Debates of Nov. 1st, 2007

Sitting Resumed

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the fact that you have called the Conservative members to order.

Canadians need to know that if Canadian women do not have child care spaces in Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador, the three territories--

[Brian Fitzpatrick, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

You missed a province.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

I must say that comment was funny.

If they do not have child care spaces today, they should blame the Conservative Party, but at least it kept its word. But they should also thank the NDP for colluding with the Conservative Party, knowing full well that should the Conservatives come to power, they were going to cut all of these social programs. The NDP is to be thanked by Canadians who do not have affordable housing, who do not have social housing, and who do not have child care spaces.

According to Tom Flanagan, the main campaign organizer of the Conservative Party and a senior policy adviser to the Conservative Prime Minister, until recently, the Conservatives would not have won the election and been able to implement all of their promises to slash social programs to ensure that women do not get further ahead, either on the economic front or on the social front. He said, “It would have been hard for us to win if the NDP had not held up its end”.

I guess we should congratulate the NDP for holding up its end and ensuring that there are not any child care spaces that have been created since the election of the Conservative Party, that there are not any new affordable homes or social housing created, and that women's groups no longer get funded if they dare to advocate gender equality. We need to thank the NDP because it held up its end with the Conservatives.

It ensured that the Conservatives would win and do exactly what they promised to do. So I have to wonder, who should we be blaming more? A party that made clear its anti-women, anti-poor family, anti-working class, and anti-aboriginal views, and said it would cut all of that if it came to power, or the party that claimed to stand up for Canadians but worked with the Conservative Party to ensure that party would come to power and do exactly what it said it would do.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to my hon. colleague's discourse. Whenever she speaks, it is sort of like looking in a political funhouse of mirrors because whatever she says is so distorted when it comes out the other end I am not sure what side is the upside or the downside.

I am certainly pleased to take credit that 19 New Democrats stood up along with millions of Canadians across the country and threw their royal petards out on the street. In the speech we just heard, the sort of shallow revisionism actually speaks to the fact that the Liberals do not get it. They do not believe that average Canadians, who became tired of year after year of empty promises, actually had the right or the nerve to stand up and throw them out of government after what they failed to deliver on. If the member wants to put the hopes and beliefs of the Canadian people who wanted something different than the Liberals on the backs of the NDP caucus, I would certainly be more than willing to assume that.

However, I have to ask her a simple question. Why is she talking about history when we should be talking about today, when we are talking about a budget that will strip the fiscal capacity of the government, of future governments to bring forward any form of plans that they are advocating? The Liberal Party is a party that took a dive. This is the party that members do not have the guts to stand up. Those members would rather sit down because they are more worried about saving their own political skin. If the member believes what she says she believes, why did she not just stand up and vote?

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I find it interesting what the NDP member says. This is the party that on a confidence vote on the softwood lumber deal sat on its hands.

We did not criticize those members for abstaining. We did not criticize them at all. They abstained on a confidence vote on the softwood lumber deal, knowing that the Conservative government had blackmailed the forestry and softwood lumber industry that was dying, and at risk of closing its doors with the loss of thousands of Canadian jobs. Nevertheless, that party sat on its hands.

We said it was their right to do that if they believed that they could neither support or oppose. They decided to sit and abstain, good for them.

[Louise Thibault, Independent, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I must say that I always find it interesting that, in a forum composed of men and women, when a woman expresses herself forcefully, all sorts of motives are imputed to her, but when a man does so, he is described as passionate and courageous. This is especially surprising in a place that represents democracy.

I would like to ask my hon. colleague whether, in the government's intentions, as expressed in the throne speech and yesterday's economic statement, she found anything similar to what she is talking about. I do not want to ask her a partisan question or know why she has not done this or that. I just want to know whether she has found anything consistent with the Liberal motion today.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question. I do not find it partisan at all. It is a completely impartial question.

The throne speech contained nothing for women or for single parent families which, as we know, are primarily headed by women. There also was nothing in it for children.

However, the increase in the basic personal exemption announced in the mini-budget, that the Conservatives finally decided to restore to the level set by the former Liberal government, does help a little, although not very much.

