Status of Women Committee on Nov. 9th, 2017

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you, all, so much for being here today.

I'll start with you, Ms. McRae. Thank you so much for your presentation. There were a few things that I was curious about, though. You were talking about a lot of programs that you have. I'm just curious about the accessibility for indigenous women, and also for women in rural and remote communities.

[Frances McRae]

Thank you for the question.

First of all, let me say that this is something that's very much in our minds, the intersectionality of the group we are talking about. We know that women entrepreneurs are not a homogeneous group, and the needs will differ depending on, as you say, rural areas, women with disabilities, indigenous women, or visible minority women. We do know that this is not just one single homogeneous group.

At the moment, the data we have is not particularly sophisticated in terms of splitting out the needs. The Business Development Bank of Canada, as you may know, has done quite a lot of work in terms of expanding its reach and visibility, as well as its offices across the country, and of course partnering with organizations in much smaller communities.

They are well aware that in order to reach women with all their needs, we need to be much more visible, much more present, and work with communities. That also entails working with other financial institutions, for example indigenous financial institutions.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Are you collecting that data so that we will be able to look at it in the future?

[Frances McRae]

Yes, we are. There is a commitment that we will start collecting much more detailed data on our programming.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Okay.

When I was knocking on doors, I talked to many women who had actually quit their job or stopped their small business because they just couldn't make ends meet, specifically because of the high cost of child care. In B.C., it's very high. I'm curious, when you are working with these women—and you said that you are collecting data about the challenges that prevent them from starting a business—are you hearing about child care? Are you hearing about other things? What are the most prevalent issues that are barriers for women to start their own business?

[Frances McRae]

As you say, it is very complex, and there are needs that are very different across the country.

We do work with organizations, other parts of the government, like ESDC, in addressing the more holistic view of what it is we have to deal with. Clearly—

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

I'm asking about the data collection. Are you collecting that information? What are the top issues that prevent women from joining business?

[Frances McRae]

When I talked about data collection work, we're collecting data that is much more about the use of our programs and much more sophisticated data about who uses the programs: if they don't use the programs, why don't they use the programs?

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you.

I'll move over to this side of the table and ask if you're collecting that kind of data. If so, what are you learning about what is preventing women from entering the workplace or working in the workplace or starting a business?

[Douglas Wolfe, Director, Strategic Policy, Analysis and Workplace Information, Labour Program, Department of Employment and Social Development]

Yes. We have a lot of data on challenges with respect to women in terms of their starting a business or whether it's being in the workplace. There's really a lot of data we have with respect to questions of the reasons why women may not be in the workplace, so things like lack of access to affordable child care. Certainly we have data on this sort of thing.

There's a lot of data with respect to the gender wage gap. That's something we've been looking at a great deal in terms of the various causes of the wage gap.

I would say there's a rather large amount of data we're looking at, and certainly, we're working actively with StatsCan to increase the amount of data we have on women in general.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Good. Can this committee have access to that information?

[Douglas Wolfe]

Yes. I think we have quite a lot of studies done, for instance StatsCan studies, that certainly would be public. We would be happy to provide them.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you.

I worked for many years in an immigrant-serving agency. Something else that's very close to my heart is closed work permits for temporary foreign workers. One of the challenges is specifically around women and their increased vulnerability, and being locked into a workplace where they can't get out, and they are not always safe.

What steps are you taking to address some of those issues?

[Douglas Wolfe]

Sorry. We don't have anyone at the table as far as I'm aware who can answer that one.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

That definitely was one of the challenges. Immigration would look after one part, and they didn't often talk to your department, so people were often left hanging in the middle.

If you have nothing to say about that today, it would be great if you guys could find the information and present that.

[Kristen Underwood]

Perhaps I could get clarification on exactly what your question is, because we do look after the temporary foreign worker program in our area. I want to make sure I have the question.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

It's when temporary foreign workers are in a closed permit, but they are in an unsafe situation. The challenge is for them to disclose the unsafe situation without being immediately removed from the country.

I think it's really important, especially for women temporary foreign workers. How many of them are feeding their children at home and are extremely vulnerable? Imagine being in that situation. It's really important that we address that. Thank you.

I still have a little bit of time. You talked earlier about how important affordable housing is and the commitment that the government has made. Do you know how much money has actually been moved towards any kind of housing that would support employment indirectly?

[Jonathan Will]

Supporting employment?

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

You talked about it so I thought I would ask.

You mentioned that there was a commitment by the government to put money into affordable housing. We're still waiting for that strategy. You talked about the $11 billion. How much of it has actually moved into communities to build any type of housing?

[Jonathan Will]

I can get back to you with that information.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you. I would appreciate that.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

You're more than welcome, Rachel.

We're going to Pam Damoff, for her seven minutes.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Thank you, Chair, and thank you to both of these departments for coming back. It's very helpful for us as we're doing this study. It has been quite a lengthy study, and some of your testimony was earlier on. You were our first witnesses. It's nice to have you here again.

We've heard repeatedly through the course of the study about the need for child care and how it's critical for women to find meaningful employment. In fact, it has come up today as well during questioning.

Back in February when the department was here, it was brought up then as well, but that was prior to our government re-engaging with the provinces and committing to a significant investment in child care. It's the first time in over 10 years that the federal government has been engaged in that conversation with the provinces.

Do you have the statistics for how many subsidized child care spaces for children from zero to five this will create? If you don't have it, could you provide it to us?

[Jonathan Will]

A significant part of the investment that you mentioned goes towards closing data gaps that we have concerning child care, like who is getting it and who is not in various regions. In fact, there is $95 million to close those data gaps, so that we better understand what child care looks like and more importantly, track progress on the money that is being spent.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Okay.

I understood that there were numbers available that were in the fall economic statement in terms of the number of spaces. Could you double-check for us?