Thank you for the invitation to testify for this important study.
My area of research expertise is in care work and its intersections with gender, race and immigration status.
The focus of my testimony will be on how we can best improve working conditions in the care economy to better meet the needs of the often exploited women who provide care for our vulnerable seniors, children and people with disabilities.
To begin, I'll note that a large body of research conclusively demonstrates that the care economy is distinctive. My research finds that across wealthy nations, care work is devalued both socially and economically. People working in care, such as personal support workers, health care aids and child care workers, are doing jobs that we consider “3D”: dirty, difficult and dangerous. These are jobs that most Canadians have no interest in doing, yet these workers are paid significantly less than others doing comparable work. This low pay is in part because the jobs are often associated with “women's work” and because care work is often thought to be unimportant, low skill or marginal.
We know that Canada's care economy overwhelmingly comprises women of colour. By most estimates, in Canada, over 90% of these workers are women. It is specifically racialized immigrant women who are doing these jobs—in particular, Filipina and Black women. Care workers are especially vulnerable due to the frontline nature of their employment as well as their gender, citizenship status, race and/or class.
My recent report, conducted in conjunction with the Calgary Immigrant Women's Association and the Parkland Institute, focused on the impacts of the pandemic on health care aids working in long-term care. We interviewed 25 immigrant women health care aids who detailed how the pandemic had exacerbated their financial insecurity and increased their physical and mental distress at work. They also spoke about their systematic exclusion from institutional decision-making processes.
I will now provide six recommendations for how to best improve working conditions in the care economy.
I do not wish to get involved in the discussion of federalism in Canada and I'm certainly not an expert in federalism, but these recommendations focus on how the government, in collaboration with the provinces and territories, could better fill Canada's labour market needs and protect these essential care workers.
First, given the overrepresentation of immigrant workers within caring occupations, there is a need to streamline processes of credential recognition for care workers and reduce the associated costs so they can work in the jobs for which they were trained in their home countries. As it stands, care workers are overwhelmingly trained as licenced practical nurses or nurse practitioners, but they end up working in jobs as personal support workers because of the practical difficulty of transferring their credentials.
Second, given widespread and growing shortages in health care occupations in Canada, there is a need to further prioritize caring jobs in Canada's immigration point selection system.
Third, there is a need to ensure higher wages and pay equity within care occupations. The pandemic has highlighted how essential these jobs are, yet they remain low wage and precarious. This means raising hourly wages and ensuring proper employment equity standards.
Fourth, there is a need to increase physical and mental health benefits and supports for care workers and their families. These families experience high levels of burnout and distress, which was only exacerbated by the pandemic. At the provincial level, this means implementing guaranteed paid sick days. At the federal level, it means supporting access to affordable child care, mental health supports and affordable dental and pharmacare.
Fifth, in collaboration with provinces, there is a need to ensure that privately operated long-term care and other health care operators do not pay care workers lower wages with fewer benefits than public operators. As well, there is a need to legislate higher staff-to-resident ratios in health care settings and a need to reduce or eliminate the use of casual employees and temp agencies in favour of full-time, permanent work in the care economy.
Sixth, and finally, there is a need to ensure that the voices of care workers are included in all decision-making processes within the care economy going forward, moving away from top-down decision-making processes.
I'm happy to speak to any of this further, either in the rounds of questioning that follow or in follow-up with any members of the committee.
Thank you.