Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from London—Fanshawe for bringing these recommendations back to the House. This resonates especially strongly for me as I hear of the child care resources and referrals centre being cut and child care costs being passed on by the provincial governments because of the cancellation of the federal-provincial agreements.
Last year when these cuts were announced, we should have been celebrating Canada's ratification of the UN Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women. Instead, we mourned the impact of the Conservative government's decisions regarding pay equity, regarding the cuts to the court challenges program, the cuts to child care, the cuts to Status of Women Canada, the cuts to literacy and so many other social issues, this, despite the UN's concern with Canada's compliance in these very areas.
In 2003 the UN made a number of recommendations that we should reassess the gender impact of anti-poverty measures and increase the effort to combat poverty among women; increase the funding for women's crisis centres and shelters; take additional measures to increase the representation of women in political and public life; expand affordable child care facilities--and we know what has happened to that; in fact they are diminishing--and accelerate the effort to eliminate discrimination against aboriginal women.
So much for modernizing and refocusing programs for women. All this talk on the Conservative side of the House about modernizing Status of Women Canada or modernizing women's programs brings to mind the image of the elephant in the chicken coop stomping around and shouting, “Each man for himself”, as he tramples on the chickens. All this talk of gender neutrality, gender neutral programs is a little far-fetched. The reality is the Conservatives have cut the programs.
I would like to speak specifically on the Conservatives' elimination of the mandate for advocacy. What does that mean exactly? The word “equality” was also removed from the funding mandate.
We know from the UN report there are many areas where women are still in a position of inequality. Child care has been mentioned often. We could talk about housing for single parent women who have unequal access. We could talk about political representation. Our party happens to have 41% women in our caucus. The Conservative government has 10.8%, and there is no indication of any program to improve that. There is a lot of work to be done around advocacy.
Last weekend I happened to be with young people at a conference to celebrate International Development Week. The focus was on promoting gender equity. One young woman spoke about a program that she was involved in, spearheading and promoting in Canada to have young women in Malawi become educated and escape the fate of poverty. It made me see the need to stress and highlight the importance that advocacy has had on their lives.
Even though Canada is certainly not Malawi, there are still huge inequities in Canada. Some of them have been pointed out, especially with respect to aboriginal women. In this House as we look at the sea of suits and ties, we can see that we have not by any means reached any level of equity.
We know that the largest number of single families are headed by women. We know that they are disproportionately poorer.
Status of Women Canada played a very key role in breaking down those obstacles and barriers, in working toward a more inclusive society by promoting gender equity and promoting the full participation of women in the economic, social, cultural and political life. This has been made more difficult by the Conservatives' decision to make cuts to Status of Women Canada.
Fortunately the young women who are following in our footsteps will not accept the kind of inequality the Conservatives would like to reserve for women.
I would like to read some statements made by a couple of young women at the VIDEA workshop and conference last week. One woman said, “We wish to achieve gender equity, including equal distribution of power and influence so women's contributions can be manifested worldwide. This can be achieved through education and understanding and politics”. Another woman said, “I dare to dream of a world building happy, healthy and hopeful communities through equal opportunities for all, listening to all voices, empowerment of all, encouragement and recognition of the individual and collective initiatives”.
Those are the words of the next generation. Those women will continue to oppose and speak against the kind of inequalities the Conservatives seem to want to perpetuate through their meanspirited cuts.
I would also like to come back to the word “equality” that was removed from the funding mandate, aboriginal women living in poverty, women generally working in non-standard jobs, the lack of child care spaces that would have allowed many single women struggling to make ends meet to access jobs.
I heard last week that in one case the fee of $900 for one child care space for a toddler was going to increase by at least $50 per month per child. Imagine paying that on a very modest salary. Imagine trying to make ends meet and really meet the needs of one's child. This is simply not realistic.
The Conservative facade of choice has simply been unmasked in British Columbia. Parents and child care providers have been meeting at town halls. They will meet again tomorrow in a rally to protest the lack of opportunity that the Conservative decision has led them to, the situation that women are now facing because of it.
Women will not accept that decision. They will continue to speak out against it, as we should continue to speak out against the cuts to Status of Women Canada. Without the support and the strong actions of organizations that are willing to speak out for the marginalized, for those who are struggling, it would have been very difficult to make the progress that we have made so far. It is because of women who have spoken out publicly that we have made progress. We are now in a situation where the government has taken a step backward. This must stop.
I ask all members to support these recommendations.