Status of Women Committee on June 2nd, 2009

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Thank you very much.

I think I'm building on my previous question, and actually, my colleague Ms. Mathyssen sort of made my point for me when she stated that tax cuts don't benefit women. I can tell you that there are a lot of women in my riding and, I believe, across Canada, who would disagree with that very strongly. Tax cuts do benefit women.

My concern, and what I'm trying to understand so that I can explain it to my constituents, is when we look at gender-based analysis, what are you specifically looking for to see that it was done? I know we talked about the systems in place, but how can we also show that gender-based analysis is going beyond some way of thinking that many women would disagree with? I think that has been a challenge and continues to be a challenge. We are looking at very narrow criteria.

The Department of Finance may have looked at tax cuts and said that this is good for small businesses, but they didn't say that this is good for women. Is that what you didn't see in the documentation? Is that what you were looking for?

[Sheila Fraser]

No. We looked to see that the analysis was done and was considered. It does not mean that if the analysis was done and it said, for example--take a worst-case scenario--that this could negatively impact women that it would be the overriding consideration. There are a number of other factors that come into account in determining policy. But it is important, and government has made a commitment, that this would be considered. We can equate it to environmental issues and to a lot of other considerations that need to come into play in developing policy.

What we wanted to see was that the analysis had been done. Government made a commitment that it would do this. We wanted to see that the analysis had been done and that there had been some consideration given to it in policy development. It doesn't mean that it was the overriding factor, and it could have been completely put aside. We just wanted to see that it was done.

You will see, in the chart on page 16 of the English version, that we were only able to see evidence in four cases out of 68 that it was done and integrated into policy options--not necessarily into the final policy itself, but considered in the policy development.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Okay. So it's probably a little more on process and systems where we have some work to do. Then maybe we can build on that so that we are integrating all the components related to women and are not looking just at single issues.

But I understand that this wasn't what you were looking at. You were looking to see that those systems were there and were being carried through.

[Sheila Fraser]

That's right.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Okay.

Ms. Beckton, I'm not sure how long you've been with the department. I'm wondering if you can tell us what kind of improvements you have seen. I'm happy to hear that the 2006 cabinet opened up their confidential documents to the Auditor General, but I'm wondering if you have seen any improvements as well.

[Clare Beckton]

I'm assuming that you're referring to gender-based analysis.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

I am.

[Clare Beckton]

Yes, in the last two years I think significant progress has been made, particularly with respect to working together with central agencies to focus on the accountability elements. We understand that if you're going to have gender-based analysis, and you're going to ensure that it is working, you need to ensure that there are ways to have each department reporting on it and demonstrating the accountability that's there. I think there's been a tremendous amount of work with the central agencies, as was described this morning by Catrina Tapley and also by Neil Bouwer.

With respect to the Department of Finance, we have engaged in a considerable amount of training with the department over the past several years, which is enabling them to do the analysis and apply the gender lens. I'll just take that back to the question you raised about tax benefits for women. When you look at small businesses, and you have a small business initiative, if you understand that women are increasingly disproportionately entering small businesses faster than men, you can see how women would benefit from initiatives that support small business.

I think it's going back to what Mr. Bouwer was saying. Having that evidence that shows how many women are in small businesses, when they have the greatest number of business start-ups, enables you to look at what the impact of an initiative of this kind will be.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Patricia Davidson]

Thank you very much.

We now will now move to a fourth round that will be three minutes, and we will hold each person strictly to that.

Ms. Neville, please.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Fraser, you said that the responsibility to do a GBA rests with the departments. How do they decide?

[Sheila Fraser]

I think that's a really interesting question. The responsibility is clearly with them. I would refer committee to a response to a recommendation that we made, recommendation 1.79, where it's quite clear in the middle paragraph of the central agency response. It says that the assessment of department performance against gender-based analysis commitments made by the federal government is not the responsibility of the Treasury Board Secretariat.

It is the responsibility of individual departments. That's why we are recommending that there needs to be clarification around expectations of what departments are expected to do and how anyone knows if they're actually doing it.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

And who provides that clarity of expectation?

[Sheila Fraser]

It should be the central agencies, the Privy Council Office and the Treasury Board Secretariat, in conjunction with Status of Women, of course.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

And how did you choose which departments you would review?

[Sheila Fraser]

Largely, I think, through the various initiatives in the budget. We ensured that we would pick departments that did have some initiatives around that. I don't think there was any particularly scientific method. We wanted to see some that might be more gender-neutral at first glance to see what they were doing as well.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

There were, in my mind, two notable exceptions that you didn't look at, and those were Immigration and HRDC, which are significant.

I want to come back to this challenge function for one minute. How can you ensure that departments are integrating GBA into their various submissions--Treasury Board, cabinet, whatever--if there is no challenge function, and how can we hold them accountable?

[Sheila Fraser]

We would obviously expect to see evidence within the department that the analysis had been done, that it was integrated into policy options. So we can see that kind of evidence. It's where we don't necessarily see the analysis or we don't know how it's been integrated into policy options. Then we really need to see the challenge function to see if it has been considered or not.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

When you talk about “we”, is there any further role for you--the “we”--in this audit? Do they have to report back any further? We have the responses now, but....

[Sheila Fraser]

No. We can only make recommendations, of course. We do follow up and ask all the departments to indicate to us whether they're making progress on meeting the commitments that they've made in response to the audits. Then after a suitable period of time, often based upon departmental action plans, we will go back to do follow-up audits to see if the departments and agencies have actually done what they said they would.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Patricia Davidson]

Thank you very much.

We'll now move to Madam Boucher for three minutes, please.

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

I have a question that has been nagging at me. You said that, prior to 2005 or 2006, you did not have access to certain documents. Was a GBA done before 2006? Were you able to do one? A little earlier, someone said that there was a plan in 1995. It is now 2009. Was a GBA audit done before you had access to those files in 2006?

[Sheila Fraser]

We did not do one. I do not know whether one was done as part of a department's internal audit, but this is the first time that we have studied this issue.

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

So, if I understand correctly, there are no tangible figures from before 2006, prior to that audit. Is that right?

[Sheila Fraser]

That is correct, yes.

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

So this goes back a long way. We can say that we are doing everything at the same time. In a perfect world, all the departments would be at the same point.

I have another question, but I am not sure who will know the answer. When a GBA is done, are the questions specific? I saw that the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs practically received a score of 10 out of 10, but Transport Canada had no's all over the place. Are the questions the same for all departments? Are their analyses comparable? Are we comparing apples with apples?