White Camellia Award Winners Announced

EMBARGOED UNTIL 8PM MONDAY 19 SEPTEMBER

The New Zealand WEPs Committee announced the winners of the White Camellia awards in Auckland tonight.

The White Camellia awards celebrate organisational commitment to the Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs), a UN Women and UN Global Compact initiative which encourages gender equality in the workplace.

“Not only does it make sense to include more women in leadership and treat them equally in the workplace, it makes economic sense because it improves the financial bottom line,” says NZ WEPs Committee Chair, and President BPW New Zealand, Vicky Mee.

“International research indicates it and the experience of WEPs signatories proves it.

“The calibre of work carried out by the New Zealand signatories to the WEPs made judging hard, however, the overall commitment of ANZ Bank to improving gender equality in their workplace and the pragmatic approach they are taking to empower women in their workplace put them head and shoulders above the rest,” says judge and EEO Commissioner, Dr Jackie Blue.

“Alongside supreme winner ANZ, other categories were captured by Westpac, BNZ and Sovereign all taking two categories each.

“It was heartening to see big improvements in best practice for gender equality since we started these awards and we look forward to further progress and a gender equal New Zealand workplace in the future.

“All of the entrants deserve a pat on the back for showing real commitment to gender equality in the workplace, however, as always with these things – there can only be one winner,” says judge and UN Women National Committee Aotearoa New Zealand Vice President Angela McLeod.

The five organisations who make up the NZ WEPs Committee are: UN Women National Committee Aotearoa New Zealand, NZ Federation of Business & Professional Women, Human Rights Commission, Diversity Works NZ and Zonta International District 16.

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