Health’s pragmatic approach to Reconciliation is articulated in its Reconciliation Policy and the Wesfarmers Elevate Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP). This Plan prioritises five core areas of focus: sustainable employment, career progression, Indigenous procurement, community partnerships and celebrating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.

Health is currently focussed on increasing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander representation and building the cultural competency of its workforce, in addition to identifying opportunities to increase procurement spend with Indigenous businesses.

This financial year, the business has undertaken the following actions:

• Continuing to promote an inclusive workplace through its focus on cultural awareness training;
• Encouraging Indigenous team members to self-identify;
• Sponsoring two indigenous team members to undertake the Wesfarmers Indigenous Leadership Program;
• Drafting a new First Nations Employment Initiatives Strategy;
• Promoting and celebrating Indigenous days of significance, in particular National Reconciliation and NAIDOC week; and
• Establishing a First Nations metrics dashboard to give visibility to Indigenous employment, procurement and training data to quantitatively measure performance over time.

Health’s key Reconciliation commitments are tracked via the aforementioned First Nations metrics dashboard. The division’s goals in this area are in accordance with the Wesfarmers Elevate RAP, and include:

• Achieving employment parity of 3.8 per cent of the Australian workforce (to match population parity currently);
• Increasing the number of Indigenous people in leadership positions;
• Increasing Health’s spend with Indigenous suppliers;
• Increasing the uptake of Indigenous cultural awareness training; and
• Resourcing its Reconciliation ambitions with a new First Nations Affairs and Employment Manager to lead a step-change in its approach to Indigenous Affairs.

The key stakeholder engagement forums in relation to Reconciliation during the year were the Reconciliation Action Plan Steering Committee (RAPSC) and the Wesfarmers Indigenous Network. The collective knowledge of the Wesfarmers divisions that are further progressed with Reconciliation initiatives is invaluable, as is the external expertise and perspectives of the external Aboriginal advisors on the RAPSC.

Internally, Health is progressing its First Nations employment strategy by identifying and engaging with leaders across the business who have the greatest influence to identify employment opportunities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

Health’s engagement with its workforce through celebrating events like National Reconciliation and NAIDOC Week, along with the significant take up of Indigenous cultural awareness training, has confirmed the strong appetite of the workforce to advance Health’s Reconciliation journey.

Click here to view Wesfarmers latest Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP)

This financial year, the division reported 15 self-identified indigenous team members, compared to 11 last financial year and 3 in the 2023 financial year.

There were over 2,500 instances of cultural awareness training undertaken by team members during the financial year compared to over 3,000 instances last financial year.