:
Thank you, Madam Chair.
[English]
Thank you to the committee for inviting me to be here today to discuss the main estimates and supplementary estimates (C) for Status of Women. I would like to thank all of you right off the bat for the great work you do on behalf of women and on this committee.
I'm joined by Suzanne Clément, our coordinator and the head of agency at Status of Women Canada, and Johanne Tremblay, our chief financial officer.
[Translation]
Our government is committed to bettering the lives of women and girls in communities across Canada.
[English]
Since 2007, I am happy to report to the committee, our government has now funded more than 600 new projects from coast to coast that support women and girls through the women's program at Status of Women Canada. Today, I know it would be important for you to know that almost half of this funding has focused specifically on ending violence against women and girls.
We've increased funding now to the women's program to its highest level ever. As you have seen in the main estimates, we are maintaining this level of funding.
I'm also happy to inform the committee that in the next fiscal year, Status of Women Canada will continue to focus on three priority areas that I know are also important to this committee: ending violence against women and girls, increasing women's economic security and prosperity, and encouraging women's leadership and democratic participation.
We have made a serious and strong commitment to ending violence against women and girls. We're taking action to protect the most vulnerable women in Canadian society: women in immigrant communities, women who are living in poverty, and aboriginal women and girls.
Over the last year, Status of Women has issued a number of calls for proposals that address this serious issue. These targeted calls have allowed us at Status of Women to focus on emerging and urgent issues and to expand our reach across the country and build relationships with new organizations, and at times we've been able to take a national approach to some of these issues. For example, our government is currently supporting 21 projects across Canada that are working to end violence against women on university and college campuses. These projects are addressing a wide range of issues, such as sexual assault and sexual harassment, and they are innovative because they're led by students themselves.
I'd also like to inform the committee of our most recent calls. We asked communities to work together to address violence against women and girls in four key areas: preventing and reducing violence against women and girls in high-risk neighbourhoods; preventing and reducing violence against women and girls in the name of so-called "honour"; preventing and reducing the trafficking of women and girls through community-based planning, to support our national action plan to combat human trafficking—there are 16 departments involved in that plan, and Status of Women is one that's supporting it—and engaging men and boys in ending violence against women and girls.
It's no coincidence that Canada's theme this year for International Women's Week 2013 was entitled “Working Together: Engaging Men to End Violence against Women”; that reflects one of our key areas. We believe that violence against women is an issue for all Canadians to address, women and men and girls and boys alike. We must all be part of the solution.
This is an innovative approach, and it has not only led to a call for proposals, but has already led to some really exciting and interesting projects. Nationally, we have supported the work of Canada's White Ribbon Campaign, which focuses on educating men and boys and raises public awareness to end violence against women and girls. We have also partnered with the Ending Violence Association of British Columbia and their innovative "Be More than a Bystander" campaign, which involves high-profile male sports figures educating young boys that violence against women and girls is not acceptable.
In addition, our government recently launched the End Violence Against Women and Girls resource website, which has information related to this specific topic. I would urge you to take a look at it and to share the website with as many people as you can. It's at women.gc.ca/violence.
We are committed to ending violence against women, not only at home but abroad. Two weeks ago, I led the Canadian delegation to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, at which we focused our discussion on ending violence against women and girls, with many other countries. I co-hosted panels, with the United States specifically and also with Canadian non-governmental organizations, on violence committed in the name of so-called "honour", and as well on engaging men and boys in violence prevention.
I was pleased to be joined as well by Manitoba's minister responsible for the status of women, and by many other provincial ministers, at the panel on engaging men and boys in violence prevention. During the panel, we highlighted the Government of Manitoba's and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers' own “Be More than a Bystander” campaign. Using EVA BC's innovative model, which I mentioned earlier, the Government of Manitoba and the Blue Bombers are now also working together to engage men and boys to prevent violence against women and girls.
