Status of Women Committee on Dec. 6th, 2006

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Ms. MacLeod.

Our next presenter will be Jennifer deGroot. Welcome.

[Jennifer deGroot, Project Coordinator, United Nations Platform for Action Committee Manitoba]

Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

I'd like to start with a story.

Last week my co-worker and I facilitated a workshop with 16 immigrant women. The women were originally from Iran, the Philippines, Colombia, Sierra Leone, Macedonia, and China. Some had been in Canada for six years. One had arrived only a week ago.

During the course of the day, the women learned about the political process in Canada, specifically that related to the government budget. They looked at a cartoon showing them the budget process, from throne speech to estimates to budget day. They put their hands on colourful laminated pie pieces representing different areas of government spending, guessing which piece of the pie went with which area. They talked about their own priorities for government spending--programs that work for them, programs that don't work--and ideas they have for increasing government revenue.

Near the end of the day, the women did some role playing, acting out a meeting with a politician. As we closed our time together, a gentle and quiet Filipina woman said, “I'm a shy person. Before this workshop, I would have never imagined I could meet with a government representative. Now I know that this is something that I can do.”

This is the work of the group I represent, the UN Platform for Action Committee in Manitoba, or UNPAC. In accessible and engaging ways, we give Manitoba women, particularly those who are vulnerable, the tools they need to participate fully in economic and political life.

We have received funding from Status of Women Canada since our inception in 1995. We have used these funds for a wide range of activities related to making international human rights commitments to women relevant at the local level.

Since the year 2000, our work has uniquely focused on promoting women’s economic literacy. We have developed popular education resources and tools to engage women on the economic issues that impact their lives. One of our resources is a video about women and the economy; more than 600 copies of Banging the Door Down have been distributed.

At the moment our work takes us across Manitoba, where we hold interactive full-day workshops on the government budget. In the past 18 months, we have worked with roughly 400 women from 16 communities across the province. The women include single mothers, women living with disabilities, and northern, rural, aboriginal, immigrant, francophone, and senior women.

We offer our workshops at times that work for women. We provide lunch and child care, and we use a methodology that acknowledges different kinds of learners and that recognizes women’s lived experiences.

We chose to hold workshops on the budget because the government budget does not impact women and men in the same way. Budgets are not gender-neutral. Because budgets reflect the government's priorities, talking about the budget is key to promoting women's economic equality.

At the same time, we see women as budget experts. Many women are used to making a little go a long way, something that governments favour. We have found that women have many good ideas to contribute to budgetary discussions.

Women are also very concerned about accountability, another critical concern of governments. A government budget that works for women will contribute to more accountability and to a more effective and efficient budget. This will benefit all citizens.

For many women, participation in our workshop is the first time they have talked about a government budget. Many had no idea their voice mattered or that government policy and programming is something they can understand. Many never realized that they had a right and a responsibility to make their voice heard.

After our workshops, we heard women make comments like this one: “Every woman should know about the...budget. I had no clue. Now I know more and am confident to mention it to others.” Another woman said, “J’ai appris que ma voix peut être entendue et peut changer quelque chose.”

We provide grassroots women with tools to advocate on their own behalf. Over half of women who participate in our workshops write letters to their elected officials, naming their budget priorities. For many, this is the first time they have written a letter to a politician.

One woman chose to run for elected office, citing her involvement in our video on women and the economy as one of the catalysts for her decision. Other women have attended provincial pre-budget consultations, been interviewed by their local media, or organized meetings with their elected representatives.

We teach skills that empower women to advocate for their own equality, economic and otherwise. We provide resources and ongoing dialogue with women, supporting their full participation in the political and economic process. Many countries would never support this kind of work, work which is essential to a healthy and accountable democracy.

Our understanding of the new terms and conditions of Status of Women Canada is that the type of work we do with grassroots women no longer fits. We are an advocacy organization, and we have been told that advocacy will no longer be funded.

Administrative cuts will also effect us. The closure of our Winnipeg office will mean a distant and reduced relationship with Status of Women personnel. Staff of Status of Women have been tremendously supportive of our work. They have attended our workshops, translated our materials, connected us with other groups and resources, and provided ongoing support.

We need these funds, and the people who administer them, to continue working to create a true democracy in which all women of this country have a voice.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

We'll now go to Lise Martin.