According to this mini-budget, the lowest tax rate—15% when the Conservatives were elected and then increased to 15.5%—will now be returned to 15% by the Conservatives. That will result in small savings for families and higher-income earners, and it may be that some families or individuals will no longer have to pay federal tax. However, I cannot venture anything about provincial taxes.

Clearly, the 1% reduction in GST is of no help at all to poor or working families.

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, on the eve of the 25th anniversary of CEDAW, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, the treaty monitoring committee made a series of recommendations of particular relevance to Canada which bear recall today.

It recommended that Canada call upon the federal government:

To double its efforts to put an end to the feminization of poverty and to reform laws that both directly and indirectly result in discrimination against Aboriginal women. The CEDAW Committee also recommended that Canada: i) improve its Live-in Caregiver programme by re-examining the legal obligation that workers live with their employers and by fasttracking access to permanent residency; ii) double its efforts to eliminate violence against women; iii) adopt measures to increase women's representation in politics and public life; iv) work harder to implement a national child care strategy; v) increase benefits allocated to maternity/parental leave; and that Canada vi) double its efforts to achieve pay equity and increase funding for legal aid, notable by restoring the budget to the Court Challenges Program devoted to addressing inequalities in the provinces.

In that regard, what I would like to do within the time constraints is address three areas in which government action or inaction can have a positive or prejudicial impact on the state of women's rights in both the domestic and international arenas, as the case may be.

First and foremost, and having regard to the motion before this House today, I will address the issue of pay equity, where the government has failed to act on this issue on the grounds that no consensus exists as a matter of principle and policy in this matter. Yet, this response by the government ignores the seven points of consensus that have arisen from the pay equity task force group which conducted a comprehensive review of pay equity law and policy in this country, a consensus which our government adopted and which, as I indicated in one of my last submissions as a minister to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women of the House of Commons, we were prepared to act upon in that regard.

Let me briefly identify the seven points of consensus for the purposes of our understanding, arrived at after a series of sustained consultations across this country with a myriad of groups, all engaged in this issue and arrived at within the 113 recommendations.

First, all stakeholders were committed to the principle of pay equity.

Second, all agreed that the principle of equal pay for work of equal value is a human rights principle.

Third, all agreed that employers have a positive obligation to take steps to eliminate wage discrimination.

Fourth, all agreed that any new pay equity regime should be equally accessible to unionized and non-unionized employees.

Fifth, all stakeholders agreed that any new pay equity regime should provide more guidance on how the pay equity standards should be met.

Sixth, all stakeholders agreed that there should be a neutral source of assistance, information and respect.

Finally, all the stakeholders agreed that there should be an independent adjudicated body with expertise to deal with any pay equity issues.

One would have hoped that the government would have acted upon this, not only because of the seven points of consensus, but because the Prime Minister, in his remarks on January 18, 2006, in the midst of an election campaign, declared this on the whole issue of women's rights:

Yes, I'm ready to support women's human rights and I agree that Canada has more to do to meet its international obligations to women's equality. If elected, I will take concrete and immediate measures, as recommended by the United Nations, to ensure that Canada fully upholds its commitments to women in Canada.

One would have hoped that the Prime Minister would have followed through on the commitment. Yet if one looks at the Speech from the Throne, if one looks at the mini budget, there is nothing to reflect and represent that commitment which, at the time when uttered by the Prime Minister, encouraged us to believe he would act on the recommendations as set forth by the committee, regarding the convention on the elimination and discrimination against women.

One would have hoped the would have appreciated the clarion call that came out of the Vienna Conference on Human Rights, which said, “Women's rights are human rights and there are no human rights which do not include the rights of women” and that we must act on this, not as a matter of rhetoric but as a matter of principle and policy.

As women's groups across the country and Canadians have affirmed, not only as principle and policy but to ensure its implementation, this should be a priority on the government's agenda. Yet there does not appear to be any expressed priority on the government agenda in this regard.

I mentioned the seven points of consensus on pay equity. Regrettably, in the matter of pay equity, the Prime Minister once said, “Pay equity is a ripoff”. I would hope that the Prime Minister, in light of his own statement in the election campaign on January 18, 2006, and which I quoted and I take him at his word, will therefore move to act on the issue of pay equity, which at this point is out of reach for many women, and the statistics speak for themselves.

