Debates of Feb. 12th, 2007

Status of Women

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, like my colleague before me, I heard a list of things that the government has purportedly done for women.

What tangible progress has been made to advance the needs of women in regard to proactive pay equity legislation, the needed new child care spaces and affordable housing?

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned in my remarks, through programs that are offered through the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, on the question of social housing, I touched on a couple, such as 633,000 households across Canada supported through funding programs that help provide access to affordable housing. In addition, there is a $1.4 billion grant, new funds that are available specifically for that purpose.

As I said before, the key focus is to get public dollars into the hands of community groups that understand where the needs really are. We see that through programs through Status of Women Canada, the additional $5 million that is coming on board as of April 1, 2007. No money has been lost on this, but we are making sure that public dollars are not siphoned off and consumed at a national level where, for many years, they have not been getting down to where the dollars are mostly needed.

We are going to continue that focus. It is a theme that this government supports. We will continue to do it. It is a benefit to all women in Canada.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my colleague on his excellent overview of what the government is doing in addressing the needs of women.

I was in Montreal a couple of weeks ago and I happened to pick up a copy of the Montreal Gazette. An article caught my attention. It was about how well women are doing in some sectors. The article was part of a series called “Women learn better, faster”. It talked about how women dominating at universities and it listed statistics for both McGill and the University of Montreal. For a point of information, the percentage of women in medicine is 60.6%; in law, 53.6%; in dentistry, 54.6%; in architecture, 66.9%; in science, 52.3%; even in agriculture and environmental science, 68.4%; in commerce, 52.9%, in education, 78.9%; in nursing 96.7%; and in occupational therapy, 89.6%. At the University of Montreal the percentage of women in medicine is 71%; in law, 62.9%; and in dentistry, 64%.

We want to acknowledge that women are doing very well in some ways, but we know there are other women who are facing challenges. The member accurately pointed out that we are dealing with situations on reserves and what we are doing to help with real property rights on reserves.

I want to ask the member about a particular project I heard mentioned but I did not get details about. I think it was a new program in Prince George called the New Hope Society that was receiving funding. This program helps women to get out of prostitution. The member is on the committee, and I wonder if he has any information about the success of this program.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the program is one, if not the first, program to be approved under the new terms and conditions of Status of Women Canada. It is particularly important because it deals with issues around sexual slavery, the very issues that our committee dealt with in depth this past fall.

We saw the worst set of conditions that could impact the plight of women, not just women born here in Canada, but those who come to Canada for completely proper and economic reasons to build a future but inadvertently find themselves in conditions where they are forced into slavery through organized crime and through contacts who deceive them.

As I referred to earlier, this program gets support to the people who need it most, just like the temporary visa program and all of the financial supports that are there. We are going to continue to work on this. I would agree with the hon. member that women are doing very well in Canada, but I would underline that we still have more work to do. We will continue to do that.

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

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member referred to immigrant women and programs, language training and so on.

I wonder if the hon. member knows that one of the reasons women are getting into the English as a second language programs is that in 1986 or thereabouts when the former Conservative government was in power, I was part of a national group of women who initiated a charter challenge because under that government immigrant women were not eligible for English as a second language. Only men were allowed to apply for that program because it was assumed that men were the head of the household. If it had not been for the advocacy role and the research done by women on the ground who forced the government's hand to eventually back-off, it would never have happened.

I ask the hon. member again, why is the government so convinced that because equality is a word that appears in the charter somewhere it is a de facto reality in women's lives when it is not? Why have we delisted equality provisions from the criteria? It is not just the funding of the advocacy organizations. I would like the hon. member to tell me because the criteria as I read it said that Status of Women Canada is responsible for promoting the equality of women in Canada and that is gone completely now.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the point is that for the very reasons that the member outlines I was particularly pleased and proud to see that in the new terms and conditions for funding of the women's program, there are three specific areas, one of which is a focus on funding visible minorities and immigrant women. There is an understanding of where the needs are, what the history is, and that there needs to continue to be a focus on that type of funding. We are glad to see it there in the new terms and conditions.

