Status of Women Committee on April 2nd, 2009

[Janice Charette]

I'll come to the data in just one second. When I say access to regular benefits for individuals who leave their job for a valid reason, anybody in that kind of a situation would be eligible for regular EI benefits. It's a voluntary quit, because they were choosing to go on and do something else.

As to your point about statistics, I think we have an ongoing conversation between HRSDC and StatsCan about how best to invest our data and research dollars in terms of being able to get the kind of information necessary for policy analysis. Our appetite is endless, and our budget is fixed. As in all things, we have to figure out how best to set priorities between us.

I would say that the input of parliamentary committees in terms of the information that is of use to you is an important input into our discussions with StatsCan. So if there is a particular kind of information or data that you think would be helpful to policy analysis, that would be helpful to see as part of your report, we'd take that into consideration in our conversations.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Status of Women Canada told us last year that the department is working on developing indicators to identify trends and gaps that have impacts on gender equality.

I'm wondering if you are involved with the development of those indicators. If so, could you talk about the status of the project?

[Janice Charette]

We're involved with the Status of Women on a wide variety of topics. I'm not exactly familiar with the indicators work, but we can find out for you if you want, or inquire with Status of Women Canada.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Okay, I see.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have about 20 seconds.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

I'll make it really quick.

Did HRSDC make recommendations for improving EI eligibility criteria for Budget 2009? Just a yes or no, as I understand the limitations.

[Janice Charette]

Yes, we made recommendations.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you.

[Janice Charette]

We give advice.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much.

We have to end this session and go to the next session. I want to thank Madame Charette and Mr. Thompson for coming.

If there's any data or information that was requested here, or if people want to clarify things, please send it to the clerk. We'd love to use it.

Thank you very much for coming.

[Janice Charette]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

We're going to suspend until we call in the new witnesses.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

I want to thank our witnesses for coming.

I just want to tell you some of the rules. We have a very short period of time in which to get this done. Normally we allow everyone 10 minutes to present. However, I think if all of you present for 10 minutes, we are never going to be able to get the questions part done. Because of the timelines, and today is the last day for hearings on this report and you all want to be heard, I would like to ask you if you can give us a five-minute presentation, because that will allow for a fulsome discussion with you and questions to you.

So if you can boil—Susan knows how to do this very well—your 10 minutes down to 5, I think we can just move forward.

I'll begin—

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

I would just like to make a suggestion, Chair. If they have written submissions they can submit those. Have they already done so?

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

We usually do.

What I'd like to do is start on my right with Colleen Burns for five minutes. If you just look up at me, I'll give you a one-minute signal so you know how to pull your thoughts together to the end. So beginning with Colleen and moving towards Michèle Asselin, we'll begin.

Colleen Burns and Susan Russell are here together from the Canadian Federation of University Women. Which one of you would like to present?

Ms. Russell.

[Susan Russell, Executive Director, Canadian Federation of University Women]

Thank you very much for the opportunity to appear before you. This is a very important issue, as far as the Canadian Federation of University Women is concerned.

I have a summary, so I'll work on my summary first in case I don't finish this. We're very concerned that more women than men do not qualify for employment insurance, in part because of part-time work hours; seasonal employment; unstable contract work; time out of the workforce because of child care, elder care, or other care duties; moves due to spousal employment, and so on and so forth. It's harder for women to qualify for employment benefits because it's harder for them to reach the qualifying barrier.

Because women are often in lower-paid work situations, their benefits are lower and the level of benefits are lower, and it makes living on unemployment benefits very difficult. This can lead to falling into a cycle of poverty and being dependent on a spouse for economic stability. That's my summary.

I'll go as far as I can with the rest. We find the EI program is of great importance to all workers in Canada. It provides protection at the time of job loss, and it should provide benefits that support the individuals and their families while they are searching for jobs.

Our current EI program leaves many Canadians, especially women, lower-wage earners, contract workers, and insecure workers with insufficient or no income while they are searching for work. In November 2008, just four out of 10 unemployed workers qualified for benefits. Today's maximum benefit is $447, more than 25% lower than it was in 1996. The average benefit is $335 per week. We feel the need to stress gender analysis when looking at this program and how it impacts on women.

Benefits of employment insurance are that it can stabilize family income, and it really does help in periods of high unemployment to get people back in the workforce because it provides them with income while they're doing their search. However, women are unfairly penalized because of their different working patterns compared to men.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have one minute and a half.

[Susan Russell]

In that case I think I had better go to our recommendations.

We would like to see a cut-off requirement of 360 hours of work across the country to enable more workers to qualify if they are laid off, and we see more and more people falling into unemployment as a result of the current economic downturn; benefits for up to 50 weeks so fewer unemployed workers exhaust their claim; higher weekly benefits so the best 12 weeks of earnings before a layoff are used; and a replacement rate of 60% of insured earnings. These proposals would assist women. A reduction of the entrance requirement is particularly important in terms of closing the employment insurance gender gap.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much, Ms. Russell.

Next is the Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action. Who is going to speak? Is it Ms. Diamond?

[Bonnie Diamond, Co-Chair, Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action]

Nancy and I are both going to speak. CRIAW and FAFIA have come together. Our recommendations were remarkably similar, our analyses were similar, so from the get-go we said we were going to present together.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Okay. So you can have five minutes and you can have five, CRIAW. You will decide how you do that. You can take seven minutes, Ms. Diamond, and CRIAW can take three minutes, if you wish. What I would like to do, if you'll just kindly look at me now and then, if I put up three fingers, it means you have three minutes left, and so on.

[Bonnie Diamond]

So we're going to dispense with all the introductory niceties and get straight to the point.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Yes.

[Bonnie Diamond]

We're very happy to address you from a FAFIA perspective. CEDAW has urged Canada to address income support so women can have sufficient income to attain an adequate standard of living. Of course, that would mean not only benefits such as EI, which are very important in that, but also looking at other forms of income support for women that fall outside EI, such as social assistance.

I've already told you that CRIAW and we are presenting together. I just wanted to make a note before we start that is not directly relevant to EI, but is, and that is that the research capacity of women's organizations like FAFIA and CRIAW is being compromised by the changes to Status of Women Canada. The change I'm talking about specifically is that research is not a funded activity in many cases anymore, and we have lost the community research fund. It means that today we're sitting here with work we have done in the recent past on EI and whatever, but the capacity of contributing community research by women to this type of discussion will be eroded more and more.

If you look at the presentation that has just been set before us, you will see why it is critical to add community research done by women to that piece. We take an intersectional approach. We put women directly at the centre, so you would never be looking at a situation where you're saying women are net EI recipients, and if you do the women-centred analysis, that's because women are into the special program of maternity leave almost exclusively, and it is a contribution not only to their own pockets but to their families and to the other partners in the family who are not taking that benefit. I think it only underscores why we have to look to this type of community-centred research by women to continue.

As we still have access to the materials that are created by CRIAW and other women's organizations, I'm going to pass over to Jane to do the analysis, and then we'll come back to Nancy, who will put forward our joint recommendations.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you.

Ms. Stinson.