First of all, I'd like to say thank you for inviting me to present. I'm going to be talking off the brief that I had presented to the committee much earlier.
My name is Louise Smith-MacDonald, and I'm from Every Woman's Centre in Sydney. We're an organization that offers support services for women and adolescent girls who are living in low income.
Geographically, the area we serve is Cape Breton Island, and it is made up of a small urban area, a large rural area, and many coastal communities. The island has many social and economic issues, such as high unemployment, pegged at 17.7%. There's a lack of adequate and affordable housing, and of course a loss of traditional industries that have existed in Cape Breton for many years, not unlike the situation in any rural community, I suppose, in Canada. The total population of Cape Breton Island stands at 105,000, with 22% under the age of 19, 53% between the ages of 20 and 59, and 24% over the age of 60, and therefore we have an aging population.
The immigration rate is very small in Cape Breton. There were only 155 new immigrants between the years of 2001 and 2006. As for educational attainment, for the population aged 15 to 24, 79% have no certificate, diploma, or degree, although some have a high school certificate. For the population aged between 35 and 64 years of age, 44% have no certificates, diplomas, or degrees, so we have a very uneducated, in some ways, older population. In the total experienced labour force aged 15 years and over, only 2.66% of females are employed in non-traditional jobs, compared to the average of 5.22%, and in the retail sector, 58% are women.
These statistics show that we have an aging population who are not highly educated, and there are very low numbers of women working in non-traditional jobs, instead relying on retail positions, which are considered to be precarious employment.
I will move into our recommendations.
Recommendation 1 is to develop a national poverty reduction strategy with a long-term vision and measurable outcomes and timelines.
I'm sure this isn't the first time you've heard that. We feel a national poverty reduction strategy is the responsibility of the federal government, and therefore the leadership must come from the federal government. We are aware of the social, health, and justice consequences of poverty, but to put it simply, we cannot begin to address these issues until money is put in the pockets of families in order to secure adequate and safe housing, and to meet their basic needs. Work training, volunteerism, and health are not uppermost in the minds of those who do not know where their next meal will come from. Poverty is not the outcome of not working hard; in fact the opposite is true. How hard is it for a mother to provide food, clean clothes, and a safe and secure living space when resources are scarce? A guaranteed livable income would ensure that amounts paid would meet family needs at realistic rates, unlike the present system.
We have been asked to give the cost of our recommendations. This is an ominous task, for sure, for someone with my experience, I suppose. The National Council on Welfare, in its study of 2007, estimated the cost to be in the range of $23 billion, but we know that Canada spends billions of dollars on social programs currently, and still families, seniors, youth, and women continue to live in poverty.
Recommendation 2 is to create sustainable jobs and training.
Over the past few years there's been an emphasis on shovel-ready projects in an effort to create sustainable jobs for Canadians; unfortunately, most of these jobs did not include women. Speaking to my own local area, there was, and continues to be, road work and some construction, but as you've seen in the statistics presented earlier, only 2.66% of females in our area are employed in non-traditional work. Most women employed in these shovel-ready projects were used as flaggers. This is not sustainable work.
There should be a federal strategy to allow women to be part of the economic recovery in Canada. The strategy does not need to create any additional cost; in fact, it could save the government money. There are hundreds of programs now being offered, but it requires fitting into them.
Calls made for proposals are now designated before they come to community, instead of community being asked to have support for projects that they see necessary for their own area.