Science and Research Committee on Oct. 23rd, 2023

[Lena Metlege Diab, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Thank you very much.

I was hoping you would talk about the child care needs, so thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Lloyd Longfield]

Thank you very much. We're over time.

We're going to move along.

I would mention that the University of Guelph also has a female president, Dr. Charlotte Yates, so we're in good hands at both universities.

We will move to Monsieur Blanchette-Joncas for six minutes.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

I welcome the witnesses and thank them for joining us for the second hour of this Committee meeting.

Madame Naidoo-Harris, thank you for joining us today and, of course, congratulations on your political engagement. You were Minister of Education in Ontario, so you're well aware of the responsibilities facing a provincial or federal government. Today, I'd like to focus on the federal government's responsibilities.

In your opinion, which action levers could the federal government employ to reduce the gender wage gap in universities?

[Indira Naidoo-Harris]

I apologize. I believe the question may have been for me, but unfortunately I do not have the interpretation up. I don't seem to have that activated.

Can someone help me understand what that question was about?

[The Chair, Liberal, Lloyd Longfield]

I have a time of one minute on the question.

You do have an interpretation selection on your screen at the bottom. It looks like a globe. If you click on the globe, you can select English interpretation.

Maybe we could ask Mr. Blanchette-Joncas to repeat his question.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

Ms. Naidoo-Harris, you were Minister of Education in Ontario. In your opinion, what can the federal government do to reduce the gender wage gap in universities?

[Indira Naidoo-Harris]

Thank you so much for that question, Monsieur, because it's a very important one.

While universities and post-secondary institutions come under provincial governments and that is where a lot of the rulings, policies and so on happen, the federal government's programs have also been very helpful. Federal programs like the federal contractors program are huge because, as I'm sure this committee has heard already, the collection of data is one of the key pieces that we need assistance with in order to know where the gaps are and how we can go ahead and fill those gaps and take care of them.

The federal contractors program is good. My advice would be that this program needs to be expanded. It needs to be expanded in a number of ways. For example, right now we're looking at four designated groups. One group that's not included in the collection of numbers is the LGBTQ2SIA+ community. That might be something we may want to add when we're taking a look at the federal contractors program.

When we reach out and collect more data, there are racialized community members in those four designated groups, but for the racialized group it's an all-encompassing number. It doesn't tell you what's happening with the Black community and what's happening with, let's say, the Asian community and so on. This became very important during the Black Lives Matter movement, when universities and large organizations were struggling with trying to work out what was happening within their communities with these particular groups.

Those are two ways, perhaps, that it could be improved.

The other piece is intersectionality. When we look at data collection, we have to understand that it's not just whether you're a woman or, like me, someone who also belongs to a racialized group. Identifying those members of our communities who fall into both of those groups gives us a much more fulsome idea of what the challenges are and a better sense, perhaps, of where some folks are being left behind in our institutions.

I would commend the federal contractors program. It has been very important for us in terms of data collection. The dimensions program is also good, and some of the work that's going on with the tri-agencies in terms of EDI and even the Canada research chairs requirements. The federal government is insisting more and more on EDI—“What are you doing in these areas?” and “What are your policies?”—and that is very helpful.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Ms. Naidoo-Harris, thank you for the clarification.

You mentioned the principles of equity, diversity and inclusion, which are mandatory criteria for Canada Research Chairs. These principles aim to support underrepresented groups. However, there are no criteria dealing with pay equity per se.

What is your opinion? What should the government do? If it wants to promote pay equity, it could establish criteria, but there aren't any, currently.

[Indira Naidoo-Harris]

These are areas we could certainly examine. The thing about pay equity is that you're dealing with confidential information at times. There has to be an examination of how we navigate some of this stuff.

The other part of the data collection piece that creates some challenges is that data collection depends on self-identifying. A lot of times, while we may have things in place to find out the numbers and know what we could do with requiring certain kinds of identification, we also have to recognize that a lot of people are not self-identifying at times. There's a hesitation and a reticence to do that.

