Thank you very much, Ruby, for your question. I, too, was particularly motivated and heartened to see the 338 young women who took up their seats yesterday in the House of Commons. I think it's an incredible window into the possibility that the future could hold.
I had the opportunity to address them on a couple of occasions on Tuesday 7th, one on a panel on women in politics and the other as their keynote speaker during their banquet gala on Tuesday evening.
One of the things that struck me was a question one of the young women asked about how I had the confidence as a young woman to run for office. It reminded me that so many times, when you ask young men to run, they often say, “Okay, sign me up, when do I start?” When you ask young women to run, they say, “Why me? I think I need to get some more education, or I need to do a bit more to be prepared to do it.”
I think part of it is making sure we have those positive role models that young women or women in general see, and that they are able to see themselves reflected in the House of Commons and in potential opportunities. They also need to know that they have many champions out there to ensure that when they do get here, they are successful, and that sometimes the barriers we think are there in front of us are more imagined than they are real.
There are very real barriers when it comes to finances and when it comes to systems that are in place that discriminate against women, but there are often times where those limits can be society-imposed on us, where we say that as a young woman you don't have the experience, or you don't have the ability to do it, and it's going to be detrimental to your campaign. To demonstrate real examples of the fact that when women run, they succeed—I think—is really important.
I would be really curious to hear from the committee, as you're going through your reflections, on what you think some tangible measures are that could be done, and how we as parliamentarians, we as a government, we as Canadians, can do what we can to foster greater participation, not just of women but also of diversity in Canadian politics.