Mr. Speaker, a few years ago in New Zealand a member of Parliament named Marilyn Waring did a study on the value of work. The book was called If Women Counted: A New Feminist Economics. She followed that up with a documentary where she placed a value on home care, child care, doing the dishes, doing the laundry, and all kinds of things that were undervalued and not paid work in society. The documentary found that if those jobs that women do, or anyone does, that are unpaid in the home or outside, were added to the GDP, it would make a significant increase.
She also compared that to some of the things that create wealth in our society such as oil spills and accidents. For example, when an ambulance is called out to an accident, people are paid to clean up and things like that. These things are talked about as value for our economy because they create work. It was quite an interesting documentary. I just want to let the member know about it.
What we are suggesting here is that women who are working should be adequately compensated. We are talking about pay equity for already paid work. I hope the member and I can have a conversation about this at some other point.