Mr. Speaker, I am young, but for my whole life, I have been concerned about the status of women in our society.
I myself have volunteered with various organizations to help improve women's lives economically, politically and socially. Obviously, as a woman, I find the motion before us today very meaningful because it touches the core of who I am and what I believe.
Status of Women Canada was a model of social development and support for women. That is, until the current minister, the member for Durham, arrived. Unfortunately, the minister's lack of leadership has turned it into an empty shell, completely lacking meaning and realism.
Status of Women Canada's three priorities no longer have meaning. Originally, those priorities were: improving women's economic autonomy and well-being; eliminating systemic violence against women and children; and advancing women's human rights. Those are still supposed to be the department's priorities.
To achieve those three priorities, Status of Women Canada worked to ensure that legislation, policies and programs advanced women's equality throughout the federal government; conducted gender-based analysis of legislation, policies and programs, and recommended changes to ensure that government decisions were of benefit to all Canadians, women and men equally; promoted the implementation of gender-based policy analysis throughout the federal government; promoted and monitored the progress of the status of women throughout the country; funded policy research and integrated the research findings into the policy development process; provided financial, technical and professional assistance to women's and other voluntary organizations at community, regional and national levels, to support actions which advanced women's equality; and collaborated with provincial and territorial governments, international organizations and other countries, women's organizations, and other stakeholders, to address women's equality issues.
Unfortunately, all of this work is now compromised because of the actions of the Conservative government, the member for Calgary Southwest and the Minister of Status of Womenand member for Durham.
Since 1973, the Women's Program has been providing funding for women's organizations and equal rights organizations. Its mandate is clear: to support action by women’s organizations and other partners seeking to advance equality for women by addressing women’s economic, social, political and legal situation. This support includes financial support and technical support, such as linking different groups that share a common goal, helping groups gain access to various parts of the government, or providing access to resource materials and tools that help organizations to work more effectively.
This program distributed $10 million every year for projects to improve the economic situation of women, to eliminate systematic violence against women and to achieve social justice.
In response to all this work, often performed by thousands of women and men volunteering their time, the Conservative government imposed administrative cuts totalling more than $2.5 million for two years, or $5 million. Does the minister still believe that this is just trimming the fat? This cut of $5 million has led to the closure of 12 of 16 regional offices, which means eliminating fundamental regional expertise concerning knowledge of various local realities.
It is crucial that front-line organizations have the support they need, as well as a listening ear and understanding on the part of the program and Status of Women Canada, without which their task will be considerably more difficult. This could be very discouraging for many people. In this regard, the end of the National Association of Women and the Law organization is a loud wake-up call.
Indeed, the role of regional officers is to establish strong ties among local organizations to support them in their work for women.
Eliminating these offices and concentrating decision making in four major centres will only mean less knowledge of the needs of women's groups and will leave groups in the affected areas feeling abandoned.
This is just one example of the long-term effects these cuts will have. When we consider the report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, it is easy to see that the minister does not care about her parliamentary colleagues' opinion.
On May 12, the committee, which I have sat on since I was re-elected in January 2006, adopted its third report, which called for 10 actions by the government. Here are the 10 recommendations.
Recommendation 1 reads as follows:
The Committee reiterates the recommendation made in its 10 February 2005 report, calling on the federal government to increase funding to the Women’s Program at Status of Women Canada by at least 25% for investments in women’s groups and equality seeking organizations.
Yet the Conservative government cut 20% of Status of Women Canada's total budget, in addition to eliminating the court challenges program, to ensure that no women's advocacy group would ever have the means to challenge the government in court.
“Many women’s organizations today are financially fragile because they depend on a web of unpredictable, short-term, targeted project funds”, the Child Care Coalition of Manitoba told the committee.
It is crucial to provide these organizations with core funding so that they have the minimum they need to operate and are freed of the stress that comes from the fear of losing their funding.
Recommendation 2 reads as follows:
That Status of Women Canada immediately take advantage of the ongoing review of the Women’s Program to revise the funding to organizations by introducing a mix of core funding and project funding.
The groups that participated in the roundtables organized by the committee on May 3 and 10, 2005, agreed that there was a need for both project funding and core funding. They told the committee that sustaining funding allows them to cover infrastructure costs and to leverage more funding.