On average, women working part time earn 30% less than their male counterparts. I am just quoting some of the data. Indeed, in the Prime Minister's province, Alberta women make only 56¢ for each dollar that men make. Moreover, regardless of their educational attainments, women suffer from pay disparities and inferiorities. In 2003 women earned on average $24,000 per year while men earned $39,300.

Accordingly we recommend that the government should take the comprehensive pay equity task force set of seven points of consensus seriously. First, it should introduce as recommended a proactive law to rectify pay inequality from the start. Second, it should set more than clear standards for pay equity and ensure that the laws apply and this right is redressed.

This brings me to a second issue that I wish to address. It has to do with the whole question of a comprehensive and sustainable legal aid system in the country.

At a meeting of the ministers of status of women, held in Saskatchewan in 2005, all the women there, reflecting and representing a consensus across this country, called for a comprehensive and sustainable legal aid system in Canada, recognizing, as they affirmed that the absence of such a comprehensive and sustainable legal aid system prejudicially impacted on the rights of women, whether we talk about family matters, or child custody cases, or low income single parents who are women, and I could go on.

Later that year, in November 2005, the meeting of federal-provincial-territorial ministers of justice across the country, acting upon the recommendation of the ministers on the status of women conference, unanimously recommended that such a comprehensive and sustainable legal aid program be put into effect. Regrettably, the government has not taken any initiative in this regard, neither in the area of enhancing the criminal legal aid program, nor, in particular, the civil legal aid program with all the adverse fallout that the absence of such a comprehensive program has for women and other disadvantaged and vulnerable groups in the country.

This brings me to the third and final point, which is the importance of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the promotion and protection of equality rights in general and women's rights in particular.

The advent of the Charter of Rights, as the women of Canada have themselves affirmed, has had a transformative impact, not only in the protection of equality and women's rights but in fact on the ground, in the lives of women.

As justice minister, I went across the country. When I asked women if they were better off now than they were before the Charter of Rights was enacted, the answer was, invariably less. This was also because the women were particularly responsible for including in the charter the section 15 guarantee in the language in which it reads, which now prohibits discrimination on grounds of gender inequality and it speaks about equality before the law, under the law, equal protection law, equal treatment law, and has the only non-substantive clause in the charter dealing with gender equality. Notwithstanding anything in this act, men and women are equal in all respects.

Regrettably, however, in the throne speech, before and since, there has been no reference to the promotion and protection of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, nor to the promotion and protection of women's rights.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I know the member has a lot of experience in the area of the charter challenge. When I was involved in community work in the city of Toronto around 1986, the policy of the Government of Canada was not to provide subsidized language training, English or French as a second language, to immigrant women. The assumption was that immigrant women would not work when they arrived here or, if they did, they would do demeaning work so English did not matter. They were left behind and only the head of the household, supposedly the male, would get language training as an integration process. That was clearly discriminatory.

Myself and the organization I worked with, along with immigrant service agencies in the city of Toronto, consisting of women of immigrant and visible minority backgrounds, and LEAF, the women's legal education fund, launched a charter challenge to the Supreme Court of Canada on the basis of discrimination against immigrant women. At the time, it was a Conservative government under Brian Mulroney. We had to go that far in order to get rights for immigrant women. We succeeded, and did not have to go all the way.

Could the hon. member tell us why this is critically important to women in Canada?

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in the matter of equality rights in general, and women's rights in particular, and in the matter of the rights of minorities, regrettably not only was the government silent in the promotion and protection of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and equality rights in its Speech from the Throne, or even by reference in its mini budget, but it dismantled the very instruments which have, by way of principle and precedent, promoted and protected equality and minority rights in general and women's rights in particular. The government dismantled the court challenges program.

In the course of my tenure as minister of justice and prior to that, I appeared together with LEAF, in matters to which reference was made, before the courts for the purpose of promoting and protecting women's rights. In those cases, the court would affirm, as a matter of principle and precedent, issues related to women's rights brought about by the support given by the court challenges program.

Regrettably the court brought about the dénouement of the Law Commission of Canada, which also facilitated the promotion and protection of equality rights. Regrettably it brought about the dénouement of the National Association of Women and the Law, which was a catalyst for the promotion and protection of not only women's rights in the country, but for the promotion of law reform in the matter of equality rights in general and women's rights in particular.

