back and champagne, as the cover girls of bourgeois feminism congratulate one another on having "made it". What’s fairly unlikely is that these women, enjoying entertainment options including a convention dinner (an additional $51) will give more than cursory consideration to the interests of the women getting paid $9.50 an hour to sweep up their discarded chicken bones. Basically this is a rich white women’s convention.