[Hedy Fry, Liberal, Vancouver Centre, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for St. Paul's.

I stand here in support the third report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, but why am I not surprised that the new Conservative, new, neo, whatever we want to use as the term, government has presided over the gutting of women's programs. It has closed 12 out of 14 status of women's offices and cut by over 50% the funding of women's groups which will happen in the next fiscal year.

I am not surprised because we saw this happen in 1989 under another Conservative government when women's programs were cut by 25%.

It is not simply the cutting of women's programs. I think the hon. member for Beaches—East York asked a very important question. She asked, “Why is it that in this new iteration of this new Conservative government, the word equality has been taken out of the mandate of the Status of Women Canada?”.

I would like to know why because the whole issue is about the equality of women. Women we know are some of the most vulnerable in our society.

Let me tell the House and these are not my statistics. They come from Statistics Canada. They come from university studies everywhere. We know that of those who suffer domestic violence or family violence and who are kidnapped, 98% of persons whom this happens to are women; 47% of single families are headed by women and these are poor families; one in every three seniors lives in poverty; and women in Canada who in spite of their education are making 71¢ for every $1 that a man makes. We know that the United Nations speaks always of the feminization of poverty. Women are unequal.

We listen to this concept and the language that it is all wonderful and generic, and that we are doing things for families, and families are important. However, we fail to recognize that in today's society families come in different sizes and in different shapes. The families that are headed up by single parents who are women are the poorest in our society. These are the most vulnerable.

When a government decides that it is going to trim the fat and it does so on the backs of the most vulnerable in our society, one has to ask oneself, what is the agenda of a particular government like this? We know that aboriginal women, for instance, are the poorest, the lowest in health status and the largest number of victims of violence in our society. Yet the Kelowna accord was cancelled.

We hear talk on the one hand of all the wonderful things that are being done, and as I pointed out earlier on, these were sort of iterations of programs that we had already put in place. We heard another member stand from the new Conservative government and speak about all of the wonderful gains that women have made in society. Those gains were hard fought. They were hard won gains. They came after 13 years of solid programs put in by the previous government which increased funding that was cut by the Conservative government. In 1989 we increased that funding in order to provide for programs and projects for women.

We left advocacy as a key cause. We hear a lot about advocacy as if it is a bad thing. Advocacy is important for any vulnerable group, any group that is not able to speak out for itself. Advocacy is public education. Advocacy brings the truth and the facts home, so that people, governments and policy makers understand the status of that particular group. That is what advocacy is for.

Women need a voice. Women's voices have not been heard. It was only in 1960 that aboriginal women got the vote. It was only 1929 that women were considered to be persons in this country. We have not come such a long way. We continue to fight.

Pay equity was something that came about in the last Liberal government. We brought about pay equity. We took to the United Nations terms of diversity and the differences in women's status that come not only from there gender but from their race, language, ethnicity and sexual orientation. We talked about how important it was to analyze the impacts of that difference on society.

Women are not simply men in a dress. Women are different. We are anatomically different. We are physiologically different and we are psychological different. That very difference has created extraordinary barriers that are very difficult for women to have to deal with.

One of those barriers comes from simply having children. We know that has in fact created the system in which women are making 71¢ to the dollar because women lose lifetime earnings when they drop in and out of work in order to care for their children.

If it were not for the Liberals who put in, away back in Pierre Trudeau's day, the issue of that seven years off for child rearing so women could continue their lifetime earnings and have some kind of CPP when they retire, we would have more than one in every three senior women living in poverty in this country.

I just do not get the government's whole idea of cutting by 50% women's programs. Why? We, as a Liberal government, brought in something called gender based analysis. I heard one of the members speaking about how women's equality and women's programs are not only about the Status of Women Canada. This is true.

Under gender based analysis, we had put in a fairly sizeable amount of money outside of the women's programs simply to create a swat team that would go into every department, get the aggregated data, and start analyzing the impact of public policy in each department on women and on men based on the reality of their lives. Because of that, we initiated a lot of changes. We realized that a lot of single mothers could not get a post-secondary education, so we created grants for them in one of our tax changes. That was a finance decision, a finance policy. Because women were the largest number of victims of violence, we realized that gender violence was an issue in terms of refugee status. Canada was the country that started that.

