Thank you all very much for your attendance today.
I have to say that among things that make me angry, this one is getting close to the top of the list. Twenty years ago we made a commitment at the United Nations, to a great deal of fanfare, that we were committed to this. Here we are, 20 years later, with an Auditor General report saying fail, fail, fail.
All I'm hearing, quite frankly, is, oh, we'll do better this time. I'll return to that, because that's not acceptable. That's not nearly enough. We went down that road once already, back in 2009. We're not going down that road again.
The government said, in their opening remarks.... Madam Ballantyne, on behalf of Status of Women, said, “The Government of Canada has a long-standing commitment to implementing gender-based analysis....” And we know how serious that was. She continued, “GBA is important because its helps us advance gender equality by ensuring the federal government considers women and men's different experiences when we create new policies, programs, and legislation.”
Therefore, it suggests, if this is important to gender equity and you didn't do this, then gender equity has not been a priority to any government up till now. Because you can't have it both ways. You can't go bragging and say you think GBA is really, really important to get gender equality in Canada and then not do it, because then it speaks to how strong the commitment is to gender equity. At this point, it doesn't look very strong.
Moving on, Chair, this is the stuff that really makes public accounts committees go through the roof. We've been here before. The 2009 audit found almost identical problems. What's interesting is that the recommendations are oh so similar.
I mean, in 2009, we see from the Auditor General's report, in paragraph 1.16, that the Auditor General recommended that “Status of Women Canada, in consultation with the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat and the Privy Council Office, establish a plan for facilitating implementation of gender-based analysis, and clarify expectations”, blah blah blah.
Then we have almost the identical wording, or at least the concept, in today's document, where they're saying, “Beginning this year, Status of Women Canada will begin working with the Privy Council Office and the Treasury Board Secretariat to identify, analyze, and address barriers to GBA implementation, as a way to understand....” Look, this is exactly the same thing we had last time.
I heard Madam Ballantyne say that this time we have engagement. What does that mean, “engagement”? Oh: comply or explain. Why are we dancing? We heard very clearly from the Auditor General that one of the main barriers to not having GBA in the federal government in Canada is because it's not mandatory.
I want somebody there from the government—I don't care which one of you—to give me a really good reason why it shouldn't be mandatory. Then we don't have to worry about all this engagement, and it will be different, and comply or explain.
Why don't we just make it mandatory and be done with it? Please.
Through you, Chair.