To clarify, on the private sector boards, it depends on whether you look at the FP500 or the TSX, which I think is at around 17%, or if you look at other companies, where it's at almost 20%. It's around that mark. A few years ago, it was about 14%, so it's inching up by 2% at a time, very slowly.
What you can do about it is use the “comply or explain” model that the Ontario securities regulator put into place last year. It's coming up to about one year right now, and we know that certain sectors, such as the finance sector—banks, for example—are at 22% women, whereas mining is at around 7%.
There are varying numbers that we're getting. Now that we have this comply-or-explain model, publicly traded companies basically have to show how many women are on the board and how many women are senior executives. If they don't have 30%, they have to explain why. Is it because they couldn't get qualified women, which we know is not quite true?
We think that will be a change in the system, because we've never had that model before. About nine provinces and territories have adopted it. The others are yet to come, but this was the first year that they had to actually explain why. There's still data missing and still a lot more to be done, but now people have to explain. I think it's all about transparency, right? It's about asking the questions. Globally, too, everybody is asking that question: why don't you have more women on boards?
We see the system changing as well. There are now recruitment firms that, for a price, can give you a list of board-ready qualified women, so that there's not this thing about how women aren't ready or how they don't have any in the mining sector or whatever sector. They're saying that they can give you a list of them. There are recruitment firms that are going in that direction, so I think the system is starting to change to increase the number of women.