In October 2026, a controversy erupted in New South Wales after the NSW Parliament updated its own employee breastfeeding policy, removing references to mothers and replacing them with gender-neutral terminology such as “parent”, “carer” and “lactating parent”.
NSW Opposition Leader Kellie Sloane challenged the changes, questioning why a policy about breastfeeding could no longer use the words woman and mother. She argued that supporting parents and providing workplace flexibility should not require removing the recognition of women from a policy about a female biological function.
The issue attracted considerable attention. On 22 October, it was raised in the NSW Legislative Assembly by Monica Tudehope, who asked the Premier whether he supported removing references to mothers from the Parliament’s policy. She also pointed to a separate policy issued by the Premier’s Department, which had removed references to both “mother” and “women”.
Premier Chris Minns acknowledged that the terminology was strange. He said that documents of this nature should use “mother” and “breastfeeding”, and indicated that NSW Government guidelines of a similar nature would reflect that terminology in future.
The Premier’s response was welcome. But this controversy is not an isolated development. To understand how this language has changed, it is worth looking back more than a decade at the wording used in NSW Government policies.
A comparison that speaks for itself
In July 2014, NSW Treasury issued its Breastfeeding Policy, Circular TC14-15. Its language was straightforward. The policy stated:
“The NSW Government strongly supports participation in paid work by women in their child-bearing years.”
The document included a section titled “Facilitating the Return to Work of Breastfeeding Mothers”. It explicitly supported the return of mothers to the workplace and recognised the health benefits of breastfeeding for mothers and babies.
The attached award provision was equally clear. Clause 15A.1 applied to “staff members who are lactating mothers”. There was no apparent difficulty in identifying women and mothers in a government policy about breastfeeding.
Now compare this with the wording of the newer Lactation and Work Policy, issued by the NSW Premier’s Department in November 2025 and updated in January 2026.
The policy replaced the earlier 2020 breastfeeding policy and the 2014 Treasury circular. It also introduced a new model award clause.
That clause begins:
“This clause applies to lactating employees who seek to breastfeed and/or express milk while at work.”
It goes on to refer to employee health and wellbeing, maintaining milk supply, and the differing breastfeeding requirements of employees as their children develop. It sets out practical arrangements for breaks, private facilities and expressing and storing milk.
Those practical provisions are not the issue. Supporting employees who breastfeed or express milk at work is sensible. The significant change is in the language: the new model clause does not mention women or mothers at all.
The comparison between these documents, issued more than a decade apart, demonstrates a clear shift. In 2014, the policy explicitly identified breastfeeding mothers. By 2025, the language had become “lactating employees”.
This is not simply a change in the title of a document. It is a change in how the people concerned are described.
What happens when sex-based language disappears?
Words matter in public policy. They are not merely decorative or interchangeable labels. They identify the people a policy concerns, explain why particular protections or provisions exist, and help ensure that their needs are recognised.
When government documents replace women and mothers with increasingly abstract expressions, the biological reality behind the policy becomes less visible.
A policy can provide practical support for breastfeeding without avoiding the fact that breastfeeding is a female biological function. There is no contradiction between accommodating individual circumstances and accurately identifying the people who breastfeed.
Fathers, partners and other carers can play an important role in supporting a child and sharing parental responsibilities. But that does not make them mothers, nor does it change the biological meaning of breastfeeding.
The same principle applies across public policy. Women’s health, pregnancy, maternity care, reproductive health and breastfeeding are not sex-neutral matters. They concern the female body. Accurate language allows governments to identify the relevant population and develop policies that respond to its actual needs.
When sex-based language disappears, it becomes harder to speak clearly about sex-based experiences, inequalities and needs. It can also make women less visible in the very policies intended to support them.
This is why the NSW example matters beyond the immediate controversy. The gradual replacement of familiar, accurate words such as woman and mother is not a trivial administrative adjustment. It reflects a wider tendency to avoid naming biological sex, even where it is directly relevant.
We should not have to fight to retain the word mother
The NSW controversy has exposed a broader problem. The words woman and mother should not have to be restored only after public criticism and political intervention.
The 2014 policy shows that the NSW Government once had no difficulty describing breastfeeding in terms of women and mothers. The 2025 policy and its model award clause demonstrate how far the language has shifted. The Premier’s own response suggests that he recognised the problem.
Women are the people who become pregnant, give birth and breastfeed. Not every woman will breastfeed, and not every mother can or wishes to do so. But the biological reality remains unchanged.
Inclusive public policy does not require the erasure of sex. It should be possible to accommodate individual circumstances while retaining accurate language about women and motherhood.
Women Speak Australia believes that sex-based language matters. Women and girls must remain visible in laws, policies and public institutions. When governments stop using the words that accurately describe them, they risk obscuring the very people their policies are meant to serve.
Breastfeeding is not gender neutral. Mothers are women. Public policy should be able to say so.