Gender Equality at Downer New Zealand

Last week, as part of #Internationalwomensday we formally launched our Wāhine Kotahitanga programme - an initiative that aims to establish a support platform for young women entering the construction industry. Wāhine Kotahitanga means 'women united', which links back to the purpose of the group – to bring women together to grow and to change the ‘status quo’ of the industry.

The group’s goal is to nurture and support a community of young women. They want to be able to empower and retain the female engineers entering the construction industry and connect them with women in leadership roles.

The launch event was live streamed and was MC’ed by Kate Lyon National Learning and Development Manager, and opened by John Burden, GM Major Projects Transport. John has been a champion of this group of women from the very beginning.

A panel of women joined Kate on the virtual stage and discussed their successes and challenges as females in a male dominated industry. The panel was represented by Evangeline Chung, Graduate Engineer, Evelyn Babu, Site Engineer, Janet Jackson Technical Advisor, Inspector Lyle Norris, NZ Police and our new diversity ambassador Ruby Tui.

Check out the video to learn more about our Wāhine Kotahitanga programme.