Thank you, Chair.
Of course, as a woman, I'm very excited to see that this year's budget and therefore the estimates, of course, were in regard to women, since I am a woman and since I support women.
However, I am very concerned—I've stated this previously in committee—about the outcomes that these types of budgets have historically had. In Australia, this type of budget was abandoned in 2014. In Austria, we saw a third party auditor review this type of budget, with no data coming out that women were in fact much better off. Also, in a study of several OECD countries, only half were shown to have some type of measurable improvement in the lives of women in their nations with these types of budgets that were implemented.
I asked the minister this question the last time she was here and it wasn't addressed at all. As someone who is very proud to have managed million-dollar budgets for the government in my previous role as a management consular officer for missions abroad, and as someone who prides herself on having a Master of Business Administration—like many of my colleagues in the House, I'm sure, who also have many designations—I'm wondering if you can please identify specifically the metrics by which this budget and these specific portions relevant to the Status of Women will be measured.
I think the Canadian public is very excited to see this budget, but they will need the evidence, the proof. The government talks all the time about being a science-based government, a data-based government, so what are the metrics that we can look for and the tools that will be used to see the positive outcomes, the benefits, and the results for this budget, please?