Mr. Speaker, we all want poverty to be eliminated in our country and women have been at the front line of poverty, no question. When women are paid less because there is no proactive federal pay equity legislation, they are the ones who drop out of the workplace to look after kids or elders, with no universal affordable child care. They end up taking the brunt of family care and get into more precarious and part-time work. We have been calling on the government to reform EI legislation and it has not. It would have helped women in precarious work have more of a social safety net.
I cannot let my colleague's comment about pay equity go unanswered. CUPE says its members have been waiting decades for federal proactive pay equity legislation and, “Based on this legislation, it appears women could be waiting until 2027 for a full remedy. We urge the government to...ensure that women's equality rights are no longer denied.” I moved 20 amendments to the budget implementation act in the finance committee, putting forward the exact amendments that the Ontario Pay Equity Coalition, CUPE, the Teamsters and the Canadian Labour Congress proposed, detailed amendments under tight timelines because the government has rammed through the budget implementation act and, therefore, the pay equity bill at every step of the way and the Liberals voted every amendment down. How do they answer that?