We looked at the issue of creating houses for women to find a place to go as a result of domestic violence. That was the money that was so proudly spoken of by an hon. member across as having come from his government, but that was brought in six years ago in order to fund half-way houses. It came up to $2 billion in order to help women to find a place to live so that they could escape violence and find a safe place to be.

These are the things that have changed things. We started up programs so that women could go into earth sciences. We created grants for that because we realized that women were not going into earth sciences. The gains that women seem to have made over the last few years have been gains that were brought in by programs that were gutted.

The hon. member, my colleague from Beaches—East York, was saying that one of the big changes came about because her organization, back in the 1980s, used the court challenges programs to bring forward the reality of their plight. That was advocacy. It was advocacy first and then seeking access under the law to make changes in public policy.

Many of the changes that women currently enjoy in our society came about because of the court challenges program set up by Pierre Trudeau, cancelled by the Conservative government, and brought back in by our government when it came into power in 1993. It has now gone, so women, women who are poor, immigrant women, no longer have that access to be able to change things for themselves, to be able to seek remedies through the courts. That program that was there for them has been gutted.

When the government talks about what it is doing for women, one has to wonder what exactly it means and what exactly it is talking about. There seems to be a word called “women” and the fact that I remember sitting in the House 15 years ago when the Reform Party spoke about the fact that women are a special interest group.

Mr. Speaker, 52% of our population are seen to be a special interest group and that has permeated all of the public policy.

Let us look at what was changed under the women's programs. First and foremost, we talked about cuts in 14 departments. We have cut 12 of them. The third largest city in Canada, Vancouver, no longer has a women's program. Yet, we know that in east Vancouver we have women who are the poorest, women who are being murdered daily because they are victims of violence. We see this, and yet Vancouver and British Columbia cannot have access any more to a Status of Women's office because that was cut. That was trimming the fat.

I am not surprised at this new Conservative, neo-Conservative government, making these changes, but I was a little surprised when the trimming of the fat occurred in the September 2006 fat trimming exercise in the House, and when the Liberals brought in a motion to decry this, to stop it in October, the New Democratic Party did not support that motion.

I am surprised that the NDP is now speaking out for these issues when it had an opportunity--

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Questions and comments. The hon. member for Kildonan—St. Paul.

[Joy Smith, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Mr. Speaker, as I listened to all this hyperbole, I heard quite clearly that the past government had A for announcements and D for delivery. We saw that in the child care program, pay equity, violence against women and matrimonial rights.

It took 13 long years to deliver programs and today I hear that all these were really the former Liberal programs and nothing to do with the new Conservative government. It was all Liberal programs.

Unfortunately, the Canadian public understood that after 13 years if there is not an A for delivery, it does not matter how many bags of money fly out of airplanes. It does not matter how many announcements are made. People want action and that is the difference here. The minister and the government have actually taken the precious taxpayers' money and put it straight into programs for women. Is the member opposite not supportive of that $5 million going directly to programs for women?

[Hedy Fry, Liberal, Vancouver Centre, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I suppose I should be happy that we have at least got something left in that program budget. The hon. member knows that her government has cut that budget by 50%, so to ask if I am not happy for a pittance, of course, people who are needy are happy for whatever crumbs are thrown to them.

The hon. member talks about child care and D for delivery. We signed agreements with the provinces. The word and bond of the federal government went into those signed agreements and they were broken. They were one of the first things that were nullified by the current government and it dares to speak about giving $100 a month to people and at the same time clawing it back by adding a half per cent to the lowest income bracket in the country.

Let us talk about rhetoric and talk about the facts. I think women's equality has been set back decades, into the dark ages, by the government.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for her intervention but I would like to set the record a little straight. When she talked about us not supporting a motion, it was a motion that actually did not talk about the true record of the Liberal government. One of the things I wanted to ask the member about was the Liberal government's failure to institute a gender based analysis in its budgets.

