Mr. Speaker, today I rise with more sadness and concern than I have experienced in my 20 years in elected public office and my 30 years of fighting for women's equality.
Yesterday the Liberals gave a blank cheque to the Conservatives to kill pay equity. They sold out their principles. They let down the women of Canada. They decided to sacrifice pay equity on the altar of political expediency.
Pay equity goes to the heart of equality, human rights and civil liberties in this country. Equal pay for work of equal value is a fundamental right in Canada, and when that right has been denied, there has always been the option to seek justice through the courts. No more. That fundamental right is now gone with the Conservatives.
We fought for and won this battle decades ago, with the Manitoba NDP government under Howard Pawley being the first government in Canada to legislate pay equity, to proactively implement it while maintaining the human rights complaint mechanism.
For Conservative hack Tom Flanagan to compare women's rights to polyester leisure suits is beyond insulting. It is discriminatory, sexist and misogynist.
I say to the Conservatives that they should publicly renounce these offensive comments and stop their attack on women.