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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2023-05-03 Daily Xml
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Male Life Expectancy

The Hon. S.L. GAME (14:42): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before addressing a question to the Attorney-General, representing the Premier, on the creation and delegation of ministries.

Leave granted.

The Hon. S.L. GAME: Ninety-five per cent of workplace deaths in Australia are men. Seventy per cent of those who die in car crashes on South Australian roads are men. The Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality state that men are more likely than women to abuse illicit substances of all types and these same men are more likely to end up in emergency departments or die from overdoses of illicit drugs and abuse of alcohol than women.

A 2011 longitudinal study in the journal Demography states that divorce is associated with worse mental and physical health for men than women. Depression, anxiety and suicide are the three leading causes of burden of disease in Australian men, and suicide is also a leading cause of death for young men in this country. Across every age cohort above 15 years, men are grossly over-represented in Australian suicide statistics and in some categories the figure is 14 times higher than for women.

Male life expectancy all round is a full four years shorter than that of females in Australia, according to the ABS. The South Australian government has a dedicated Office for Women for the purpose of achieving gender equity and positive change for women. There is no such office for men. My questions to the Attorney-General, representing the Premier, are:

1. Does the Malinauskas government acknowledge that there are indeed model issues seriously affecting men disproportionately compared to women in South Australia?

2. Considering that disproportion, has the government considered creating an office for men's issues in balance with the current Office for Women?

The Hon. K.J. MAHER (Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, Attorney-General, Minister for Industrial Relations and Public Sector) (14:43): I thank the honourable member for her question. I don't think I need to refer that. I can inform the honourable member: no, we have not.

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