[Lise Martin, Executive Director, Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women]

Thanks.

I'm from the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women, a national non-profit bilingual organization whose work centres on providing research and tools to facilitate organizations taking action to advance social justice and equality for all women. We believe that information and knowledge are key to empowerment. CRIAW has a long and successful track record of providing reliable, accessible and relevant information on key women’s equality issues. The impacts of both the cuts to Status of Women Canada and the changes to the terms and conditions of the women's program, are enormous.

First, I'd like to make a few clarifications before the committee, as there has been a certain level of confusion that has been once again repeated here at the hearings. In terms of the cuts, these are by no means administrative. Complete programs have been eliminated, such as the Status of Women Canada policy research fund, as has almost 50% of the workforce.

A number of statements have been made indicating that women's groups would no longer receive funding following the cuts. While it is true that the women's program budget has remained intact for the moment, the reasons why groups such as CRIAW will not get funding are much more serious. In fact, denying funding for research, lobbying and advocacy, reneges on two key values that are held dearly by Canadians: equality and democracy.

When CRIAW speaks about equality, we are not merely talking about equality between women and men, but also between many different groups of women. Society cannot simply be lumped into two neat categories of women and men. This is highly simplistic and not at all visionary. If we want Canada to move forward, we need to have the capacity to provide a critical eye. This is what research provides.

Moving forward means looking at the picture and being able to constantly question the angle under which it is taken. What does this mean for those in the picture, as well as for those not in the picture? By no longer funding research, which poses difficult questions and tries to unpack the multiple layers of systemic discrimination, we are essentially saying that we can live with the status quo. By denying funding for research and advocacy, we are in fact closing the door on democracy for a vast portion of the population.

Let's be honest, the private sector is not interested in funding organizations that question systemic discrimination. We are not fools and neither are they. The hard-hitting questions that we ask are for the most part counter indicative to their profit motives. Its all about the bottom line, and that bottom line has nothing to do with the aboriginal, racialized and disabled women who are, indeed, too often at the bottom of society's priorities.

One of the rationales advanced for no longer funding research is that it is no longer needed, that we have all the answers. Again, what this says to me is that the status quo is okay. This is denying that we are in a constantly evolving world. In fact, the ground on which we stand is constantly shifting.

I would like to come back to the values of democracy and equality and how these values are being undermined by the cuts to Status of Women Canada and the changes to the terms and conditions of the Women's Program. As I indicated earlier, research can lead to empowerment. The research methodologies practised by CRIAW not only empower women, but strive to give them a voice in shaping their future.

To illustrate this, I would like to draw on our recently completed study on the impact of the changes to the Canada social transfer on aboriginal, immigrant, and disabled women. This study was funded by the now defunct Status of Women Canada policy research fund. The study responded to the question, Are women's voices being heard? Its objective was to bring the voices of these women to policy tables and policy-makers. Unfortunately, the current federal government has very little interest in this matter, as well as to any other issues linked to poverty, social assistance, clawbacks, etc.

We had envisaged bringing the results of the study to the human resources standing committee and had hoped that some of the women who participated in the study could express themselves firsthand at the proposed cross-country hearings on the Canada social transfer. To no surprise, these hearings have also been axed.

The following quotes are from our study.

From a woman living with a disability in Winnipeg:

I myself cannot afford fruits and vegetables. As a result, my health has suffered because of lack of nutrition, and now I have permanent problems, because I'm simply too poor to feed myself properly. It's resulted in some lifelong issues that will never be cured because, as thankful as I am to be receiving assistance, it's well below the poverty line, and sometimes I don't have money to eat for a few days in a row, and now my health is also suffering.

From another woman living with a disability:

I ended up living in a place that was extremely unsafe. I've been attacked several times. I'm scared to live there, and I have to move, and there's nothing out there. You can't even rent; you go into a rooming house and they're charging the welfare rate. My last three roommates have been strangers from the paper, and it's all resulted in disaster and them splitting and me spending all my food money to cover people's rent, or I get evicted.

Interestingly, issues linked to telephone access were brought up by the women. Telephones were a luxury for many of the participants. Lack of a telephone has a direct impact on ability to find paid work; it also posed significant safety concerns for women in ill health, women with disabilities, and mothers.