Recommendation 3 reads as follows:
That the Government of Canada, through its central agencies, ensure that all new and renewed funding programs incorporate the commitments undertaken by the Government of Canada in the Code of Good Practice on Funding, particularly the commitment to “reach decisions about the funding process through collaborative processes”.
Recommendation 4, which is related to the previous recommendation, reads as follows:
That Status of Women Canada take advantage of the current evaluation of the Women’s Program to implement new funding processes which could position Status of Women Canada as a leader in the application of the Code of Good Practice on Funding.
The Coalition for Women's Equality said in committee that, “Change is necessary, it must come soon. The particulars of a formula require a coast to coast conversation amongst women’s groups at all levels to come to an understanding of what will foster the achievements of equality guarantees in Canada”.
It is very important to involve equal rights organizations in the valid consultation process on the direction of funding under the Women's Program.
Recommendation 5 reads:
That Status of Women Canada immediately engage equality-seeking organizations in meaningful consultation to determine future directions for the Women’s Program.
Sharon Taylor, executive director of Wolseley Family Place, said, “Who wants to do this job any more? We’re supposed to be manager of the project, we’re supposed to find funds, we’re supposed to do the front line work, and the list goes on. When does it end?”
We have to prevent the turnover of staff and provide staff with competitive levels of compensation which recognize the valuable contribution of the voluntary sector.
The Canadian Council on Social Development noted that, “if an organization does not price what it sells in such a way as to completely cover all of its costs, it will soon cease to exist”.
Recommendation 6 reads:
That Status of Women Canada develop fair and consistent practices which recognize the indirect costs to be covered by Women’s Program funding, and that these practices be developed in collaboration with equality seeking organizations.
Most witnesses indicated that they wished to avoid at all costs the financing models that would pit organizations against one another in order to obtain their share of the increasingly limited funding.
Recommendations 7, 8 and 9 read:
That Status of Women Canada work with other federal government departments to raise awareness about the importance of funding gender projects relevant to the funding mandates of those departments.
That Status of Women Canada explore eligibility criteria for Women’s Program funding through meaningful consultation with equality seeking organizations.
That Status of Women Canada act now to enter into funding agreements for a minimum period of three years.
Funding issues are clearly very important to equality seeking organizations throughout the country. All comments are along the same lines. Funding of groups that promote women's rights must be increased by at least 25%. These organizations should receive core funding and local realities should also be taken into account.
Recommendation 10 reads:
That the Standing Committee on the Status of Women be granted intervenor status in the ongoing review of the Women’s Program to ensure that the comments contained in this report are appropriately reflected in the review process.
The collaboration of women's groups and equality seeking organizations is vital to the development of a new Women's Program funding mechanism.
Although women are considered equal before the law, the reality remains quite different. Even today, they earn only 71% of a man's salary for a full-time job. More than 50% of women who are single, widowed or divorced and over 65 years old live in poverty.
Although women make up over 50% of the population, we hold only 21% of the seats in this House. While women make up only 11% of the Conservative caucus, there are three times more women in the Bloc caucus.
Here is an argument that will surely be easy to understand and may even reach the Conservatives because it involves money. Violence against women costs an estimated $4.2 billion per year in direct and indirect costs related to the justice system, health care, social services and loss of productivity. Status of Women's budget, which represents a small fraction of those costs, is actually an investment in prevention. If they would have us believe that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, they should probably increase Status of Women's budget.
In conclusion, I would like to emphasize that the Bloc Québécois finds the cuts to Status of Women troubling and indicative of how important this government thinks women are. The Bloc Québécois is asking the government to backtrack and cancel cuts to Status of Women. Those cuts were not really about saving money; they happened because of the government's fiercely ideological approach, which is not in line with Quebeckers' values.
Cutting Status of Women's funding and sabotaging its mandate will probably lead to the disintegration of the very organization that is in a position to make things happen.
I am waging this battle from within a party, the Bloc Québécois, that supports Quebec sovereignty. Until Quebec becomes a country, it will have to live with decisions made by the Canadian majority, even though they are not in line with its own ambitions.
The Bloc Québécois has always stood up for women's rights and will continue to do so. It is clear that this government is reactionary and misogynistic. The Bloc will always stand up to the government to protect women's rights until the day we become independent.