I mention these three instruments in particular because of the manner in which they underpin the whole struggle for women's rights along with the whole struggle for equality rights.

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, when the Conservatives cut funding to women's groups, they cut it based on the fact that they were advocating for safety, for aboriginal issues and against violence. Yet they are providing the Conference of Defence Associations, the oldest advocacy group in Canada's defence community, with a $500,000 multi-year grant for safety purposes.

What does the hon. member think when acts of violence really are committed by handguns and guns are a real problem for violence against women?

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, regrettably violence against women continues to be pervasive in the country, and in particular, with respect to vulnerable women such as aboriginal women and visible minority women.

One would have hoped the government would have kept in place those instruments and provided support for those groups that were there to protect women against violence, that were there to protect vulnerable women's groups such as aboriginal women and visible minority women. Regrettably, here too the government has not only been silent, but it has dismantled those initiatives.

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Human Resources and Social Development]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Simcoe North.

I am thankful for the opportunity to speak to this important motion. I would like to thank the Standing Committee on the Status of Women for its 21st report. We appreciate the diligence that the committee has shown in exploring the issues concerning the economic security of women.

Our government shares the committee's recognition that there is a need to ensure economic security for women and we have taken a number of measures to achieve this goal.

Speaking as the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Human Resources and Social Development, and as a woman, our government's objective to enable Canadians throughout their lives to have the opportunities needed to participate in all aspects of Canadian society is fundamental in recognizing the many roles of women in Canadian society. Solid analysis on a wide range of issues, including gender, is key to fulfilling that mandate.

Before looking at the specific measures our government has taken to ensure the economic security of all Canadians, I will first take a quick look at the important advancements that women have made to improve their own security, particularly in education and in the labour market.

Over the past few decades, the participation of women at university has increased dramatically. A Statistics Canada study found that among 19-year-old youth in 2003, 38.8% of girls attended university compared with only 25.7% of boys.

As well, I am delighted to inform the House that the increase in Canadian women's participation rates in the labour force is one of the most significant social trends in recent decades. In fact, our nation has one of the highest women's labour force participation rates among the OECD countries and the highest among the G-7 countries. Our unemployment rate of 5.9% is the lowest it has been in 33 years. Half a million jobs have been created in the past two years alone.

Achieving positive results for all Canadians is our government's role. To this end, the economic update introduced by the government on October 30 lowered taxes, both income tax and GST. Taken together, these measures will contribute to greater economic security for millions of Canadian women.

In addition, because skilled workers are necessary to boosting productivity, budget 2007 made a landmark investment in post-secondary education, aimed at creating the quality workforce of tomorrow.

As I mentioned earlier, women are attending university in record numbers and our investments will help those numbers continue to rise. By 2008-09, we will be transferring $3.2 billion to the provinces and territories, an increase of $800 million, or 40%. Budget 2007 also provided an additional $500 million a year for labour market training, starting 2008-09.

Working with provinces and territories, this new investment will help all Canadians get the skills and training they need to prepare them for the future.

Our government supports low income Canadians through a range of programs, transfers to the provinces and territories and tax measures that work together to support self-sufficiency. To help in this effort, budget 2007 introduced the working income tax benefit, which will help Canadians over the welfare wall and reward work for low income Canadian men and women. This is in addition to the Canada employment credit of up $1,000 to help working Canadians.

The federal government also has built measures to support parents during the first year of a child's life through employment insurance, which is a national program providing Canadians with a full year of maternity and parental benefits.

Furthermore, after 13 years of empty promises and inaction by the previous Liberal government, our government is providing Canadian parents with choice in child care. We have taken action to support families with the cost of raising their children through a number of concrete measures. These include the universal child care benefit, which provides $100 per month for each child under the age of six, a new $2,000 child tax credit for each child under the age of 18 and the Canada child tax benefit. This provides $9.5 billion this year alone to families with children.

We also recognize that many families need child care spaces and this is why we are transferring an additional $250 million per year to provinces and territories to help them create and enhance child care spaces. This is on top of $850 million they already receive for children's programs and services, for a total of $1.1 billion this year alone.

We are implementing a tax credit for businesses that create child care spaces for their employees and the surrounding community. With this support, provinces have already committed to the creation of tens of thousands of child care spaces.

