Status of Women committee  Good morning. Thank you for inviting YWCA Canada to contribute to this study. Since our founding in the late 1800s, YWCA Canada's member associations have provided essential programs and services to women and girls, including being the leading provider of employment programs for

Electoral Reform committee  Yes, I would agree that the electoral system alone is not the issue or the solution, but we've come to the conclusion that it is part of the solution. All of those other things matter. In particular, the travel matters, more so at the federal level. If you think of it tradition

Electoral Reform committee  Other strategies have been proposed. One is having funds available for women within a party. These funds are set aside to help women run for office because we know women on average have lower incomes, and they often don't have the same fundraising networks that men do. We've cert

Electoral Reform committee  I would agree on the issue of leadership. I think it's good for the government to think about where the country needs to get to. Also, you are talking about grassroots as if barriers and prejudices don't manifest at the community level. I think they do, so some encouragement to

Electoral Reform committee  Sorry, that's your suggestion? I hope not.

Electoral Reform committee  Yes, absolutely. I think so. As other people have pointed out—not today—you also need to look at how Parliament functions. Obviously, while women continue to do the majority of child care in the country, it's very difficult to be someone who is in a different city, say, four days

Electoral Reform committee  Yes, absolutely. We repeatedly talk to parliamentary committees about the need for a gender-based lens on all the work that you do. I think it would be of immense value to apply it in this process.

Electoral Reform committee  I think it was 62nd, but I can check, but in the sixties for sure. So there's obviously a huge disconnect there. There are very talented women who aren't getting elected one way or another. They aren't stepping forward, aren't getting through the processes, and aren't getting ele

Electoral Reform committee  Again, I haven't specifically studied what happened in Ontario, but I know that with the NDP the same policies apply at the provincial level as they do federally, so the same equity process would apply. We know that it encourages women to run when there is a woman leader in plac

Electoral Reform committee  It won't be if we make change at that level.

Electoral Reform committee  I gave you one example of a system that tends to result in more women getting nominated, where there's an equity process. I think that you have the power to set the rules for nominations.

Electoral Reform committee  You could set some kind of affirmative action rules around nominations. There have been suggestions in the past. When there were the subsidies for votes, there was a suggestion that you wouldn't be able to collect the government subsidy for votes—I know we don't have it anymore—u

Electoral Reform committee  The evidence isn't really clear that changing it alone won't do anything. The biggest factor to go with it, I think, is that you have a country that already believes in women's equality. I think if you had a country that didn't believe in women's equality and where women weren't,

Electoral Reform committee  I haven't studied it, in particular, but I would point out that they have two parties that are led by women, which would obviously encourage women to feel that they could legitimately run for office. You also hate to say this, but when an election is skewed to centre and centre-

Electoral Reform committee  Thank you. Good afternoon. I am Ann Decter. I am the director of advocacy and public policy at YWCA Canada. We appreciate the invitation to appear before the committee as the oldest and largest women's multi-service association in the country. The first YWCA was founded in 187