One woman said:

...it's unsafe...to be living without at least a home phone, especially if you have kids and there's some kind of emergency, and it's also impossible to look for work if you don't have some way for people to get hold of you.

Unlike what Minister Oda may believe, equality for many women is not just a phone call away.

An aboriginal woman in Vancouver said:

I work for a dollar an hour at an organization, volunteering, to make sure that I have toothpaste, ass wipe, face soap, shampoo, dish soap, laundry detergent. That's what the coupons I make at the organization help pay for. If I didn't have that dollar-an-hour job, I wouldn't have those, because I can't afford to buy them on my cheque, because my disability cheque is not enough.

I would like to ask those who made the decision on the cuts and changes to the terms and conditions whether they feel these voices are not deemed worthy to be heard. If they do feel that yes, everyone deserves a chance to have input into the policies that truly affect them, do they seriously think the current climate will provide these women with the safe space to express their concerns?

Dealing with the issues expressed by the women living in poverty requires much more than a few donated business suits. They require a concerted effort that brings together research and front-line services, which will deliver long-term change.

As we all know, under the new terms and conditions most research will no longer be funded. Funding will no longer be available to create CRIAW's fact sheets. We will no longer receive funding to answer some of the difficult questions that need to be addressed, such as: why is it, in a country such as Canada, which has experienced substantial economic growth, that poverty continues to persist and deepen?

It is clear that the new terms and conditions reflect a charity model that essentially denies that systemic discrimination exists. Our research clearly demonstrates that far too many women in Canada have not benefited from the equality that has to date only been available to them on paper.

It's for this reason that we recommend that the cuts and changes be reversed immediately.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Ms. Martin.

We will now go to Ms. Monika Chappell, from the Disabled Women's Network. Welcome to our committee.

[Monika Chappell, Chair, Disabled Women's Network of Canada]

Tansi, everyone. Thank you very much for asking me to speak.

I want you to know that I've also been given the privilege and the responsibility of carrying the Cree name that means “Eagle woman who watches over the sacred fire”. I take that name and that responsibility very seriously.

As a visitor to the lands of the Six Nations peoples, I want to acknowledge the fact that this meeting is taking place on aboriginal lands, and I want to thank the Haudenosaunee people for the use of their lands for us to come together. All of us, I'm assuming, are visitors here.

I also want to thank the Standing Committee on the Status of Women for the opportunity to speak to the committee on this important issue. In particular, I'd like to thank the committee for moving their venue so the room could be accessible and for ensuring that a taxi could bring me to the door of the Parliament Buildings, as I wouldn't have been able to speak to you if this hadn't occurred.

I am the national chair of the Disabled Women's Network of Canada. On this important day, the 75th anniversary of the first female MP in Canada, I speak to you for the very first time. It's the very first time that a national organization of women with disabilities has ever been able to speak to this august body. It's an amazing fact, I think.

I'm going to tell you a little bit about DAWN Canada, assuming that perhaps many of you don't know what and who we are. DAWN Canada is a national cross-disability network of self-identified women with disabilities, and we have representation in all areas of Canada.

In 1985, a small group of women with disabilities who were part of a national umbrella group, which later became the Council of Canadians with Disabilities, met in Ottawa after they had trouble getting women-specific issues addressed in an all male umbrella group--not too surprising. This historic meeting lasted three days, during which the women identified a number of issues of priority for them, including violence against women with disabilities, mothering, self-image, and employment. After the meeting, the women went home and started to organize locally, and grassroots groups sprang up in many locations.

The group applied for and received funding to conduct research on these four priority issues. This research was groundbreaking and served to make Canada a leader in this area worldwide. In 1992, we became a national non-profit and continued conducting research on issues that women told us were important to them. We developed ethical guidelines for research that ensured our research would always be based on grassroots involvement and would identify policy and organizational changes and would always have an impact on the women who were involved and the women in our network.

This research was a venue where we could work on community development. Since women with disabilities are in large part isolated, lack social and organizing skills, and face discrimination and huge barriers to participation in society, both internal self-confidence and external accessibility barriers, community development is an essential piece of our network.

In 1998 we received core funding from ODI and hired a national coordinator, and our focus changed, in part to follow government funding to focus on employment and IT skills building. Another change was a gradual loss of our grassroots connections and community development. Unfortunately, in 2003 we lost our core funding and have been working to rebuild since then.

