Dear committee members, thank you for the opportunity to present Oxfam's recommendations for Canada's next federal budget.
At Oxfam Canada, we put women's rights and gender justice at the heart of everything we do both here at home and in our work with some of the poorest communities around the world.
I would like to start by providing a glimpse into the lives of women who are at the bottom of the economic ladder. Tasmia, a medical doctor, came to Canada in April 2017 from Bangladesh under the skilled visa program. After months of searching for a job, she found employment in a cosmetics factory, but at eight months pregnant was laid off being just five hours short of 600 hours needed to be eligible for parental leave. Tasmia tried to convince her employer to give her one more day but to no avail. Now that her child is born, she is struggling to juggle work and care for her baby, being ineligible for child care subsidies as she can find only part-time work.
Lae Lee, on the other hand, paid a smuggler to leave Myanmar for Thailand when she was 21 years old, hoping for a better future. After six years working on a rubber plantation, she found work as a hotel housekeeper. Despite her extremely long hours and back-breaking work, it is impossible for her to save money. Strapped for money and time, she had no choice but to send her two children, now six and eleven years old, back to Myanmar to stay with relatives. She hasn't seen her children in four years.
These stories are heartbreaking, but sadly not uncommon. Too many women around the world are stuck in jobs like these. They work so hard yet they cannot escape poverty.
At the other end of the spectrum are the super-rich who continue to accumulate excessive amounts of wealth. Last year, of all the wealth created globally, 82% went to the richest 1% of the global population while the 3.7 billion people who make up the poorest 50% of the world's population saw no increase in their wealth at all, nothing. Here in Canada, the richest 1% saw their wealth increase by 32%, and Canadian billionaire fortunes grew by a staggering $28 billion in just one year.
Inequality is one of today's greatest challenges, obstructing poverty reduction and sustainable development. It undermines social, environmental and economic sustainability and fuels poverty, insecurity, conflict and xenophobia. Inequality is bad for everyone but it is especially bad for women, who are being exploited providing endless hours of free and cheap labour.
We know economic inequality and gender inequality are inextricably linked. To make progress, we must tackle both simultaneously. It is for these reasons that the federal government must invest in making economic growth truly inclusive and in advancing gender equality.
Oxfam Canada would like to highlight a couple of the recommendations it recently submitted to the finance committee.
The first is to invest in women's economic equality in Canada. The International Monetary Fund recently conducted a study that demonstrated that increasing female labour participation is critical for Canada's economic growth and it made the case for Canada to invest in child care to free up women's time for productive labour. The study predicted that the cost of child care would be fully compensated for by the growth in GDP, yet Canada continues to spend less on child care than any other OECD country does, a meagre 0.2% of GDP, way below the OECD's recommended target of 1%.
Investing in child care is the most effective and transformative investment the federal government can make to engage women more productively in the Canadian economy. It's the best bet for closing the economic gap between men and women and significantly advancing women's economic security. We are calling on the government to, first, invest $1 billion in 2019-20 in child care and to move towards universal child care by setting a 10-year timetable for reaching the OECD target of 1% of GDP. This should include enacting national legislation grounding child care in universality, quality and comprehensiveness, and protecting caregivers' rights.
The second is to demonstrate global leadership on women's rights. Around the world, hard-won gains to advance gender equality are under threat. In this context, it is critical that Canada continue to champion gender equality especially in areas that align with its values and commitment to human rights.
However, leadership requires resources. Last year's budget announcement of an additional $2 billion over five years in international assistance was welcomed, but this amount will do little to budge Canada's current aid-to-GNI ratio of 0.26% or improve its ranking on international assistance among OECD peers, where Canada currently ranks 16th.
We're calling on the government to develop a robust 10-year plan to achieve the UN aid target of 0.7% of gross national income and make investments in two particular areas: $700 million a year over 10 years, starting in 2020, in sexual and reproductive health and rights; and $220 million a year over 10 years in women's organizations and feminist movements.
In closing, I would like to encourage you, honourable members of the finance committee, to show leadership as well. Earlier this year, you received a letter signed by 50 Canadian women's rights organizations calling on you to include gender equality as a topic in your call for pre-budget consultation submissions, and ensuring that at least 15% of witnesses in the pre-budget consultation hearings are feminist or women's rights organizations. Women's voices must be front and centre when it comes to governments making decisions that affect their lives. You have the opportunity and responsibility to ensure that women's voices are heard.
Thank you so much.