The standing committee's report rightly focuses on the most vulnerable women in society. Our government also concentrates its efforts in supporting these Canadians.

Housing is fundamental. To this end, we designated close to $270 million for a new homelessness partnering strategy and $256 million in support of CMHC's renovation programs over the next two years. This will help improve the living conditions of some 38,000 households, including single women, seniors, persons with disabilities, aboriginal people and others in need across Canada. We have invested $1.4 billion to create three provincial-territorial trusts that will help Canadians to find safe, affordable housing.

We have invested $300 million for a first nations marketing housing fund that will facilitate up to 25,000 housing units on reserve over 10 years.

We recognize, too, that aboriginal women and men need access to skills training jobs that enable them to participate more fully in the workforce and the economy.

Our aboriginal human resources development strategy is a $1.6 billion community based initiative designed to help aboriginal people prepare for, find and keep jobs. The aboriginal skills and employment partnership, ASEP, is an $85 million labour market initiative designed to provide training and long term skilled jobs for aboriginal people in major economic development sectors across Canada. We recently announced an additional $105 million investment to extend ASEP until 2012.

We all need financial security. This is particularly so for seniors, especially women who constitute a large share of the seniors population. Through its stewardship of Canada's public pension system, old age security and the Canada pension plan, HRSD provides income security for Canadians in their retirement years. Canadians know that the government has done more in 20 months than the previous Liberal government did in 150 months to address the needs of seniors.

For example, through Bill C-36, which we introduced and has been passed, we made it easier for Canadians to apply for and receive the benefits for which they are entitled, such as the guaranteed income supplement. We have also created the Secretary of State for Seniors and the National Seniors Council to ensure that our policies, programs and services continue to meet the needs of seniors.

The Government of Canada works with other levels of government and all concerned and informed stakeholders to develop a national approach that responds to the needs of seniors today and in the future.

We all know there is more work to be done. We know there is still a gap in earnings between men and women. However, the gap has diminished in recent decades and our government will continue to work to close that gap.

I am proud to be a part of a government that is strongly committed to providing effective and meaningful support to all Canadians, men and women. Once again I would like to thank the standing committee for its report. The observations and recommendations it contains will be of valuable assistance as we move forward.

[Mario Silva, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the struggle for equality rights and women's equality is something the Conservative government does not advocate. Let us look at the Conservatives' record. They eliminated the court challenges program. We know there are financial barriers for Canadians to challenge offensive laws and policies. However, now that the government has eliminated this vital program, which has helped millions of people, they cannot make a challenge.

The program helped aboriginal women to challenge unfair laws. I am not surprised that the issue of aboriginals is not of concern to the government, given its appalling record on the international stage where it did not want to ratify and adopt the aboriginal convention that is presently being discussed at the United Nations.

When there are laws in this country that need to be challenged, the Conservative government has said that there are no financial barriers to women, but we know that is not the case. Many minority groups in this country depended on the court challenges program. It is a question of rights and equality. It is a question of fairness. Unfortunately, the Conservative government does not believe in equality and fairness.

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Blackstrap, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think there was a question there so I will just affirm that equality of opportunity is what I believe in, rather than in equality of outcome.

I believe this government has shown that it does believe in equality and where it starts is with our universal child care benefits. We did not discriminate. Wherever a person lives and no matter what a person's income might be, the person will receive $100 a month for every child under the age of six. We did not discriminate. It did not matter what region someone lived. It did not matter whether the parent wanted to remain at home and if a parent had a child that they wanted to stay at home with.

Right now in my province there is a group that has problems with children suffering from autism. The group welcomes the $100 a month because it helps with some of the needs that it has.

Equality is something on which we base all of our policies and principles. When we are guided by the principle of equality, it is a lot easier than trying to divide and put wedges between different regions, different peoples and different genders.

I do not think the member who spoke understands the meaning of equality. True equality for all individuals in all provinces allows for diversity and it promotes equality. If the member really wants to talk about equality, he would agree that our universal child care benefit and many of the tax benefits that were announced in the fiscal update are all about equality. Everyone is treated the same. Everyone across Canada will receive 1% off the GST. It does not matter where that person came from or what--

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Questions and comments. The hon. member for Compton—Stanstead.