One of our stronger affiliates, Pacific DAWN, which covers the B.C.-Yukon, worked locally with a Vancouver office to build their network. With their support and additional guidance, we overcame our barriers to participating--actually, barriers that are even within the women's movement--and after ten years finally got to the point we could apply for regional funding.

This very successful regional project focused on renewal and rebuilding, and it's almost complete. In fact, we just held our annual general meeting a week ago, and that affiliate is finally, after ten years, a non-profit.

This pilot was used nationally to apply for funding for the first time from Status of Women Canada's national office by our national group. We've just completed a six-month project designed to rebuild our governance, identify current priorities for action, and renew our board.

We have taken the opportunity to forward you our three strategic plans for action over the next 18 months. At least I hope Michelle was able to get them to everyone on the committee.

We've also just received a grant of almost $200,000 from Status of Women to carry out work on two of the priorities: violence against women and children with disabilities, and developing long-term housing options for women with disabilities.

Our third strategic plan has to do with employment, and we're seeking funding elsewhere with that.

With the additional help of the national office, we have rebuilt our relationship with ODI, the Office for Disability Issues, and we are in the process of reapplying for core funding with them.

We agree with the words of Minister Oda that it's time to put money into taking direct action for women. However, we disagree with the idea that funding places such as the YWCA or the Salvation Army will be of much benefit for our members.

We also disagree with the idea that all the research has been done. Indeed it has not. In reviewing the most recent Stats Canada document on violence against women, I found that we were not even mentioned. Nor were we identified as a group needing more research, despite our own research and that of others worldwide that identifies violence against women with disabilities as a silent epidemic.

For some of our communities, such as deaf women, we have not even asked the questions about what they need to be safe in a way that they can answer. Working across the barriers of language, culture, disability, and a lack of resources for ASL, or American sign language, reaching and connecting to deaf women, and supporting them to even begin organizing is a monumental task, but it's one we're committed to.

We are also very pleased that Minister Oda recognized that some communities of women face additional barriers to participation and will require additional help from SWC staff. However, we strongly disagree with the restriction by Minister Oda to the four communities of women who can receive additional help from SWC offices.

Indeed, I would have to say that our needs are just as huge if not larger than those of the four groups mentioned. Both provincially and nationally, we have required large investments of time and resources by SWC staff, in order to overcome the many barriers we face. Despite the many issues we face regarding participation, we just don't make the cut and are consistently left off the list. We would request that Minister Oda revisit this restriction with an eye to adding women with disabilities to the list.

We're pleased that Minister Oda kept the grants and contributions area untouched. However, by closing the offices and cutting staff, the impact on our network will be enormous. It takes time and support to work past our extremely low self-esteem and self-confidence, and often our low literacy levels. For deaf women, the average literacy level is grade three.

It takes time to work past our mistrust, bureaucratic intimidation, and our own internal beliefs that we just don't matter. It will take resources to be able to travel so much further to gain the support and guidance of new staff—that is, if we're actually even allowed to get the support. Time and resources we don't have.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Could you bring it to a close, Ms. Chappell?

[Monika Chappell]

I have one more item.

The final item I would like to touch on is the opening to for-profits to apply for funding. As you can tell from my presentation, we have barely the resources to organize nationally or locally, despite the huge need. To put our poor resources in competition with for-profits is shocking. There is no way we can compete.

Thanks for listening.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Ms. Chappell.

Sometimes if there are other points that you wanted to get through to our members, you can do so while you are answering a question.

We will now start our questioning, for seven minutes each, and we will start with Ms. Minna.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you for coming here today.

I want to start off with a couple of things first before I ask my question, to correct the record.

On the money, the $5 million, the members from the government side are saying that it was understood all along that it was going to be redirected. First of all, that's not true. It was in the budget. It was a direct cut. The minister mentioned that for the first time yesterday. From what she said today, it would go to the front line and not to the organizations that are here today.

I want to read into the record what the minister did say, in fact, when she appeared in front of this committee:

After over 30 years of existence, Status of Women Canada must deliver real, measurable results directly affecting women and their families. Through our expenditure review, announced early last week, the new government has concluded that $5 million can be saved through greater efficiencies in administrative operations at Status of Women Canada. The women's program's grants and contributions will have the same annual budget of $10.8 million.