The group called FAFIA, the Feminist Alliance for International Action, did a detailed analysis of the budgets over 10 years that the Liberals had put forward and talked about the adverse impact for women. Let us just talk about employment insurance as one example, about how employment insurance legislation was not subject to a gender based analysis which meant that women actually lost benefits under that particular piece of legislation.

I wonder if the member could comment on why there was no gender based analysis done on successive budgets under the Liberal regime.

[Hedy Fry, Liberal, Vancouver Centre, BC]

Mr. Speaker, that is not true. Every single year gender based analysis was done on the budget by Status of Women Canada. Every single year we pointed out things that could have been done that were not done.

Obviously, as the House has heard before, some of the changes that we made were slow but they were made. There was the example of the whole issue of suggesting that child care was not done. We made child care for Inuits possible the day we came in because it was a fiduciary responsibility of the government. But we could not do it because it was a provincial jurisdiction and we had to wait until the provinces were ready to sign on the dotted line. Finally we got to that and it was cancelled with one stroke of the pen by the new Conservative government.

We moved forward on an increasing number of programs with gender based analysis. The government put aside a separate fund to specifically do gender based analysis on every single department. Every time something was brought to cabinet there had to be a piece of gender based analysis on the impact it would have on men and on women.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Mr. Speaker, first, I would like to thank the member for Vancouver Centre for all the work she did as minister responsible.

In response to the member for Nanaimo—Cowichan, I would like to inform her that every year during the budget, one of the most important analyses of the budget that we received was from the department when the member for Vancouver Centre was the minister. There was a conference call with all the women's groups around the country which resulted in a serious impact analysis of what the budget would and could do for women.

There is no question that we need to go further. Former minister Frulla appointed a very important committee to look at how we would do accountability on the gender issues across government, and that was an important report.

I think the debate today concerns whether we go forward or go back. The basic premise of good management is that if it is measured it gets noticed and if it gets noticed it gets done. However, unless we have good programs on the ground and government departments that work with one another to actually see how women are faring in this country we will not get it right.

I stand here today thinking about Saturday morning and having breakfast with Doris Anderson. Doris Anderson, to me, is a hero who, when she turned 80, reminded us all of when women needed somebody to co-sign a cheque, of when women could not get a mortgage and that we have come a long way.

What we are really worried about today, what people like Doris Anderson, Monique Bégin and even Flora MacDonald are seriously worried about is whether we are going to turn back the clock on the gains we have made.

Today we are being reminded that government reports to Parliament, not the other way around, and that when government reports to Parliament it means that when Parliament passes motions on things like child care, the Kelowna accord, the way in which aboriginal and immigrant women are living and the situations in which they find themselves, we must do better.

It is because of spectacular organizations that the member for Nanaimo—Cowichan mentioned, such as FAFIA and the National Association of Women and the Law, the kinds of organizations that have been funded by Status of Women Canada, that we have been able to be accountable, but it is also our international obligations with CEDAW and the United Nations' responsibilities that we as a country have signed onto and we as a country must fulfill.

Without the kind of funding that Status of Women Canada has been able to give and the kinds of organizations actually on the ground, it is impossible to get it right. It is instructive to look back at the importance that funding these women's groups have brought us. This funding is why women's equality still matters.

However, it is the government of the day that seems to have taken the word equality out of every aspect, every document and every website. It does not like the word equality and it is continuing to listen to organizations like REAL Women that has on its website “Women's rights but not at the expense of human rights”, whatever on earth that means, when we know from the great people like Irwin Cotler and Stephen Lewis that women's rights are human rights. If we cannot get women's rights correct and there is no real equality then we should be ashamed as a country that is supposed to be setting an example for the world.

