I think that training is really important. We know that women in Canada are far more likely to agree with a statement like, “Sometimes politics and government seem too complicated for a person like me to really understand what's going on.” I think by having training sessions.... I'll use the example of the Canadian Women Voters Congress campaign schools again. These are collaborative, non-partisan spaces where women are coming together to learn about issues around media training, for example, because we know that the media has a very biased view of women in the way it talks about women. Therefore you need to be prepared for when that happens. What are the strategies that women are employing when we do get asked a question that is based on our appearance or, for example, when we're called a “climate Barbie” and we're reduced to the colour of our hair?
Learning how to respond from the other women who have experienced that type of harassment and those types of comments, I think, is really important. It makes women feel more confident that they are able to then also handle those types of comments, because you know, undoubtedly, that it is going to be directed at them at some point in their career. So, there are issues around that.
Another issue is talking about party financing and really starting to get into what it means to run for politics and providing women with the resources and support they need to be successful, because I think that women are passionate about politics. I think it's just very hard to see yourself in a political position when we know that women are so vastly under-represented in our political institutions.