There was no redirection there at all from her own statement to this committee at this time. So let's not go on about how we all understood that. I just want to make that very clear.

The next thing I want to talk about, Madam Chair, is that we have had some discussion here today, but what I want to go to are the specifics. In addition to the cuts and the closing of offices, and now I understand that the money is being redirected--that's good--it still leaves the fact that the mandate of the department has been changed and the criteria have still been changed. The previous mandate of the department clearly stated there was financial support to women's organizations and other partners seeking to “advance equality for women by addressing women's economic, social, political and legal situation”. The equality, political, and legal status are gone. We know that, so I think that's important to say.

The objectives talked about “to facilitate the involvement of women's organizations in the public policy process”--so we're talking about advocacy--and “to increase public understanding in order to encourage action on women’s equality issues”, and so on. I won't read all of the stuff, because it's all here. That's all gone. What's left is two little paragraphs that talk about very generic and not-for-profit and what have you.

The fact of the matter is that those provisions are gone. My question to you then is this. It's great that the money is going to be redirected, and in fact there should be an increase. But on the actual changes to the criteria, how will that impact? In effect, any organization that works to advocate, to research, to try to inform women to fight for their rights is no longer there. How will that affect your specific organizations with the elimination of those criteria specifically?

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Whoever would like to respond may do so.

[Lise Martin]

It's clear that, given that we do research, it would no longer be eligible under the current criteria.

Before we go further, I would like your confirmation that the $10.2 million to the women's program will now be $15 million. Is that what you're saying?

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Witnesses can't ask questions.

[Lise Martin]

I can't ask questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

No.

[Lise Martin]

It's a one-way street, I'm afraid.

[Voices]

Oh, oh.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

You certainly could write to the minister and ask that question.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

It's $10.8 million, by the way, that's left for the program.

[Lise Martin]

Okay, right. We've actually done the calculations, and that $10.8 million, although it might sound big, is basically 52¢ per woman and girl child per year--less than a cup of coffee--that the women's program invests in women. I think that's important.

It's clear that we will not receive funding from the women's program. As I said in my presentation, I don't think the private sector is out there on our doors as well. I really question your.... You said to trust you, the Conservative women, and that you have a commitment to women, but you've just basically cut 50% of the workforce from the ministry of Status of Women Canada. To me, that's a complete contradiction.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Are there further comments to Ms. Minna?

[Charlotte Thibault]

I would just like to say a few words about the effect that the changes to the Women's Program will have on the Fédération des femmes du Québec. Our funding is guaranteed until the 2007-2008 fiscal year, but after that, we will lose 21 % of our funding. We have determined that, on average, 21 % of our funding was provided by the Women's Program. We don't know how many of our current projects would be eligible. We have discussed this with a number of program officers, but we still don't know what we can do to qualify. That is one of the effects of the decision.

[Leslie MacLeod]

Ah, the journey of equality for women in Canada.

The Provincial Advisory Council of the Status of Women that I'm involved with does not receive, nor does it seek, Status of Women Canada funding. We're fully provincially funded to be the advocacy voice in our province. However, the grassroots women's organizations--the local status-of-women councils and other organizations that I've mentioned--in fact must seek the advocacy funding of Status of Women Canada in order to remove the systemic discrimination and move equality forward. These are interesting times, because our province currently will fund provincial women's organizations and local organizations to deliver services. They did that when Status of Canada, a number of years ago, decided it would no longer provide core funding, and went to project funding based exclusively on advocacy pieces, so the women's movement has struggled over the years with lots of changes to programming and funding.

This is probably the most devastating one, because the groups in my province and across the country do not see how they can use and access this funding to actually move the agenda forward, so there are significant problems at play.

Website application cannot deliver social development. Women have never complained in our province that they were unable to make an application to Status of Women Canada. There was a program officer in the province who knew the women, was easy to connect with, and had a budget to travel. No one ever said they were denied access to Status of Women Canada or its funding--but they will be now. A website doesn't replace communication.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Go ahead, Ms. Chappel.

[Monika Chappell]

The very short answer I could give you, Madam Minna, is that it's like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Seriously, how will the government go about addressing the issues of women, including women with disabilities, if they're not properly informed by accurate information based on all the issues that we face? Some of those issues we don't even know yet. That's a really short and sweet answer.