The second panel, on violence committed in the name of so-called "honour", was also very productive and well attended. It included international experts from Great Britain and the United States and Canada's own Aruna Papp, with whom many of you are familiar, who was part of our own Canadian delegation.
Of course, our government has made our position clear on the topic of violence committed in the name of so-called "honour" by clearly condemning the practice in our new citizenship guide, but also by being the first government to provide funding specifically for immigrant women's organizations across the country while they tackle this very complex issue.
At the UN we also endorsed the COMMIT initiative put forward by UN Women asking governments everywhere to be part of global efforts aimed at ending violence against women and girls.
[Translation]
Our government recognizes that women's safety goes hand in hand with their economic prosperity.
[English]
In fact, economic insecurity prevents women from leaving abusive relationships, unsafe neighbourhoods, and substandard housing. It also prevents women and girls from developing their skills, furthering their education, and advancing their careers. At Status of Women Canada this means advancing women in leadership roles in all sectors of our society and increasing their economic security. Last year we issued calls for proposals across the country for projects that encourage girls' leadership and work to increase the economic prosperity of women in rural and remote communities.
In addition, through our economic action plan 2012, we are creating an advisory council of leaders from the public and private sectors to promote the participation of women on corporate boards. As McKinsey and Company, Credit Suisse, Catalyst, and others have made clear, businesses with more women on their boards are more profitable and routinely outperform those with fewer women. The council will help us increase the number of highly qualified women directors. In so doing, we will raise the profile of Canadian women's corporate excellence and leadership.
Such women leaders can also serve as role models and mentors, inspiring young women to set their sights on acquiring the education and skills they need for future success and prosperity. It's clear that increasing opportunities for women to serve on corporate boards makes good business sense for Canadian women and for Canada's economy.
So as we move forward Madam Chair, our government remains committed to ending violence against women, increasing their economic prosperity, and encouraging their leadership.
This year, as you've probably noted, $29.6 million is being allocated to Status of Women Canada through the main estimates. The majority of this funding allocation will be for grants and contributions under the women's program. Supplementary estimates (C) reflect a transfer of $83,333 from the Department of Justice to help fund a project by the Centre d'expertise en agression sexuelle Marie-Vincent that will serve victims of sexual abuse. This funding will enable us to add to our growing list of promising initiatives that help create positive, concrete change for women and girls in every region of our country.
[Translation]
Thank you, Madam Chair. I would be pleased to answer any questions you may have.
[English]
Thank you very much for your attention and for giving me the opportunity to share with you some of the great work that Status of Women Canada is doing.
:
Sure. If I could, I'll focus on the issue around engaging men and boys, because that was one of the areas we focused on when we were at the UN.
The first time we went to the UN to hold a round table on this issue, there was some interest, but to be honest, not a lot. A year later, we saw Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the UN, create a special committee of male leaders from all over the world to take a stand on ending violence against women and girls. I think engaging men and boys is not only timely, it's essential, so I was really pleased to see the work that was being done not only here in Canada but of course all over the world.
We do believe very strongly—I think all of us do on this committee, and in the House—that this is an issue for all of us. The reality is that men are the perpetrators of violence against women and girls, but the majority of them are good, and they want to help. I think the reality is that a lot of men don't quite know how to participate. Finding ways to involve them in the conversation is really important, because they are mentors, they are fathers, husbands, brothers. They have influence. They're 50% of the population. We need as many allies as we can get on this issue.
The women's movement has led this issue for decades, and that's the way it will continue to be, but we do need men to take a more active role. We need men to step up and speak out on these issues. If they see something, or if they know of something, we need it so that they aren't afraid to speak out. I think that resonated very well with the work being done at the UN, and seeing some of the projects coming forward to Status of Women are really important.
I do want to make the point also that with these kinds of projects, it's important that women's organizations remain involved. What we don't want to have happen is to lose all the great work that women's organizations have done on this issue. They're the ones who have advocated and provided great research, and are doing the front-line service provision.
