Evidence of meeting #37 for Status of Women in the 40th Parliament, 2nd session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was work.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Office Administrator and Estimator, Dig-All Construction Ltd.
I believe discrimination is still in effect, possibly has been there from the beginning of time, and will continue to be there until people change their attitudes towards women.
Liberal
Lise Zarac Liberal LaSalle—Émard, QC
It is not easy to change people's attitudes. However, you mentioned something that I think is very positive. You said that technology will change this situation. You said that a certain amount of physical strength is essential in order to work in construction, but that technology will change this situation somewhat.
Do you think that attitudes will change as the technology is put in place?
Office Administrator and Estimator, Dig-All Construction Ltd.
I believe those are two completely separate issues. Technology does make it easier for women, but the employers also have to be willing to open the doors to hire women, or women have to start their own construction businesses. So the opportunity has to be there.
Liberal
Lise Zarac Liberal LaSalle—Émard, QC
You have had the good fortune to work in a family-owned business. But I am still sure that there were constraints. If you had not worked in a family-owned business, would your experience have been different? I imagine that the problems would have been worse still for an outsider. You were still the boss, to some extent.
Office Administrator and Estimator, Dig-All Construction Ltd.
I don't know. I haven't been there. It depends on which job you're looking at. For on-site engineers, for example, there are women coming into the industry all the time when 10 years ago they weren't there. It used to be only me in Manitoba, and now I've seen on-site engineers who have gone through their training. Anybody can apply for school. Anybody can go. So the opportunity is there, and it is up to the women to make the choice whether they want to be part of that industry, to step up to the plate and be who they want to be.
Bloc
Luc Desnoyers Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
Thank you, Nicole.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Welcome to this important committee where we try to reach conclusions that will produce results. It seems to me that you are a really interesting group. We need only look at what is happening at the Commission scolaire, for a start.
I would like you to tell me what the government's role is, in your opinion. We talked about the ministère de l'Éducation, and the important role it already plays. However, Ms. Penner said that legislation had helped to integrate women into the labour market.
In Canada, Quebec and in the other provinces, do we truly have the legislation we need to bring about the integration of, and equality for, women in non-traditional occupations? I am thinking of the work-family balance, child care, harassment, training and awareness. The question is for everyone.
Adult education and vocational training commissioner, Commission scolaire de Laval
Perhaps Bianka can answer. She deals with female students every day.
Education consultant, Le Chantier vocational training centre, Commission scolaire de Laval
I am not very familiar with the legislation, but I can talk about elements of the labour market that have not changed with the times. Particularly in the construction industry, the work schedule causes problems. During peak periods, women have to work 15 or 16 hours, just like the men. Construction sites open at 5:00 a.m. and close late in the evening. Even if there are day care services, they do not cover all the hours of work. Under the rules, a child cannot remain in daycare for more than 10 hours a day, and so on. It is not always possible to get care for your children at night. That is quite difficult for women.
Policy Analyst, Government and Regulatory Affairs, Building and Construction Trades Department, AFL-CIO, Canadian Office
Yes, you make a good point. In construction there really is no workday. It's when the work is done that you can go home. I live in Kanata. To get to Kanata these days you have to drive through a night work crew. If your employer says to you, “We're building a road this week and we're doing it between 2 a.m. and 6 a.m. every day for the next three weeks, so it's 21 days on and 6 days off”--it is a very challenging work schedule for anybody. For example, for megaprojects in Alberta you physically have to go and live in these employer-provided camps.
Your question was about whether laws can help. At the end of the day, if there is a regulatory regime in place that encourages the training and encourages the development of future workers, that can't hurt. Are there laws? I can't really comment on your question about day care, but at the end of the day it comes down to the schedule of work. If I have to work 21 days on and 6 days off in a month because that's when the work needs to be done, I have to go and do it. For those 21 days I'm working 12-hour days and I'm welding pipe the whole time.
Is there a set of laws in a province or a country that can help with that kind of thing? I don't know, but at the end of the day you need a regulatory regime that promotes training and promotes building a workforce.
Bloc
Luc Desnoyers Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
In terms of workplace health and safety, for example, work stations are often changed to make things easier. This is being done in nearly all fields, thanks to various pieces of legislation.
Is this the case in the construction industry, specifically?
Policy Analyst, Government and Regulatory Affairs, Building and Construction Trades Department, AFL-CIO, Canadian Office
That's a very good point on health and safety. Obviously the contractors are bound by provincial laws on health and safety. I may have exaggerated a bit when I said it was 21 days on, 6 days off. But at the end of the day, the health and safety bundle of laws is very important. If you're an iron worker and you're not harnessed to the Trump Tower they're building in downtown Toronto, it's 35 storeys if you fall. The regulatory regime of health and safety is extremely important in the business Debra and I are in.
