Status of Women Committee on May 12th, 2015

[Kellie Leitch, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

No, I didn't say that. It's not a program.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

It's not a program, but it's—

[Kellie Leitch, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

It's an analysis tool.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Yes, but it's not separately funded.

[Kellie Leitch, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

It is not. It's an analysis tool used on each piece of government policy.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

And my understanding it that it's a core competency, so there is no funding allocated to it.

[Kellie Leitch, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

Not to the analysis component. What we do is we provide on our website an opportunity for public servants and parliamentarians, as well as government officials, to take that training program themselves. So they will then take their knowledge and apply it to their daily interactions and in their daily issues of assessing policy. So it is not a program; it's an analysis tool that we make available, free of charge, through Status of Women Canada on our website, so that every parliamentarian, every public servant, can educate themself and are supported in doing a better job.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

I have some concerns there. It's my understanding that there are 263,000 people in the public service and 1,500 have taken the two-hour online course.

[Meena Ballantyne]

Yes. The online course was developed in 2012 and we've gone through a couple of revisions of it. That's one avenue, as the minister said, that we're using to try to get more and more people in the federal public service, as well as in provincial public services, taking it. But in addition to that, we're working with the Canada School of Public Service to make it part of the core curriculum for people working in programs and at the policy level so that it's mainstreamed. We're going to be collecting the statistics on that. In addition, we work with the departments in networking events and pilots to get that everywhere—

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

I'm aware of the networking events.

Thank you.

Minister, you've had one round table on missing and murdered indigenous women. We've heard from attendees that this needs to be a first step of many. I'm wondering what your next steps are beyond agreeing to meet in 2016.

[Kellie Leitch, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

The round table that you're speaking of was the discussion that all provinces, territories, and the aboriginal organizations participated in. For myself, I participated in numerous round table discussions with aboriginal Canadian families prior to that round table, and will continue to do so. I think we would all agree as parliamentarians that we are the best informed when we speak directly to Canadians

In follow-up to that historic event where all of those participants agreed to a framework of action moving forward, we focused on the following issues that were brought up: the first was prevention, the second was supporting victims, and the third was protection, or justice issues.

The Government of Canada's action plan is very clearly stated. It was launched in September 2014. It's a clear plan, and I'm happy to provide you a copy of it. It speaks to the investments that the Government of Canada is making in these three critical areas, which were agreed to at the round table discussions—

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

I really do have a specific question here. I think there are concerns that the action plan is a set of re-announcements and money. So I'm really asking, beyond the meeting in 2016, what are your specific actions?

[Kellie Leitch, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

As I was just saying, we have an action plan and it has three component areas.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

I know what the areas are.

[Kellie Leitch, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

We're moving forward and we announced on April 1 the launch of our website. I would encourage everyone to encourage organizations that would like to access these funds or programs to go to www.women.gc.ca. What comes up immediately on our webpage is a tool for aboriginal organizations or those organizations that are supporting aboriginal families' access to the programming opportunities. That is our coordination function which is outlined in our plan.

We're moving forward in setting up community safety plans through Public Safety, by looking at those areas where aboriginal families have worked with us to identify where they can best create a community safety plan to make their areas safer. We're also augmenting, as outlined in our plan, the victims fund, and therefore making available to these families what they requested, namely liaison individuals to make sure that when they have interactions with law enforcement or individuals whom they don't know, they have a more culturally sensitive liaison opportunity. Those are just some of the things we're moving forward on—

[The Chair, NDP, Hélène LeBlanc]

Thank you very much. Merci.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

[Inaudible—Editor]...people with the community all the actions that are the follow-up from—

[Kellie Leitch, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

Yes, we're happy to do that.

[The Chair, NDP, Hélène LeBlanc]

Thank you, Madam Minister and Ms. Duncan.

Mr. Barlow, you have five minutes.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for being here today.

This is my first time on the committee and I want to commend my colleagues. I've really enjoyed the time in the committee. The issues that we've been addressing have been extremely interesting and quite timely.

Cyberbullying is a great example. My daughter was a victim of cyberbullying in high school, so to see us take steps on that is something I'm very proud of.

What I've learned in the time that I've been here is how we respond to some of the challenges and about those three pillars you talked about— violence, economic security, and democratic participation.

I understand that Status of Women's calls for proposals have provided some opportunities for organizations to improve some of the things that we've talked about here this year: improving economic security for women in rural communities, obviously very important for me, being in rural Alberta; increasing the participation of girls and young women in leadership roles; and something that was very prominent this year in one of studies, the importance of engaging men and boys in gender-based violence education.

How many of these calls for proposals have been approved for funding since 2011? As a secondary question, how many of these projects have been funded on a continuous intake?

[Kellie Leitch, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

Our focus is primarily on our calls for proposals. We've had several calls for proposals just in the last year, but particularly since 2007. The highlights, as you mentioned before, include Cyber and Sexual Violence: Helping Communities Respond. We had a call on Economic Prosperity: Positioning Women for Success in the future. We had a call for Increasing Economic Prosperity for Women. And then, we also had a call for proposals on Working in Partnership to End Violence Against Women and Girls. Since 2011, our calls for proposals have funded more than 330 projects; those have spanned the three theme areas.

With respect to the continuous intake, I'd have to ask Meena Ballantyne. I don't personally track those on a day-to-day basis. Meena may have a number to answer that question.

[Meena Ballantyne]

I don't have the exact number for the continuous intake, but what we do is look at emerging issues and work with communities to respond to those. For example, on skilled trades we're doing an invitational call right now for women in skilled trades and how to promote more women in those fields. That's something we're working on with the community, with the organizations, and for which we're inviting people to apply on a very proactive basis.

We have these targeted calls for proposals. Then, in addition to those, if we know that there are some communities that want to work on something, we'll do it through the continuous intake process.

I can get back to you on the number of projects we've done.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Yes, if you could provide that number, that would be great.

[Meena Ballantyne]

Sure.

[John Barlow, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Minister, we're in the process of completing our study on attracting women to the skilled trades and STEM fields. This was something that I and several of my colleagues on both sides of the table were very interested in.

Despite the downturn in the oil and gas sector, we in Alberta especially still have a large void in skilled trades. We've heard some witnesses come through saying that if they could get women to go into the skilled trades, they could see their salaries reaching into the six-figure area.

It has really been a challenge for us. How do we change the perspective? How do we get women involved in these types of opportunities? What initiatives are in place through Status of Women Canada by way of an effort to support and advance women in skilled trades and technical professions?