6 October 2020
Historically women represent 13% of jobs in transportation, distribution and logistics. At Transurban, we are proud that our workforce is comprised of nearly 40% women with 57% of our executive team positions held by women – that is more than 3x the industry average.
I was pleased to share my thoughts with P3 Bulletin on the importance of inclusion within the transportation industry and how P3s can help boost economies alongside leading ladies driving our industry forward. Here’s what I had to say:
- It has been encouraging to see, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, that female representation in male-dominated industries like transportation, logistics, construction and manufacturing was increasing faster than historic rates. Still, for those of us on the ground, working day in and day out to deliver billion-dollar modern infrastructure in this nation – we know we need to do better.
- It is an economic imperative to ensure that we maintain a qualified workforce – which is a challenge as nearly 50% of the current infrastructure workforce is set to retire in the next decade – but, more importantly, to build a diverse workforce that brings the breadth of expertise and perspectives required to rebuild this nation’s infrastructure that is falling behind every day.
- Governments are facing the perfect storm of steep spending increases to address the COVID crisis and deep reductions in tax revenue. We need to find more ways of putting private capital to work and creating space for private innovation to get this economy moving again.
- This will require new revenue sources, first to return to the baseline of funding, and then grow beyond the baseline to modernize our aging infrastructure. The private sector has a key role to play, and by better leveraging private capital and innovation, smaller public contributions can have big pay-offs.
