When Senator Reynolds was promoted to the defence industry portfolio last week, the prime minister noted there was now a record number of seven women in cabinet.

Senator Reynolds initially said the number of women "absolutely" made a difference to cabinet decisions.

"In any organisation where you have a critical mass - and generally that's about 25 to 30 per cent - it does change the dynamics of any board or any workplace or in this place cabinet," she told Sky News on Sunday.

"What you've seen in private enterprise, I think, is the same in politics.

"When you get more diversity of thought and how we think, what we say and how we assess situations, it's very clear that better decisions are made."

However, Senator Reynolds then denied suggestions the current cabinet would make better decisions than when there was only one woman in the senior ministry under Tony Abbott.

"No, that's not what I'm saying," she said.

"What I'm saying is having diversity of thought, having diversity of opinion and also approach to life, in any workplace it only makes things more effective."

The minister argued the issue was not necessarily the number of women in cabinet.

"It's who you have and the abilities that they have," she said.

"It's not just the fact that we're women, it's the fact that the other six women are all extraordinarily capable women (who) come from very diverse backgrounds.

"We do bring a different way of thinking but also great experience, as our men do."

Senator Reynolds also defended comments made by Scott Morrison on International Women's Day.

The prime minister made international headlines on Friday when he insisted while "we want to see women rise ... we don't want to see women rise only on the basis of others doing worse".

Senator Reynolds said Mr Morrison had been "completely and somewhat mischievously" misrepresented.

"The prime minister's point was all about aspiration versus envy," she said.

"The prime minister's point that we want everybody to have equality of opportunity and unlike the Labor Party, we don't want anybody's success, man or woman, to come at the expense of another."

Returning to Mr Morrison making a big deal of the number of women in cabinet, Senator Reynolds said the prime minister had looked beyond gender to pick the best people for the job.

"He is not into tokenism, he is not into virtue signalling, he has appointed seven women on merit," she said.

"Please, for myself and my six female cabinet colleagues, have a look at our experience, at our record, and us as people and look past our gender."

Australian Associated Press