So the way that we have structured the call for proposals is that men's groups, if they are men's groups, or organizations like the Y, for instance, that may want to work on projects, have to involve women's organizations. I think that's important, because it creates that dialogue that we really need to have happen.
I would say there's a lot of work being done. I mentioned EVA in British Columbia. The flagship project that EVA BC is doing with the BC Lions is called “Be More Than a Bystander”. It has iconic football role models or athletes going into schools, making hundreds of visits into schools, to talk to girls and boys, but specifically targeting the boys about ending violence against women. It's an innovative idea. These are men that the boys look up to. They listen to what they say when they come into the classroom.
That has spurred another program in Manitoba, with the Manitoba government and the Blue Bombers.
The idea is to open up the conversation and look for innovative ideas.
In Brantford, Ontario, the Nova Vita women's shelter has a male-led project to engage male and female students in at-risk schools in promoting awareness of domestic violence against women and girls.
There's also one in London, Ontario, that we're supporting, an initiative called “Changing Ways”. It engages youth aged 12 to 15 and their parents to end gender-based violence and bullying.
There's also a great one in New Brunswick that the YWCA is working on with young girls and boys.
The idea is to look at this from a more holistic point of view, to ensure that boys at a young age know that they also have a responsibility and obligation, and to talk about healthy relationships. I think this is a very important aspect, and an essential aspect, of the conversation to end violence against women and girls moving forward.
:
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Ms. Ambrose, welcome to this committee. We hope to see you again at our committee very soon and as often as possible.
Madam Minister, the United Nations is one thing, but last night, at a meeting of the NDP women's caucus, we had with us Michèle Audette, the President of the Native Women's Association of Canada. She did not see things as you do, in that she was saying that, before getting men and boys involved, it is necessary to provide basic, essential services, including a shortage of 10,000 homes in first nations communities.
Here are my questions for you.
The Main Estimates 2013-2014 show a transfer from Justice Canada to Status of Women Canada. It is intended to strengthen the development of knowledge for aboriginal service and resource deliverers so that they can better deal with the problems of sexual violence against women in their communities. The funding of projects designed to improve the lives of women and girls is very important.
Given the seriousness of the problem of sexual violence against first nations women, is Status of Women Canada recommending a national inquiry on missing or murdered aboriginal women?
We work with a number of different departments. If a project, for instance, doesn't fit within our mandate, we work with that group to try to get funding for it through another department. We work very closely in particular with Aboriginal Affairs on projects related to aboriginal women and girls, and with Justice Canada on issues related to violence against women and girls through their Victims Fund.
So, for instance, in this project they transferred money to us. They thought it made more sense for us to manage this project, so they transferred some funds to us. This is consistent with the Government of Canada's objective through our blue ribbon panel to streamline the way that we effectively manage our programming. It made more sense for Status of Women to deliver this project. This project is...you're probably familiar with it, the Centre d'expertise Marie-Vincent. It was approved in March of last year as a 36-month project that is basically around the development of knowledge for aboriginal service deliverers on the issue of sexually assaulted girls. The project is going to develop expertise of service delivery professionals in aboriginal communities in Quebec to better serve aboriginal girls who have been victims of sexual abuse.
Status of Women's contribution itself for the project is $380,000, but Justice's contribution is $250,000, so that means $83,333 per year. That's where the transfer comes in. The total combined amount for the project itself over the three years is just a little over $630,000, but we know this is an excellent organization and an excellent project, so we're very happy to fund it, and very happy that Justice Canada is also contributing to the project.
The women's program is a grants and contributions funding program. It is governed by the Treasury Board policy on transfer payments, which requires an evaluation of terms and conditions of programs be undertaken on a cyclical basis. In 2011-12 Status of Women Canada undertook an evaluation of our program, reviewing the Ts and Cs to see if any areas needed to be addressed to change the Ts and Cs.