[France Bonsant, Bloc, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the parliamentary secretary and I have a question for her. She is pleased, as a member, to have the same salary as her male counterparts.

Why then, in the Conservative Party election platform, is there no mention of pay equity, or maternity benefits, or parental leave?

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Blackstrap, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I am sorry but I need to know the circumstances. Perhaps the member could give me a circumstance of where there is no equal pay. I did not quite catch her question. Would she repeat it?

[France Bonsant, Bloc, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will speak more slowly.

Why are pay equity, maternity benefits and parental leave not part of the Conservative Party election platform?

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Blackstrap, SK]

Mr. Speaker, maternity and parental benefits are part of our legislation. EI benefits afford parental and maternity benefits to both women and men. There is no difference and no discrimination.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to address this issue raised by the hon. member for Beaches—East York concerning the support provided by the Government of Canada to Canadian women.

The member is referring to the report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, a committee that I was pleased to be a member of in the first session of Parliament.

I know the committee's work on the issue of economic security of women was extensive and thorough and I would like to take this opportunity to thank my fellow committee members for their considered efforts on behalf of Canadian women on this and other important issues the committee addresses.

The Government of Canada shares the committee's belief in the need to ensure the economic security of women and has taken a number of measures to achieve this goal. Despite the high participation rate of women in Canada's labour force, actually one of the highest, as was mentioned, in the OECD countries and certainly the highest in the G-8, we know there is a still a gap in earnings between men and women.

To ensure that women are treated fairly in the workforce, we are undertaking new measures to improve wage imbalances for women in the federal jurisdiction. Our approach has three components: first, we are increasing education about pay equity; second, we are implementing a new specialized mediation service; and third, we are expanding our compliance monitoring. I will elaborate briefly on those three measures.

First, on increased education for pay equity, we are distributing information packages about the rights and obligations of the workplace parties. We are increasing the number of site visits and encouraging representatives from industry, such as the banking and trucking sectors, to help employers of particularly smaller federally regulated businesses to establish more gender neutral job evaluation systems.

Second, our mediation services will assist labour market partners address the pay equity issues during collective bargaining. We are doubling the number of dedicated pay equity mediators to enhance this service.

Finally, the third plank in these measures, we are expanding the already rigorous monitoring program that will enable us to be more vigilant in verifying whether employers are complying with pay equity requirements. We trust that these employer audits will reinforce and encourage compliance with the already substantive pay equity laws.

Our aim is to ensure that for those women who wish to participate in the workforce, the fundamental right of equal wages for work of equal value is upheld, regardless of gender. It is noteworthy that through the course of our committee's study on the economic security of women we learned of some significant trends that suggest the wage gap between men and women is closing, especially in the Canadian public service where in the last five years women are competing head on in securing no less than 61% of the new hires in management, scientific, professional and administrative positions.

The educational attainment of women has reached unprecedented levels, now seeing some 60% of all university graduates are women, and these higher graduate rates among women will see that women will surpass men in the number of doctoral graduates in the very near future.

It shows that the better awareness of the federally regulated workplace parties, the higher educational attainment of women and the participation rate of women in the workforce are trending toward an ever-diminishing earnings gap between men and women.

Achieving positive results for all Canadians is the goal. With respect to women, we are proud to have contributed to their lives in a number of important areas, such as promoting self-sufficiency, child care, parental leave and the economic security of senior women. The Government of Canada supports low income Canadians through a range of programs, transfers to the provinces and territories and tax measures that work together to support self-sufficiency.

Of course, we recognize that family responsibilities, especially child care, play an important part in the lives of many women. The Government of Canada is supporting families with the costs of raising their children through a number of measures, including the universal child care benefit, the Canada tax benefit and the new child tax credit.

We also recognize that many families need child care spaces. We are transferring an additional $250 million per year to the provinces and territories to help them create more child care spaces. We are implementing a tax credit for businesses that create child care spaces for their employees and the surrounding community.

The Government of Canada also concentrates its efforts on supporting the most vulnerable members of society, many of whom are women. Housing in this area is fundamental. To this end, we have designated close to $270 million for a new homelessness partnering strategy.

