Recognize that the preamble doesn't actually change anything. The only action in the legislation is the establishment of the gender equality week. However, the list of areas in which women are not equal and where human rights have not been respected in relation to Canada's commitments internationally around gender equality is so complete that we did get some feedback from stakeholders that there are some missing pieces.
One is that women's rights are fundamental human rights. Another is that Canadians are committed to safe as well as reliable sexual and reproductive health care access, and access to abortion. Another is that Canada is a signatory to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, adopted in the United Nations General Assembly in 1979, and that the Government of Canada reiterated its commitment to implement all recommendations of the convention.
The government has committed to implement the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, adopted in 1995. Canada is a signatory to the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women, adopted at the UN in 1993, and the government supports the 2016 report of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women. The second-to-last one is that the Parliament of Canada recognizes that the principles set out in the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and in particular those in articles 21 and 22, should be enshrined in the laws of Canada. That has also been a government commitment.
Canada has long recognized the importance of women's rights and long sought to address status issues, including those addressed by the Royal Commission on the Status of Women established in 1967.
Especially on the UNDRIP commitment, the National Aboriginal Circle Against Family Violence wrote to me, saying that the preamble definitely needs a culturally relevant, gender-based comparative analysis to make a real difference. The legislation ought to include the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, articles 21 and 22.
I also have a letter from Joyce Arthur, executive director of the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada, who strongly recommends that an “important addition” be made to the preamble to recognize that “Canadian women and LGBT persons are still being denied their reproductive rights because of lack of access to safe and fully funded abortion in their own communities, and inadequate access to other sexual and reproductive health care and information.”
In summary, I'll say that you can't have it both ways. Either we say that the preamble is something we're really proud of in the way that it categorizes the problems and leave some of these important partners and segments of our community that have suffered from gender inequality—not have an exhaustive list—or we say that the preamble doesn't matter so much. Let's either make the list complete or else recognize that the only power in this bill is, in fact, in the one paragraph around the establishment of gender equality week.
