Thank you very much. I appreciate the opportunity to address the committee face to face. I apologize in advance for not having a written brief in both official languages, but I will follow up my remarks with the written submission.
I should also note that my presentation today is on behalf of a number of organizations, including the Information and Communications Technology Council's diversity committee, the Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council, the Mosaic Institute, the Canadian Women's Foundation, and prominent individuals such as Phil Fontaine.
I'm here to focus only on the sections of the legislation that apply to diversity on boards.
I first want to congratulate the government and in fact all parties for supporting this very important initiative. I think we have seen good success and results from comply-or-explain approaches. If we think about Canada's employment equity legislation, for example, our research would suggest it has helped level the playing field so we can advance a true meritocracy.
However, I want to focus my comments on one point, and one point only. As important as it is to advance women on boards, using a definition of “diversity” that only focuses on gender, I think, is consistent neither with Canadian values nor with our economic and social interests. I want to take the few minutes that I have to articulate the argument about why that is important and to suggest ways in which you might use the regulations associated with this bill to accommodate these concerns, which I think are shared by many.
Put simply, if all we do is replace white men with white women on the boards of our corporations, we are not, in my view, behaving as we would expect in the 21st century.
Diversity Institute was founded with the intention of providing evidence-based approaches to increasing inclusion. I am from the Ted Rogers School of Management. I've been an industry and a business professor for 30 years, so I come at this very much from a perspective that is grounded in human rights and a commitment to equity, but also with a very strong recognition of the business case for diversity.
My sector is primarily information communications technology, although I work in other sectors as well. In that sector in particular—which, as you know, is driving economic growth and innovation in this country—gender is important, but so are visible minorities, so are people with disabilities, and so is the growing population of aboriginal people.
I want to highlight some of the research that brings us to these conclusions.
One of the big projects that we have undertaken for the last number of years focuses specifically on diversity in leadership roles in the public sector; in government; in elected officials among non-governmental organizations, agencies, boards, and commissions; and the education sector, and of course what is particularly relevant today is the work that we have done in the corporate sector. In addition to looking at overall data for the country, we have focused particularly on large urban centres. We have done research in, for example, the greater Toronto area and we recently released a study on the greater Montreal area.
Unfortunately the pictures in my presentation are only in English, so I can't distribute them at this point in time, but there are really only a few key points that I would like you to think about and urge you to consider.
First of all, when we look at the greater Montreal area, for example, women are half the population. They're about 37% of senior leaders overall, and 21% or 22% of corporate directors and CEOs in the largest corporations headquartered in Montreal. They're 50% of the population, but they make up only about 22% of the boards of directors and C-suite executives in large corporations. On the other hand, racialized minorities, while 20% of the population, make up only about 6% of senior leaders and just over 1% of the leaders in large corporations. It's a huge difference in the level of representation. It's, in my view, something we simply cannot ignore.
The second point I want to underscore is that while the percentage of women in leadership roles has increased dramatically over the last three years—it's still not where it should be, but it's definitely moving in the right direction—the percentage of racialized minorities in leadership roles in Montreal has declined. That should be cause for concern, given that we all know that this segment of the population is growing and that all employment growth in the next decade is likely to come from immigration and therefore largely from racialized minorities.
If we look at Toronto, we see a similar phenomenon. Toronto is really easy, conceptually. In the greater Toronto area, 50% of the population is female and 50% of the population is visible or racialized minorities. If you look at the representation of women and racialized minorities at the most senior levels, a very different picture appears. Women account for 33% of senior leaders across sectors, but racialized minorities account for only 12%. If we look at racialized women compared to white women—and remember, for every white woman there's a racialized woman in the GTA—we see that white women outnumber racialized women by seven to one. This is not an equitable situation.
When we look at corporate leadership in the GTA, we see more progress than perhaps has been made in other areas, but it's still only 5%. Only 5% of the most senior leaders of large corporations and board members in companies headquartered in the GTA are racialized minorities, even though racialized minorities are 50% of the population and 50% of the workers, and in many cases better educated than others. I can elaborate on this in the questions.
The third key point that comes out in our research is that the overall averages—the percentages I've cited—mask huge variations between organizations. For example, in Montreal, in the corporate sector, 9% of companies—not a big number—had more than 40% women in senior leadership roles. That's getting pretty close to parity. Another 25% had none. When you see some companies with 40% and some companies with none, the only thing I want you to remember is that it proves it is not a question of the pool. What that proves is that it's a question of intention among those organizations.
I hope that makes sense. I know it's hard to talk about data when you don't have it in front of you.
Similarly, when we look at racialized minorities in Montreal, we see that only three of the largest 60 companies had any visible minorities on their boards, and only nine had one on their executive team.
These are important things to consider, given that this segment of the population is increasing across Canada.
The other important point I wanted to underscore is that, as was already mentioned, these issues and who you see in leadership roles have a direct and profound impact on corporate performance, and this doesn't just apply to women. We know from large corporations like Xerox that the engagement of immigrants and diverse populations has driven productivity and innovation.
The final point I wanted to make is really a plea on behalf of all Canadians. It's very important to address the inequities that continue to face women in leadership, and you've heard from many women's organizations on these issues. As I said at the outset, though, if we only focus on gender diversity, we are missing a huge opportunity. The percentage of women in the Canadian population is not going to increase dramatically over the next five to 10 years. The percentage of racialized minorities, of aboriginal people, and of people with disabilities is. We should be looking to the future, not to the past, in crafting this legislation.
Thank you.