I attended the women's forum there in February. I wasn't able to attend in person because of the weather in Newfoundland, but some of the things I heard in that forum from the LGBTQ community.... The level of trust is not there, especially for the LGBTQ community, because of the purge that happened some years ago. One of the ladies said to the team there, “We don't trust you.”
With Helmets to Hardhats, that's fair enough. There is that level of trust that we need to establish with women and members of the LGBTQ community who are applying. That's up to our team when it comes to diversity, inclusion and safe space. I've been in this job just one year. We're trying to get the word out there that we're a safe space. There is a lot of stigma and a lot of stereotypes attached to the building trades. A big part of my job is to help break that down and help educate where the education needs to be.