In the panel report that I mentioned, entitled “Equality for Women: Beyond the Illusion”, released in July 2006, it reiterates the reality of the fact of how much more work we can do. I will quote from it as I think it is an extraordinary synopsis of where we are. The report states:

--many people think that we have truly achieved equality for women in Canada. Much as we would like it to be so, it is simply not the case. In 2005, only one in five members of Parliament is a woman. The same holds true in general across the legislatures of the provinces and territories. Girls are the victims of more than four out of five cases of sexual assault on minors. Four out of five one parent-families are headed by women. The employment income gap between male and female university graduates who work full time has widened. Women working full time still earn only 71 cents for every dollar that men make. Women do the large majority of the unpaid work in Canada. ...The most recent figures show that 38 per cent of Aboriginal women live in low income situations. So, too, do 35 per cent of lone mothers and 27 per cent of immigrant women. Immigrant women working full time earn 58 cents for every dollar earned by Canadian born men--

We are not there yet and it is so important when we look at the things that we fought for and won. It was because of things like the commission on the Status of Women and then the organizations that ended up being funded when we first began the women's programs in the Canadian government.

From maternity benefits to economic justice for wives to protect their matrimonial homes, the custody and access changes, the abolition of immunity for husbands raping their wives, criminalizing wife assault, amendments to the Indian Act, human rights statutes to prohibit sexual harassment and discrimination based on pregnancy and sexual orientation, the protection of therapeutic and confidential files of sexual assault survivors and the impact the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act has on the women, which is being studied by the minister.

It is important for us to understand, however, as that important report said, that we have way more to do in terms of the real poverty among women in general and in vulnerable groups of women in particular. It is also because of the double or triple discrimination of certain groups of women, particularly women of colour and aboriginal women, that we know we must continue to work hard.

We are looking at legal aid. We are looking at the idea of working with aboriginal women to find solutions to things affecting them. We are looking at working with immigrant women so they can be included in the solutions to problems, which they understand best, in their neighbourhoods. We are also looking at women's non-standard jobs, coherent and consistent measures dealing with human rights over mechanisms of partnership, affordable child care that we have heard so much about this afternoon in terms of how there cannot be equality until women have real choice as to whether they actually go to work, go back to school and know that their children have quality child care.

This is so sad when we think of the excellent report that was done by the standing committee. This is again about a government that refuses to listen to Parliament and refuses to listen to the work of committees. When we think of the 10 important recommendations in the report, as cited in the motion today, we have so much farther to go.

It is time for the women of Canada to be reminded of the progress we have made and to be reminded that if people deny that there needs to be this kind of work in terms of real equality, if people refuse to use the word equality, then they cannot move forward.

The cuts in funding to the Status of Women Canada saddens me but the unbelievable reality that certain groups in certain Conservative ridings have been quietly approached to find out if they need money for their shelter because they happen to be in a Conservative riding is also saddening. The department should be tackling this problem and assigning funds in a peer based and evidence based way with women and community groups to determine where the programs should go.

This cannot be a political football. It must be evidence based. We have tremendous experience in Status of Women Canada for the kind of evidence and programs that it has funded up until now. This is a terrible disgrace to our country internationally and we should be moving forward, not back.

[Joy Smith, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I know the member is very dedicated in many respects to women's issues.

I was interested in many aspects of her speech because the member opposite and her colleagues had 13 years, more than a decade, to do everything she talked about as she stood in the House today. In that time, the funding for programming was cut, not once, not twice but three times.

Today we are talking about a small amount to be put in to be conciliatory and support the kinds of positive things that are happening for women all over the country.

Again today the member mentioned day care.

Clearly, actions speak louder than words and our government has taken action to ensure that programs are provided for women. I am sure all members on all sides of the House want this to happen.

Going back to the day care, is the member against families receiving $100 per child for children under six years of age? Do you not think that parents now have the choice to use that money any way they want?

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

I would just remind the hon. member to ask questions through the Chair, not directly to other members.

The hon. member for St. Paul's.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Mr. Speaker, first, we are extraordinarily proud of the way that we were able to move the agenda steadily forward, too slow for a lot of us, but still steadily moving forward every day in spite of the cuts the previous Conservative government made to the women's programs in 1989.

I distinctly remember meeting in the office of the member for Vancouver South where all the women's groups were able to fight for the substantial increase that happened in the year 2000.

On the question of the $100, or whatever really ends up in people's pockets, which could be a lot less than that as they fill out their taxes this spring, it is a family allowance. We know that all the experts feel that it is not the best way to give a family allowance. Everybody feels that the national child benefit was the best way to get money to families.

