Evidence of meeting #21 for Status of Women in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was companies.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Wai Young Conservative Vancouver South, BC
I'm getting to the question for Ms. McInturff, thank you very much.
Conservative
Wai Young Conservative Vancouver South, BC
If given our...other people have strayed; I wanted to make that point.
The question is this. In all of your studies, have you accommodated and looked at all of these other programs to see how effective they are, and how we can, as a government, leverage them and/or make them more accessible, more effective?
Senior Researcher, National Office, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
Thank you for that.
Two things: one, I am aware, obviously, that other programs, departments, and agencies spend money on programs that impact women's lives. I have looked at, in particular, federal spending broadly across all departments on violence against women. What I found for the year 2011-12—which was the most recent year for which I had fiscal data—
Conservative
Conservative
Wai Young Conservative Vancouver South, BC
What can we do more of? That is my question. Please submit that to the committee, in terms of whether these programs are not being effective—
Senior Researcher, National Office, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
Do I have any time?
NDP
The Chair NDP Hélène LeBlanc
No, but if you could briefly submit an answer to the question, or how you would complete it, or maybe a member could—
Senior Researcher, National Office, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
Yes. The second point is that there was an Auditor General's report on the extent to which the government is not, in fact, conducting gender-based analysis of the impacts of its programs. Although there's been an action plan put in place in response to that, the only thing that's been documented subsequently is the number of trainings conducted in gender-based analysis. There's been no analysis of the actual impact—differential impact—of gender-based analysis on program decisions and policy decisions.
NDP
The Chair NDP Hélène LeBlanc
Thank you very much for completing. It's always a very difficult job that I have, because I am as interested as all the members to know the answer.
Okay, thank you very much.
Ms. Ashton, you have seven minutes.
NDP
Niki Ashton NDP Churchill, MB
Thank you.
I want to pick up on that piece. In fact, we did have the Status of Women officials at our committee earlier this week. When we asked the question about gender-based analysis across departments we were told that they did a boot camp and that 12 or 13 departments came, but they weren't able to tell us which they were. We're waiting for that response in writing. I think we can certainly say that we're very concerned, not only that GBA+ isn't being adhered to, but that it's clearly not a priority of the Status of Women department or the government to make sure that all departments are taking a lead in this area.
I do want to go back to something that came out in your work, Ms. McInturff, and that is the best and worst place to be a woman. I'd like to again ask you and also Ms. Phillips to comment. You talk in your report about public sector jobs that are available, and of course we know that public sector jobs are unionized in most cases. We know according to Statistics Canada that in 2012 about 30% of Canadians were unionized. The wage gap between union men and women is smaller than it is between men and women who are non-unionized. I'm wondering if you can tell us why this gap still exists and to what you attribute the difference.
Senior Researcher, National Office, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
Sure. At the risk of repeating what Alex has said, I think one of the things that unions, and indeed any employer, can do to close the wage gap is to actually track what's happening rather than relying on anecdotal evidence. This happens to be something that unions and public sector employers do well, because they have pay equity policies in place. They actually track rates of pay. They track the way they're categorizing work and the way they're then valuing that work and compensating it. The result is that compared to the private sector you do see an 8% smaller gap in the public sector. You also see higher than average incomes for women in the public sector than in the private sector.
But there's no reason that the private sector can't do the same thing. I suspect there are particular instances of particular private sector employers who do this. We just don't have, across the board, private sector policies that are working to ensure that they are paying their employees equitably. That's one of the big differences.
I think the other difference is that obviously pay is related to rates of promotion and the extent to which women or men are able to move into those higher-paid positions. Again here, as in Alex's examples, if you keep track of how people are being promoted, then you're in a position to make proactive decisions about making sure that you are in fact promoting people who are performing equally well and who bring equal kinds of training and assets to the table. If you don't keep track, you're just not in a position to do anything about it. So there again, where the public sector has those policies in place and they're tracking that information, they're able to do a better job of providing a remedy for the gaps that are there. It's not perfect; otherwise, we would have no gap. I think that “sticky floor” is still an issue. I think the work-life balance is still an issue.
I would also say that we've seen some shifts in the last couple of years with the Public Sector Equitable Compensation Act and the changes to the legislation concerning federal contractors, which either have made it subject to market forces rates of pay or have made the implementation of pay equity policies a matter of discretion. There again, I don't think it's that anyone sets out to be a bad person. I think it's just that when we leave things up to people's discretion, as with the seat belts, sometimes we forget; whereas, if we have rules that say you have to think about this, you have to keep track, and you have to tell me what you did about it, then we see a more equitable workforce.
NDP
Niki Ashton NDP Churchill, MB
Thank you.
Ms. Phillips, can you let us know what you attribute this gap to and perhaps what the reality is on the ground in Alberta?
Director, Policy Analysis, Alberta Federation of Labour
What we see from a lot of data we've examined recently is that women do better in the public service in a handful of occupations, particularly in Alberta. Women do better in low-skilled work. For example, people who work in front-line customer service or as clerks, people who work in hospital cafeterias or in government warehouses, earn better wages—the majority of whom are women—when they are public sector workers compared to their private-sector comparators. Where we see, in particular in Alberta, the opposite being the case, where you earn more in the private sector, is as an engineer or something like that.
Where many people will argue that the public sector is so much better paid than the private sector, we see that's not true in Alberta. In many occupations, the public sector is actually paid less than the private, but what people are criticizing when they say some occupations are paid better in the public sector are women's equality gains through collective bargaining at the lower-skilled occupations. Therefore, we see women being able to earn something approaching a living wage for things like working in a hospital cafeteria or working in a warehouse or working in various kinds of administration and clerical jobs.
I think we need to be really careful about comparing private to public sector wages and union to non-union work. However, overall, where women do better, particularly at the lower ends of the job market, is in places where they are able to avail themselves of some form of collective bargaining, of pay equity.
NDP
Niki Ashton NDP Churchill, MB
Thank you very much.
Ms. McInturff, I would quickly like to turn our focus to women entrepreneurs for a moment. In budget 2014, $150,000 is earmarked for women entrepreneurs. I know you have done some analysis on the federal budget for 2014. What have you learned regarding this particular promise?
Senior Researcher, National Office, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
Well, partly it's an open question. I was interested to see that, and of course I welcome any investment in women's economic well-being, and this is certainly a welcome initiative.
If we look at the financial statements of Status of Women Canada, it appears that their financial forecast for this coming fiscal year—the one that this most recent budget was concerned with—their budget is actually decreased by, I believe, $303,000. It's unclear to me if that $150,000 will be added to the budget that's forecast or if it's simply an allocation of existing funding.
Again, I would make the plea for better investments, and indeed leadership on these issues, through other government departments but also through Status of Women Canada, which is mandated with this task.
NDP
NDP
NDP
The Chair NDP Hélène LeBlanc
Ms. McInturff, Ms. Johnston, Ms. Phillips, thank you very much for your patience. I was so excited by what I was hearing that I occasionally forgot about the time.
You gave us an overview of the situation. You also included in your testimony some very important points we will take into consideration when we draft our report. I think all the committee members were very interested in what you had to say.
Thank you very much.
I will suspend the meeting for few minutes, so that the committee can continue in camera.
[Proceedings continue in camera ]