Something quite simple that governments could do is perhaps advertise more and get more education out there about why it is important to self-identify and about how the collection of this information actually does inform, as you are pointing out, our ability to address the needs when there are gender pay gaps and pay gaps when it comes to equity-seeking groups.

[The Chair, Liberal, Lloyd Longfield]

We'll go to Mr. Cannings for six minutes, please.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Thank you to both witnesses today. It's very interesting testimony.

I'd like to start with Ms. Neals from Dal.

I must say that the one faculty member I know at Dal is a female dean, so I know some things are working there.

You mentioned that when you did your first analysis, certainly the main difference—I'm not sure if it was the only gap or the only difference—was at the higher levels or the full professor level. I wonder if you could speculate on what causes that. We've heard that before, and I want to know what your take is.

[Laura Neals]

I think it probably arrises from our y-value system, which has evolved over the years to become a bit more nuanced and to recognize different kinds of experience and equivalent experience. Faculty members who came into the system earlier—20 or 30 years ago—were subject to a different system, which didn't have as broad a view on what valuable and creditable experience would be when calculating that y-value. I think that for our newer faculty, who are subject to a more nuanced system, we get their y-value right.

I think that in those earlier years we didn't get their y-value right, so their male comparators were seen as being higher and more expert, but that was probably not the case.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

It's not just a case of things being compounded year by year when you have males who are able, for whatever reason, to publish more and are seen to have whatever qualities they need to move early from assistant to associate to full professor. It's not that compounding effect; it's more—

[Laura Neals]

No, it's more about how they entered. What salaries they were entering at seems to have a really significant impact on where they were ending up in their later career.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

We've heard that in other universities without the y-value system. Maybe they have it and call it something else.

Does that have something to do with Y chromosomes, by the way?

[Laura Neals]

No.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

You said that when you did your calculation and made a salary adjustment, there was a range of adjustments. Could you explain how you did that and how you made sure people were still being rewarded for things they deserved?

[Laura Neals]

We did our analysis on a faculty-by-faculty basis. We were comparing computer scientists with computer scientists, and folks in the faculty of management with their true peer group. The discrepancies varied faculty by faculty.

We also found that because we had made our regression line, it was very easy to say that this faculty member was far below where they should be relative to another faculty member who was close to the regression line.

We really did a deep dive into the data and were able to make tailored adjustments based on the regression line.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

I'll turn to Ms. Naidoo-Harris.

I think you said that at Guelph there was a flat adjustment of $2,000. Is that what I understand? How might that compare with the Dalhousie situation?

[Indira Naidoo-Harris]

I'm not comfortable talking about how that compares with the Dalhousie situation. I can tell you that our review was done in October 2017, so it was just before the pandemic hit. This gap was identified at the time. I think the total available sample was 798 faculty who were looked at, deans or AVPs and so on. We took a look at ethnicity, gender identity, and also at data that was part of our university's “Diversity Matters Census”. Of the 700—I think it was close to 780 faculty identified—we were able to work out that there was a gap. The distribution of salaries at that time showed that the average work wage for female faculty was lower than the average wage for male faculty by several thousand dollars.

It was decided that there had to be an adjustment made, and an adjustment was made. The difference between male and female faculty salaries was found to be $2,050, and that adjustment was made.

The important thing about this review was also to look at how we could start using predictors such as gender, rank, time from hire, time from Ph.D., and performance and how we could improve things for the future. We took a look at the change in salary distribution and really examined where we need to pay attention when it comes to that pipeline, if you will, which wasn't happening with people moving up. We looked at the systemic barriers in place to identify what those contributors were to the academic pipeline.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Thank you.

I have 20 seconds. I think I'll leave it there. Thanks.

[The Chair, Liberal, Lloyd Longfield]

Great, thank you.

In the next round, we will start off with Mr. Maguire, for five minutes, please.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the witnesses as well.

Ms. Neals, I want to ask you a couple of questions. In your role with academic staff relations at Dalhousie, what's your assessment, quantitatively, of the pay equity gaps at your university? You indicated that in some of your opening remarks. Can you expand on that?

[Laura Neals]

Do you mean the overall cost?

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

I mean quantitatively, yes, the pay equity gaps at Dalhousie.