As well, the federal government is investing $256 million in support of CMHC's renovation programs over the next two years. This renovation funding will help improve the living conditions of some 38,000 households, including single women, both with and without children, seniors, and persons with disabilities. Aboriginal people and others in need across Canada will also be included among those who will benefit.

In addition, the one time investment of $1.4 billion to create three provincial-territorial trusts will help Canadians, including many women and children, to find safe and affordable housing. We are also implementing a $300 million first nations housing fund which will facilitate up to 25,000 housing units on reserve over 10 years.

Finally, it is common knowledge that women have a longer time to enjoy their senior years. The Government of Canada helps to ensure that men and women have the opportunity to enjoy a high quality of life in their elder years. In addition to the old age security and Canada pension plan which provide income security for Canadians in their retirement years, we have established the new National Seniors Council. It is a fulfillment of our commitment to establish a body to advise the government on seniors issues of national importance, particularly health, well-being and quality of life.

The council works with other levels of government and all concerned and informed stakeholders to develop a national approach to these important issues. Its mandate is to help ensure that federal government policies, programs and services continue to meet the evolving needs of seniors today and in the future.

The National Seniors Council is just one avenue the Government of Canada is using to improve the lives of older Canadians. Another is through our $10 million expansion of the new horizons for seniors program committed to in budget 2007. This program funds community based organizations for projects led by seniors. It is a grassroots approach. The purpose is to encourage older persons' contributions and to enhance well-being in the community through seniors sharing their skills, experience and wisdom. It is a great program.

The program ensures that individuals have the opportunity to participate and to enhance their well-being in their community.

This is an especially valuable outlet for the many older women who feel isolated and lonely to remain active and contributing members of their society.

The actions we have taken on a wide variety of fronts, from labour policy initiatives and tax reform to child care, housing assistance and programs for seniors, demonstrate the Government of Canada's continued strong commitment to providing effective meaningful support to all Canadian women and men.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as a member of the committee, the hon. member has worked with us and has heard the presentations from various organizations and groups at our hearings. We heard from the Canadian Teachers' Federation. Rural women, first nations and Inuit women and immigrant and visible minority women made presentations.

There are some things that are common to all of those groups, one of which is child care which allows women to participate in the workforce and helps them to become financially secure, and another is literacy. In both areas the government campaigned on cuts to and the elimination of a national child care program. It has been two years now. Essentially many spaces have not been created. The $1,200 does not do it because it gives parents absolutely no choice. It is taxed back in any case, so it is not $1,200. The amount announced earlier by one of the member's colleagues of somewhere over $200 million, is not even close to the $5 billion the provinces were receiving and up to the $10 billion which was committed in the last election by our party.

For literacy it is the same thing. Businesses in this country want literacy back. There were cuts to literacy. Women need those programs.

Could the hon. member explain why the government is doing contrary to what the women essentially asked for at the hearings?

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, certainly the hon. member has been a very vocal and engaged member of the committee on the status of women.

The fact of the matter is that the universal child care benefit, the program that this government promised in election 2006 and which it has since delivered, is the most meaningful, direct benefit to women and families right across the country. It involves far more money than was ever contemplated under the previous Liberal regime. Maybe I will correct that. The Liberals contemplated doing it, but they did not get it done. They talked about doing it but one's track record is based on what one does, not what one plans to do.

[Kevin Sorenson, Conservative, Crowfoot, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for his speech today and certainly he made some very good points. We appreciate his work.

What Canada promises to all of its citizens is opportunity. What Canada promises to those who come to this country is opportunity. Not always is the outcome successful in new ventures but we try to provide equal opportunity for all who come to this country, regardless of their gender.

In Afghanistan, women have been given some of rights that they had never been able to have in the past. Women now represent 25% of that country's parliament. Women are back in schools.

I wonder if the member would comment as to how Canada is helping the rights of women in that country.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, certainly the experience in Afghanistan speaks for itself. We see a segment of Afghan society rising to the occasion with the support of Canada and 36 other countries from the international community that are helping to make that country stronger and to rebuild that country so that people there can enjoy the kind of peace and security Canadian women and Canadian families right across Canada have come to enjoy for many years.

There is nothing better than Canada, in keeping with its history of this kind of work in dangerous places in the world. We are going to keep doing that.