Go ahead.
Vice-Principal, Le Chantier vocational training centre, Commission scolaire de Laval
We talked about new technologies to prevent workplace accidents. For our part, in terms of training, we look very closely at new technologies. Perhaps the government could fund research to adapt work stations. It could be a kind of field of research devoted to keeping women working in non-traditional occupations. The various technologies available could be studied. We are not the only ones working in this area.
Bloc
Luc Desnoyers Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
At the Commission scolaire de Laval, do you address these issues in the courses you provide? Talking about workplace health and safety is one thing, but prevention is another.
Adult education and vocational training commissioner, Commission scolaire de Laval
We addressed some of these things during a forum. We will likely do it again because it was extremely interesting. In our case, the people in the trades are the ones feeding us. The women in those trades—we are talking about women, in our case—talked a lot to us during the last forum.
Whatever the case may be, it would be useful for us to ask them that question.
Bloc
Luc Desnoyers Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
Before I finish, I would like to touch on the issue of discrimination and harassment.
Christopher, in the construction trades, you see this situation on a daily basis. What are women experiencing in this regard?
Policy Analyst, Government and Regulatory Affairs, Building and Construction Trades Department, AFL-CIO, Canadian Office
I would say it is. I'm not a woman and they won't let me near the tools. But it is something that many of our local offices deal with. It's a no-BS kind of situation where none of that is tolerated. However, what do you do when you're 36 storeys up and there's harassment? We work with our employers and the Ministry of Labour very closely to make sure that if there are complaints, they're taken very seriously and moved forward.
Debra would have a better feeling about the harassment side in the field. But generally the experience out there is that it does happen. We're trying to make it better.
Office Administrator and Estimator, Dig-All Construction Ltd.
Harassment exists and will always exist, whether you have a different colour of skin or a different nationality. It's just part of the world. But I believe in the construction industry. I know it has changed a lot over the years. Women are more involved in the construction industry, and as long as there are more women involved, they're being respected.
Conservative
Sylvie Boucher Conservative Beauport—Limoilou, QC
Good afternoon, everyone.
What I am hearing today is extremely interesting. Some non-traditional trades are known, but not by young women. I have two daughters, two young women actually, at home. I am encouraging them to pick non-traditional occupations. I do not know whether I will succeed. There is not enough information on the subject. In fact, they do not really know where to turn.
In the high schools, students hear about nurses, paramedics, but there are very few posters encouraging our girls to go into the construction trades, for example, in masonry or mechanics.
I remember, 35 years ago, I wanted to study mechanics. But I was told that I needed to take a secretarial course first. That was not what I wanted to do at all. At the time, that was how things were, but things have changed.
Could you tell us about the programs you have developed at the Centre de formation Le Chantier, in order to recruit young women?
Vice-Principal, Le Chantier vocational training centre, Commission scolaire de Laval
Over the years, we have realized that the information, although available, was not ending up in the right places. Always targeting the same audience, meaning grade 9 and 10 students, was perhaps not the best idea. We might need to tell young girls what is available much earlier.
This year, we have decided to hold workshops for kids in elementary school. For example, we talked to children in grades 5 or 6 at two different schools in the board. They come and spend a day with us. We pay for lunch and the school bus, and we get them working with mortar, with professional teachers all around. We have them do some electrical work with electricians. They get a day's training with an elementary school teacher who will review what she saw during the day and will link it with what she teaches at school with her students afterwards. In that way, any math that can be done with reference to brickwork, or calculations about volume or mass, she can do that with them in math class. If there are instructions to read in French, so that they can do the electrical work, she will go over it with them.
Ultimately, it is not just a fun time for these elementary school kids. The girls also have to put on the gear, wear a hard-hat, learn how to do things like laying bricks or spreading mortar. We are starting this year.
In my opinion, if we strike early, perhaps we will see better results over the next few years. Kids will know right from elementary school that it is possible because they will have been part of it themselves. There is nothing better than learning by doing.
Conservative
Sylvie Boucher Conservative Beauport—Limoilou, QC
Some witnesses recently said that it was very difficult to retain women in non-traditional jobs. Has your training centre done any follow-up with these women to find out whether they are still carrying on with the same trade two, three or four years later? And if they are, what factors tend to increase the likelihood of women sticking with their particular trade?
