Status of Women Committee on Dec. 10th, 2007

[Debbie Budlender]

I've done this in other countries as well. What it reveals also is the state of the government officials' understanding of gender issues. How they present what they think the problems are and what they think the solutions are that they are delivering gives you an insight into their perceptions and where maybe Status of Women needs to go in to give a little bit of assistance. So it's a stocktaking and accountability exercise.

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

Okay, that's actually very good. Thank you. I like that. We have to start somewhere, so taking stock of what exists isn't a bad idea.

You mentioned France, and of course we've been told before that France apparently did a good job of gender budgeting. You said that every year they table a very large report together with the budget. Do you know to what extent their budget analysis changes government policy? Would that be easily accessible? I suppose not, but it's finance, so maybe....

I don't know if you have any information.

[Debbie Budlender]

I certainly have one of the reports in electronic form. I think it's a public document. France, together with its budget, has a state of documents jaunes, yellow books, and one of these yellow books is the report on gender.

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

Is it results based?

[Debbie Budlender]

I think it's a public document. I don't know to what extent it influences policy. I think, a bit like the South African one, it's saying, this is what we are doing. But my hypothesis is that if government officials have to write these sorts of things, saying this is what we're doing and this is how it contributes to gender equality, that can influence policy because people become more aware of what they're doing. They start collecting better statistics, because the gender statistics need to come not just from Statistics Canada but also from the administrative statistics. So in a sense, by doing it you build awareness and can get change happening.

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

Thank you very much.

I think maybe, Madam Chair, you could....

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Get that information? Sure.

Ms. Minna, you have 40 seconds. If you want to go for it, go for it, otherwise we'll go to the next.

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

I'll just throw it out, and maybe the witnesses could kick it around and answer it at another round.

Ms. Peckford mentioned that the budget she has is not done within the equality framework, the analysis that she's seen, apart from all the other issues. I wondered whether maybe Ms. Beckton could comment as to what discussions go on between her department and that of finance.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Do it in the wrap-up session, because I have to go to the next round now.

Madame Boucher, cinq minutes.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Hello, everyone. I would like to thank you for participating in the committee's work.

We believe that it is very important to have input from individuals such as yourselves who have studied or worked in this area.

There are several expressions to designate the process of integrating a gender approach into government budgets. We have heard the terms women's budget, gender- responsive budget, gender mainstreaming of budgets, and gender-sensitive budgets.

Can you explain the differences between these expressions and perhaps provide a definition for each?

[Debbie Budlender]

I don't think there are real differences between the terms. Usually people are using these terms to refer to the same thing.

In South Africa we use the term “women's budget” because we have 11 official languages, and only one of those languages, which is English, has the word “gender” in it. So to make things simpler and clearer to everybody, we called it a women's budget. In retrospect, it was probably a mistake in that it made people think it was a separate budget for women.

My own preference is “gender-responsive budget”, because that's what we're aiming at. But I don't think the different terms are all that important.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Should other points of view or perspectives be included in the budgets? We are speaking of gender and a number of other things. When preparing a gender responsive budget, where should any government start? It has to start somewhere. How can we ensure that the process will be instituted permanently in spite of changes in government? Does anyone have some ideas about this?

[Debbie Budlender]

One way of doing that is to include it in the budget format. So in the budget format you need to have sex-disaggregated data, certain tables, and a special section that considers the gender issues. Several countries, in their budgets, have circulars that go out each year with specific instructions about including gender and how it must be done to fit into their format.

[Clare Beckton]

It's important that all departments are also doing gender-based analysis on their policies and that there is accountability around that. Those are the kinds of mechanisms we've been working on with the Treasury Board to ensure it's in the reporting mechanisms. Of course, some of that is used in the creation of the budget as well. So you need both processes.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Do you want to give it to Bruce?

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

How much time do I have?

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

You have one minute, but you can always come back to it.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

There were some excellent presentations here, by the way. All three presentations today were very insightful.

I have one quick question for Madame Peckford.

In the course of your presentation you mentioned that the budget measures were ad hoc and arbitrary. Could you explore deeper just what you mean by that?

[Nancy Peckford]

I mean there's no coherent analysis or framework that's guiding the gender-based analysis done within the finance department. The tax policy people are doing what they can, but I don't think they're necessarily doing it...and it may not be their job. It may be the job of the senior leadership within the finance department, in conjunction with Status of Women Canada, to say these are our priorities, and this is what we want to achieve in an equitable budget for women. We want to tackle these three priorities, therefore our analysis must guide and inform these outcomes.

What I see, in terms of the gender-based analysis to which we've been able to gain access, is that a lot of measures are analyzed, but these measures in some cases are entirely irrelevant to most women's lives and really have no bearing on their equality status, their engagement in the economy, or the ways in which they support their families. So it appears to me to be ad hoc and arbitrary, in that there is no performance indicator, no guiding framework, and no coherence as to how the analysis is done.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

So you really want a stronger connection between the--

[Nancy Peckford]

Absolutely. I think what Debbie said is correct, and you need a performance indicator.

We were sad to see that Canada's report to the Commonwealth finance ministers association emphasized analysis and not indicators. Internationally, Canada claims to do gender budgeting on the strength of its gender-based analysis.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

This is a new process, and that's one of the reasons the committee is studying this. We know it's difficult.

You're going to cut me off.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

I don't want to cut you off, but you can always respond in the next round.

Ms. Demers, you have the floor for five minutes.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, ladies, thank you, Ms. Budlender for joining us today.

Ms. Dwyer-Renaud, for how many years have you been providing Finance Department staff with information and training.

Ms. Peckford, you have been analyzing budgets for ten years already. Can you be sure that the information you provide is well understood and used appropriately? Can you be sure that your students are not dunces? There were no changes in previous years' budgets in terms of measures taken to advance the equality of men and women or to improve living conditions for women. Some measures, such as the $100 per child, were introduced. This is a useful measure for some, but it is completely useless for most of the population.

I do not understand how you can give them information and they do not use it properly or even at all. Do you make recommendations after these analyses? Are you in a position to tell us if they listen to these recommendations and subsequently implement them?