At the risk of being flamed, I see this gender balance issue as being anti male, stupid and a divisive nonsense. I have have no problem with women in the workplace, I have worked with and for, women for most of my 40 plus years of working life, but I have a problem with policies that are aimed at pleasing the tree hugging, loonie left, rent a mob minority. The traditional role of the male is as a worker and income earner. Nothing against women doing this but as mentioned earlier, we are wired differently. The women's main traditional role is that of a care giver, mother and supporter. If people had not come to rely on 2 incomes to support expensive increasingly extravagant lifestyles and learned to rely on one income then we would not be having this discussion. Imagine the difference having a parent (either male or female) at home all the time would make to our children, as well as the unemployment problem. Like many people on this site, my family has relied on one income and have the house, car, computers etc. My children also has a parent at home full time doing what parents do, raising children, providing a valuable support base for the rest of the family. Sorry people but we are different, we have biologically different functions and I feel that greed, wants and convenience has replaced, to a large extent the comfort, needs and important child raising functions of the "used to be" family unit where all were partners contributing to the over all functioning of the unit.