The overall evaluation was very positive. It looked at five years of program activities and in particular the last two years. It found the focus of the program was still very relevant, a focus on gender equality. It found the design and the delivery mechanisms were appropriate to reach the population and the objectives we wanted to reach. It found we were stimulating the right partners, and in particular it highlighted the blueprint approach as very innovative and positive. It also found it was efficient in its operations.
It also indicated we needed to focus our projects more on widening their potential reach as well as the sustainable impact to have impact over a longer term.
With this in mind, the revised terms and conditions did increase the potential reach by adding new applicants and categories of applicants. One of those is cooperatives. In the past the cooperatives were not an eligible applicant, and we found a lot of the work they do at the community level made them very effective project deliverers.
We also looked at expanding the reach to aboriginal organizations. Most terms and conditions do not allow government organizations to apply for government funding, but we found in certain areas and in particular on reserve it was difficult to find organizations, NGOs, that could undertake projects. Where NGOs are lacking, we are able to have agreements with government organizations.
We can also have agreements with provincial and territorial governments, again where the NGO population or presence is insufficient to have projects.
We also increased flexibility in the types of activities we are able to fund. For example and in particular on engaging men and boys on violence, the previous Ts and Cs had a requirement that stated women had to be involved in all aspects of the project, which meant we couldn't work with a group of men, for example, that wanted to work with women. We modified that to say women are involved in many of the aspects of the project. I think that has gone a long way in allowing us to create those partnerships that are important to open the dialogue between men's and women's groups in communities.
:
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
Madam Minister, it's great to have you here with us. I very sincerely thank you for the good work you are doing. I may want you to do more, and I may want you to do many different things, but I thank you for what you are doing.
I have a couple of questions. I'll try to be quick because we only get one time slot here. I'd like to get short answers, but I'm probably going to ask you a complicated question and ask for a short answer that you probably won't be able to give me.
In a recent answer to an order paper question I had about the amount of money the government is spending on media monitoring, it came back that the government as a whole is spending over $30 million on monitoring responses to the government. You know what I'm talking about when I say “monitoring the media”. It's something we all do, as we want to know what people are saying and what the media is saying about what the government of the day is doing.
Frankly, that $30 million is a huge amount of money to spend on just media monitoring. Of that $30 million, you signed off on over $10.6 million, not only as the Status of Women minister but in your role as the minister of two portfolios. Can you tell me how much of that was related to Status of Women in particular? Can you also tell me what you felt you got out of the monitoring that told you about a different direction you might want to go in, whether that's from a polling perspective or about a different avenue that you might want to direct some of the funds to?
:
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Minister and officials, for being here.
I know that in the first round of questioning, Minister Ambrose, you spoke extensively about the commitment to engage men and boys in the fight to end violence against women. While you were saying that, I was thinking about a member's statement that was read into the Alberta legislature on March 14 of this year by Donna Kennedy-Glans, MLA for Calgary-Varsity. She was a member of Canada's United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, and she was speaking about the importance of engaging men and boys in leadership, a position that you have taken, Minister, in this particular area.
I brought it with me, and I'd like to read it in, because a lot of what she says, I think, is really important. I'm just going to read it. Again this is not my personal statement. I'm reading another statement:
Last week I attended the 57th session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women with my colleague from Barrhead—Morinville—Westlock. Our Canadian delegation was very capably led by federal Minister Rona Ambrose. The goal of this session was to identify ways to eliminate and prevent violence against women and girls.
As a mother of three sons it was particularly reassuring to me that the vast majority of the participants at this UN session recognized the need to engage men and boys in preventing violence against women and girls. In fact, this strategic imperative was concretely advanced by the Canadian delegation.
It’s heartening...to know that this approach is already being applied here in Alberta. [Here are just few examples.]
