Companies with a stock market listing in Australia would have to disclose more information about the number of women they employ and publish clear targets for getting more women into top jobs, under proposed new corporate governance rules.

Companies would have to reveal how many women they employ overall, how many hold senior management positions, and how many are board directors. They would also have to set “measurable objectives” for the number of women in each role, with information about what they are doing to achieve those objectives.

The proposals come from the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX), which regulates the governance standards of listed companies. They follow a government-backed report that last year criticized Australian companies for shutting women out. Just 8.3 percent of the board members of top 200 ASX companies are women, fewer than four years ago.

The ASX also wants nomination committees—which appoint new directors—to keep the number of women in the company under review and to support a “feeder pool” of senior executive women to get them ready for board roles.

It adds, “Diversity measures at all levels of the company [are] a measure against which the performance of the board should be reviewed regularly.”

There is no set figure for what company targets should be, but other countries have specified the proportion of board members who should be female (for Norway it is 40 percent, with France shooting for 50 percent by 2015).

In response to a critical report on levels of executive pay, the ASX also wants its top 300 companies to have remuneration committees comprised solely of non-executive directors. It thought about making this apply to all listed companies, but decided the compliance cost would be too high for smaller ones.

The proposed changes to the ASX’s Corporate Governance Principles and Recommendations are subject to consultation. If agreed, they would apply to financial years starting on or after January 1, 2011.