One cannot imagine how offended I feel when I hear this being called a universal child care plan. This is the most ridiculous misnaming of a family allowance. There is no choice in child care when there are no spaces. When we go across this country and realize the lack of spaces here in Ottawa and across the country, the fact that those--

[Dave Batters, Conservative, Palliser, SK]

For 13 years you created no spaces.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Could we have that heckle on the record. This is again the kind of absolute untruth that the other side is doing.

In 13 years, we created lots of child care spaces--

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please. Members have lots of opportunity during questions and comments to ask the hon. member for St. Paul's questions or make comments. I would invite hon. members to do that during the questions and comments period and not while another member is speaking. We will try to finish off the rest of the debate with a little decorum.

The hon. member for Vancouver Centre on a question.

[Hedy Fry, Liberal, Vancouver Centre, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for all the work she has done over the years to improve women's equality in this country. She has been a very strong supporter of this issue.

I think the member for Kildonan—St. Paul asked a question about the tax benefit for children. Maybe the hon. member can refresh my memory. I think it was a Liberal government that brought in about $2,200 per child into something called the child tax benefit.

I also would like the hon. member to refresh my memory about what the child care spaces is about. Is it about babysitting or is it about looking at early learning and early childhood development?

If I recall, when I had three small children, if I wanted to go to a movie even in those days, and that was a long time ago, 30 bucks would not cover a babysitter for the night. When we take $100 and we pay the taxes on it and all we get is 60 bucks, I do not know what--

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

There is only a short period of time left for the hon. member for St. Paul's. I am going to have to cut off the hon. member for Vancouver Centre.

Order, please. The hon. member for St. Paul's.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in my mind reading, I think the member was going to ask me why achieving social justice was taken off the page. I do not know if the members opposite can spell it, let alone understand what it is.

In terms of social justice, as a family physician, when I delivered a baby, sometimes I was delivering it into a family that had everything, like the people across the way. Sometimes I was delivering a baby to a mom who was all on her own and who was going to need a lot of help from our community.

I am very concerned that the members opposite do not understand this. To put our community action programs—

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Nanaimo—Cowichan.

I will ask for a bit of order as we enter into the last hour or so of debate.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Victoria.

I start by thanking the member for London—Fanshawe for bringing this very important motion before the House. However, it is with some sadness that I am speaking about this motion.

I was part of the membership on the very first parliamentary Standing Committee on the Status of Women in 2004. During that period of time, we heard from women from coast to coast to coast on a variety of issues, including core funding for women's programs. They told us they were tired of being studied, they were tired of coming before Parliament cap in hand, asking for core funding for their organizations. Cutting core funding does not lie at the feet of the new Conservative government. The Conservative government is continuing on with the program that was started by the Liberals. In 2004 women were asking the then Liberal government to reverse its agenda on cutting core funding for women's programs.

In 2004-05 we also heard from women's organizations about things like the convention to eliminate discrimination against women. We heard about the government of the day being cited for its failure to support legal aid programs for women, for its failure to support aboriginal women in terms of access to a variety of programs and services and for its failure to provide adequate housing for women.

It is with sadness that I see this motion before us because it could have been dealt with in the previous Parliament. It asks for an increase in funding by 25% to the women's program at Status of Women Canada. It asks for a mix of core funding and project funding. The recommendations also talked about the position of Status of Women Canada as a leader in the application of the code of good practise on funding. They also state that Status of Women Canada should act now to enter into funding agreements for a minimum of three years. Why is this important for women's organizations?

There are a number of women's organizations in my riding, but two come prominently to mind. One is Women Against Violence Against Women, which is located in the Cowichan Valley, and the other is Women's Resource Centre in Nanaimo. Both of these organizations have to spend a significant amount of their time looking for funding. The executive directors and board members spend a lot of time fundraising and going to private donors. In the meantime, they are unable to fulfill their organization's mandate even though they attempt to do a good job. Time and energy should be put into delivering their mandates rather than constantly looking for funds. This also causes a great deal of instability within these organizations. The staff is committed to the issues facing women both in the community of Nanaimo—Cowichan and across this country. These women are often underpaid and work far more hours than is reasonable to get the job done.

