Finance committee  I want to reinforce this. I talked about dealing with inequality through building stronger communities and social cohesion. Early learning and child care do that. Obviously, there are huge benefits and lots of evidence to support the benefit to kids of putting them in school earl

Finance committee  Good morning, everyone. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chair, for seating me beside Madame Smarty-pants here, because I get to take a different tack, knowing that Armine would bring forward a lot of great solutions and also help us dissect the numbers. I'm the head of the

Finance committee  Our policy choices are reduced to growth in GDP, our so-called standard of living, regardless of the benefits that are delivered for the well-being of average Canadians. Social needs and government responses are vilified as complex, costly, and muddled jurisdictionally. We can'

Status of Women committee  That's a great question. Discrimination starts early and it's often latent. It's not obvious. People don't set out to create barriers. Often the barriers are institutionalized or systemic. As women, you experience them and question it. Finding a high-quality child care place th

Status of Women committee  I think there was a concerted focus on putting more resources into those particular areas.

Status of Women committee  We could certainly pull that out. I could get our head of research to provide it.

Status of Women committee  I would guess it goes back to that gender lens that has been placed on social policy. If you think about some of the movements from academics and the research that started to point very concretely to where we needed to focus on creating those opportunities for young women.

Status of Women committee  If you haven't eaten and you're going to school, it's very likely that you're not going to be successful. By midday you won't have the capacity to learn and take in any more information. That's why I focused on the early years because if we don't give kids the right start, we'r

Status of Women committee  Yes, early learning and child care, housing, and making sure that people have the best start because they're living in a safe and affordable environment. Nutrition, getting the—

Status of Women committee  Young women need to see themselves in their environment. They need to see that there are opportunities, not by our telling them but by seeing them. So they need to see that their mothers are successful and not isolated. That's why I focus so much on the early years because imag

Status of Women committee  Thanks. Poverty is a big issue. We have to create opportunities for kids, and if I had to give a hit list of things I would tackle, education is a biggie. In Kenya, there are so many things that we could do, and we're doing a number of different things through my foundation.

Status of Women committee  Thank you, Madam Chair. It's great to be back in front of this committee this afternoon. As many of you likely know, CCSD has been around for 92 years. We call it the grande dame of social policy in Canada. CCSD has contributed significantly to building Canada's social infrastr

Status of Women committee  I think the one key issue, given the mandate of this committee, is to have question 33 not only re-added but also expanded. I think this is very critical. Given the mandate of this committee, I think that's a key recommendation.

Status of Women committee  Certainly. We are part of a very broad network in civil society. We also have partners in the private sector and at other levels of government. As we've been out doing work and connecting with partners, obviously this issue comes up on a regular basis. Some groups have indicate

Status of Women committee  It's the mandatory nature.