The Calgary YWCA hosts the Walk a Mile in Her Shoes campaign, inviting men to walk in high heels to raise awareness of men’s roles in combating violence against women. The Alberta Council of Women’s Shelters hosts Breakfast with the [Boys] events to bring male leaders together to inform and inspire action to help end domestic violence.
I’m [very] excited about an initiative launched by the B.C. Lions football team, [which] I’m hoping...will be adopted by the Calgary Stampeders and the Edmonton Eskimos. Football meets feminism when high-profile athletes
—I heard a giggle—
stand alongside women as allies.
I think that's really true, though.
Wally Buono, former coach of the Calgary Stampeders and [new] coach of the B.C. Lions, even steps up to share his own story of growing up in a home with domestic violence.
This is not part of the statement, but the next two points I really want to stress because they really drive home the need to engage men and boys.
These initiatives have the potential to be gamechangers. Too often we see gender equality as a women’s movement, dependent on male support and encouragement, yet it isn’t enough for my father, my husband, and now my sons to stand along the sidelines and root for me. They need to get in this game and participate.
I thought that was fitting, and I wanted to read it into the record today. I think the last two points this person made were very fitting as to why we need to bring men and boys into the equation now. So thank you for the good work we're doing in that area.
I wanted to touch very briefly on another point. You mentioned Bill in one of the first questions. You didn't refer to the bill by name, but you were talking about matrimonial property rights on reserves. I'm just wondering whether you could speak a moment on how important this bill is, how we currently have a legislative gap here in Canada that does not protect women on reserves, and how, in terms of marital breakdown, the fact that there is such inequality right now plays a large part in domestic violence in those particular areas. I'm wondering if you could touch a little bit more on that particular issue.
:
Well, I've already made my views known to the whips of each party who are dealing with this special committee. My view is that this is a good opportunity for all of the parties and for women's organizations that are working on this issue to put forward a substantive exercise and a substantive process, and I support that wholeheartedly.
I look forward to the special committee. I will work with my colleagues as much as I can. I know this is led by Justice Canada. This is about the investigation in particular, the investigative techniques or allegations about challenges in the judicial system that aboriginal women and girls have faced and that communities have faced. But we will be there to support the committee in any way that we can.
I don't know who is going to be sitting on the committee, but I hope all of you from the different parties make a point that it is especially important to have the expertise from this committee. You already did a study on this issue not that long ago, on the issue of violence against aboriginal women and girls. I hope that all that information is available to the special parliamentary committee and that some of the members of this committee are asked to sit on that committee or participate in whatever the undertakings are of that committee. It's very important.
There has been a lot of work done. There's been $25 million allocated to the missing and murdered aboriginal women strategy. There's been a new centre created by the RCMP for missing persons, and a new national database that's accessible for all levels of police, whether municipal, provincial or federal police organizations. There's even a public tips website. If you know of someone who's missing, you can put a piece of jewellery on it so that people could maybe identify it.
There are so many things happening across the country to deal with this issue. There's the inquiry in British Columbia led by Mr. Oppal. We have forwarded that information on to the United Nations that's looking at this issue. There's a lot of collaboration between the provinces and the federal government. There's so much work that has gone on and a lot of goodwill, but there's still an opportunity—
:
We are seeing the incidence of sexual assault rise on university and college campuses and CEGEPs across the country. There are a lot of women's organizations that are active on campuses, but for some reason it's not enough. It doesn't seem to be working, so we thought we'd target student-led organizations, ask the young people what they think would work, so that's what's different about this call for proposals. We wanted student-led organizations to be a part of it.
Of course they don't have the capacity, so they partnered with....For instance, in Edmonton, they partnered with the Sexual Assault Centre of Edmonton or they may have partnered with the Y in certain places, but the whole point is they may not have the capacity to deliver the service, but they had some really good ideas. There were some really interesting things that came out of that.