We would really improve the lot of women in their communities if women's organizations had core stable funding to provide the necessary services.

Who sits at the table and who gets to make a decision is important. All parliamentarians are hard-working individuals, but women are not represented here in the numbers they should be. I looked at some research put forward in November 2006 by the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women. It indicated that women in Canada made up 50.4% of the population, but only 20.8% of the seats in the House of Commons. According to the United Nations, Canada ranks 30th in the world in terms of women representation in Parliament. We fall behind Sweden, Norway, Rwanda, Trinidad and Tobago, among other countries. The current governing party in the House of Commons fielded the fewest women candidates in the general election of 2006, with only 10% of its candidates being women.

These numbers have not budged in quite some time. We have been stuck around the 20% range for at least 10 years. One of the ways we can encourage women's participation in a parliamentary process is to ensure there is funding at the local level.

Before I was elected, I was pleased to participate in a project sponsored by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities. It looked at barriers to women in municipal politics. That was just not elected women, but in the whole process. Part of the report stated that there were many systemic barriers to women's participation, one barrier being around education and awareness. This is a role that women's organizations can play. One of the vital functions to which core funding can contribute is in education and awareness so women know what a political process looks like, so they understand how to get involved in that process and what it means to run for a variety of elected positions, school board, municipal and federal.

We would make far better decisions and more balanced decisions in the House if 50% of the representation in the House were women.

I heard some talk about how much women have achieved. Certainly they have achieved much over the last 25 or 30 years, but there is a significant gap. People talked about the fact that women were attending post-secondary institutions in increasing numbers and becoming professionally accredited in a number of areas. However, the economic reality is this, and I quote from the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women, the CRIAW Fact Sheet report. It states:

At every level of education, women in Canada earn less on average than men. For example, in 2003, women who are high school graduates earned 71.0% of what male high school graduates earned for full-time, full-year work.

The report goes on further about the ratios and states that in terms of the ratio of male to female earned income, the wage gap, Canada ranks 38th in the world behind countries like Cambodia, Kenya and the Czech Republic among others.

I spoke earlier about programs like employment insurance. Women have lost ground under programs like employment insurance. Women have been unable to qualify, for example, for maternity and paternity the way they used to under the old system.

On economic equality, in May 2004 the federal task force on pay equity released its comprehensive report which addressed the criticisms of current pay equity legislation. In the current context, on September 18, 2006, the federal government responded no, to the recommendations of a multi-year federal task force on pay equity as part of its response to the all party House of Commons standing committee.

On September 18, 2006, it responded no to the EI maternity-parental leave recommendations of the all party House of Commons standing committee.

We can start to see this theme emerge. We are undermining women's equality in this country. The current government took all mention of equality out of the terms and conditions of women's programs and changed the rules so women's organizations could no longer use federal funds to advocate for women's equality, including pressing for changes that will recognize the value and contribution women make in the paid workplace and in the home.

According to the 1984 Royal Commission on Equality in Employment, child care is the ramp that provides equal access to the workforce for mothers. Twenty-two years later that ramp has yet to be built.

I know a number of other members have talked about child care, so I will not talk about it for the moment, but I want to talk about legal aid. I come from British Columbia where legal aid has been slashed by the provincial government, but it was also partly in response to what has happened at the federal government level.

The CRIAW Fact Sheet talks about the fact that not everyone has equal access to the law. In the early 1990s the federal government capped its contributions to the provinces for legal aid and subsequently cut it significantly in the mid-1990s. This filtered down to the provinces, with cutbacks and restrictions about who would use legal aid and for what.

We are now faced with a situation where women do not have income equality. They do not have adequate access to child care, to housing and to legal aid.

We have this continuing step back from a women's equality agenda. Here we are in 2007. It is time for women to be able to take their rightful place at all levels in our country. They should have equal access in the paid workforce and in the elected processes.

I urge members of the House to support the motion on core funding. This will get to the very heart of allowing women to speak up and advocate for what should be rightfully theirs.