Thank you, Chair.
Thank you so much for your work, and to your whole team for the impact you're having. It's really helpful for us.
I'm going to read two recommendations from one year ago, October 18, from the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women. It did a focus on Canada's success, or lack thereof, in adhering to its United Nations commitments around eliminating discrimination against women. This happens only once every five years, so it's a really good touchpoint for us.
They've made two recommendations directed at Canada that I think will resonate, so I'd like to get your perspective on whether your group would be happy to see these recommendations reflected in our final report.
There are two of them. The first one is in 37(b):
The Committee recommends that the State party... (b) Strengthen its strategies to address discriminatory stereotypes and structural barriers that may deter girls from progressing beyond secondary education and enrolling in traditionally male-dominated fields of study, such as mathematics, information technology, and science;
The second recommendation is in 39(b):
The Committee recommends that the State party... (b) Adopt effective measures, including skills training and incentives for women to work in non-traditional professions, and temporary special measures to achieve substantive equality of women and men in the labour market and eliminate occupational segregation, both horizontal and vertical, in the public and private sectors, and adopt quotas to enhance the representation of women in managerial positions in companies;
It has the non-traditional as well as the secondary to graduation.
Do you have any reflections on whether, if Canada took those measures, it might help advance representation of young women, especially moving into STEM fields and coding?