In total we funded 21 different organizations. It was a national approach to carry out these projects. They tackle a wide range of issues. There are harassment issues, but more often than not it's about sexual assault and things like safety plans on campus. There are still places where there aren't safe walk programs, where young women are walking back from their classrooms late at night, or there's no transportation on campus, so they have to walk quite far to get to a bus and they're alone. So even community safety plans on campus to create a safe walk program are needed. Other universities and campuses seem to be more advanced, so they were looking at more sophisticated approaches to getting the message out regarding the resources they have available.
In Port Alberni, British Columbia, the Alberni Community and Women's Services Society is working with the North Island College on a really great project that affects women in that area. As I mentioned before, in Edmonton, the sexual assault centre is engaging male students in a couple of the campuses to work on anti-violence against women on the university campuses.
Here in Ottawa, were working with the Ottawa Coalition to End Violence Against Women to engage students at the University of Ottawa, Carleton, La Cité collégiale, and Algonquin College to end violence against women.
In Montreal, Quebec we're funding a YWCA project that engages francophone students from three different CEGEPs in ending violence against women on their campuses.
:
We're very proud of the website, and please, I encourage everybody to go and visit it. The website was developed to encourage all Canadians, women and men, girls and boys, to recognize and do something about the issue of violence against women and girls. We know that awareness is a very powerful tool. Ensuring that there's more information available to all Canadians would certainly have the impact of increasing awareness.
The website acts as a hub of information and it includes various sections. It has forms of violence, its economic impact, and who is most at risk of abuse. It also includes information on how to respond when you're faced with a situation of violence. It has tips for parents, educators, youth, and others. It has a wealth of information on services available. When you go into the site and you want information on a specific area, as a parent, for example, you can go into your province and it will identify all of the provincial or territorial services that are available for you in that area. We feature a number of initiatives through the site, like EVA BC, the project that the minister mentioned earlier. We have information on the RespectED program, which is available in schools, on developing non-abusive relationships. There's also the Stop Sex With Kids initiative from the Government of Manitoba, for example, that is featured. There are a number of initiatives by NGOs, by governments, etc.
It also provides a cohesive picture of what initiatives the Government of Canada has undertaken to address the issue of violence from the various government departments.
In developing the website, which was completely done in-house, we worked very closely with Justice, Public Safety, INAC, and a number of other departments, and especially provincial and territorial colleagues who provided us with all of the information that the site was able to connect to. In order to attract people to this site—because we know there's an abundance of information available on the Internet—we were able to access some funding from the central advertising fund. We were provided with $250,000 in this fiscal year, which we received through the supplementary estimates (A) in order to develop, create, and purchase web banners and Google ads that would drive traffic to the site. When you're in LinkedIn or on news sites, you'll get a banner that comes across and tells you about it. If a person is interested or affected by violence or abuse, they would be able to get to our violence website. It's been a very popular site since its launch February 23. We've had between 1,000 and 2,000 hits a day, and 83% come from the banners, people discovered it through the banners and then go into the site.
:
No, I wouldn't mind commenting on it.
Hon. Judy Sgro: Well, then, please do.
Ms. Suzanne Clément: I think one of the things you may have noticed at Status of Women is that we have more men.
Hon. Judy Sgro: Yes.
Ms. Suzanne Clément: We do believe that gender equality is not a women's issue, it's a societal issue, and everybody is part of the solution.
Through our gender-based analysis work, we have done some amazing things in the last few years within the federal family. Last year we developed, in-house again, an online training course on GBA, which all policy research evaluators in government are asked to undertake. We've had close to 450 take it since its launch very recently.
We've now developed a gender-based analysis awareness week in the federal family. All departments join in for a whole week. We do activities and exchange knowledge with our colleagues. We're really reinforcing the consideration of gender equality issues in all aspects of departmental activity.
This committee certainly plays a key role, but I think that departments, and the committees that also oversee the work of the departments, need to be active in that area as well. I think more and more we are seeing more men involved in gender equality issues in the departments, as we are at Status of Women, and certainly more work is being done in that way.