It's difficult to respond to the issue of the economic security of women within the framework of that question. However, let me just say that I've appeared before a number of committees and, with all due respect, sir, a question is a question, but an effort to discredit a witness is something entirely different. Unfortunately, that's how I felt.
We are defenders of public education. There are members of our organization who are publicly funded and whose thrust in terms of the students they serve is within a religious context in the Catholic schools in Ontario, but that does not diminish in any respect our support for public education or the fact that all our members, including that organization, are staunch defenders of public education.
We inherit from the provinces the structure for education that we work within. Until the citizens of those jurisdictions change those structures, we will continue to work within them.
Yes, we are very acutely aware that we need to do a lot of work with respect to diversity of the teaching profession. We've done studies to that effect. We've done studies analyzing the diversity of the student population and the diversity of the teaching population, and in all of the jurisdictions we have offered some suggestions as to how we go about addressing that.
It's a very difficult thing to do. It's something we need to work harder at. We need to work with universities and with governments to present and provide the kinds of opportunities that would see the extent of the diversity of the teaching population work its way into the school system in the fashion that we would like.
We are so concerned about it that two major national conferences in two subsequent years have focused on that whole issue of diversity and inclusion. We know there is a problem; we are certainly addressing it.