Thank you, Madam Chair, for inviting Equal Voice here today.
Equal Voice is a non-profit, multipartisan organization dedicated to electing more women to all levels of government in Canada. For over 20 years, Equal Voice has been advocating for gender parity by working with political parties to equip women for success in politics and to retain women as elected officials.
The year 2021 was the 100th anniversary of the election of the first woman MP. Still, only 30% of MPs are women, and Canada has yet to elect an openly non-binary MP.
Part of increasing the diversity of MPs is making Parliament a more inclusive and accessible workplace.
We recommend that Parliament continue to offer hybrid participation. I will briefly describe two areas of evidence to support our recommendation. More information on these studies is in our brief to the committee.
First, our research shows that hybrid proceedings support gender-inclusive legislatures. In February 2020, after three years of research, Equal Voice launched a report with 10 recommendations that federal, provincial and territorial legislatures can take in order to make them better places for women and gender-diverse people to work.
A major finding was that legislatures need to modernize. Modernization includes having remote participation for MPs who cannot or should not travel to Ottawa due to illness, pregnancy, caregiving or other circumstances.
Second, our research shows that hybrid proceedings have the potential to attract more women to politics. Equal Voice commissioned a public opinion survey, published in January 2022, to better understand views on politics. It was found that 86% of the public, of all genders, said that we need more women as elected representatives in Canada, and 85% of respondents said that having more women in politics would have a positive impact on government policy, actions and decisions. Canadians want more women in politics.
We also surveyed 1,500 young women from the general public about their views on politics. Sixty-seven per cent of women think that being an elected representative is one of the most impactful ways to serve their communities, yet only 39% say politics offers a work-life balance and 81% of women feel that running for office would be difficult to manage with other responsibilities in their life.
In addition, Equal Voice regularly meets with women and gender-diverse people from all political backgrounds across Canada. We consistently see women choosing to run at the municipal level, often in order to be able to stay physically close to their families and communities. This situation is in contrast to the exceedingly long travel times for some MPs. From our discussions, we have strong reason to believe that more women will seek federal office if hybrid participation is available.
Thank you, Madam Chair, for the opportunity to give these opening remarks.
We look forward to the committee's questions.