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37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION
Subcommittee on the Status of Persons with Disabilities of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities
EVIDENCE
CONTENTS
Tuesday, December 10, 2002
| º | 1615 |
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The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi (Niagara Centre, Lib.)) |
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Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Director, President's Committee on the Integration of People with Disabilities) |
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The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi) |
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Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation) |
| º | 1620 |
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Ms. Beatriz Borges (Coordinator of technical and vocational evaluation and training, Department for the Integration of the Family) |
| º | 1625 |
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Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation) |
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Mr. Aleksi Asatashvili (Director General, International Relations, National Commission on Human Rights) |
| º | 1630 |
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Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation) |
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Ms. Martha Laura Brambilia Fausto (Advisor, Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs) |
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Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation) |
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Mr. Francisco Eloy Gonzalez (Assistant to the executive secretary of Finance, Mexican Ministry of Finance) |
| º | 1640 |
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Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia |
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Ms. Jessica Baños Poo (Senior Advisor, Gender and Disability Issues, Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs) |
| º | 1645 |
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Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation) |
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Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar (Coordinator, Employment Programs for Persons with Different Abilities, FEMSA) |
| º | 1650 |
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The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi) |
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Mr. Reed Elley (Nanaimo—Cowichan, Canadian Alliance) |
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Ms. Maria Elena Sandoz (Interpreter) |
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Mr. Reed Elley |
| º | 1655 |
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Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar |
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Mr. Reed Elley |
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Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar |
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Mr. Reed Elley |
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Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar |
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Mr. Aleksi Asatashvili |
| » | 1700 |
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The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi) |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral (Laval Centre, BQ) |
| » | 1705 |
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Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar |
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Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia |
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Ms. Beatriz Borges (Interpretation) |
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The Acting chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi) |
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Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP) |
| » | 1710 |
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The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi) |
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Ms. Nancy Karetak-Lindell (Nunavut, Lib.) |
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Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation) |
| » | 1715 |
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The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi) |
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Ms. Martha Brambilia (Interpretation) |
| » | 1720 |
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The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi) |
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Ms. Jessica Baños |
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The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi) |
CANADA
Subcommittee on the Status of Persons with Disabilities of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities |
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EVIDENCE
Tuesday, December 10, 2002
[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
º 
(1615)
[English]
It's appropriate that we have you here today before our committee on this International Human Rights Day to speak about what the two countries have done and continue to do with regard to persons with disabilities, both as individual countries and with some of the bilateral agreements that we're trying to put in place and that we have put in place.
Before I begin, I must tell you that I am not the chair of this committee. Unfortunately, Dr. Carolyn Bennett, the chair, had a death in her family; her mother passed on. Our thoughts are with Carolyn today. I would suggest that perhaps since we are her special little committee, as she always calls us, we could send an appropriate floral arrangement. I'll make arrangements with our clerks to do that.
On that note, I would like to recognize María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia. If you wouldn't mind, please introduce the members of your delegation, and then we'll go around the table and have a quick introduction as well. Thank you.
Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Director, President's Committee on the Integration of People with Disabilities): Thank you very much, Tony. Could I ask you if it's possible for us to take photos before we start?
The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi): Because we didn't know what time we were starting, I had thought of that. I definitely would like to take photos at the end. Unless somebody has to leave, if we stand up now to take photos and then try to reassemble, it might disrupt.... Unless there's a reason why the delegations would like the photos now, we'll do it at the end. Is that fine with everyone? Okay.
Continue, Maria.
Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation): Thank you very much. I'd like to thank Joan for inviting us to come to Canada, and I'd like to say that I'm here representing the presidential committee on the integration, the social integration, of people with disabilities. This office was established in December 2000 by presidential decree, and two months later President Fox also set up the national council for the social integration of people with disabilities. This is a council where both government and society work together in support of people with disabilities.
My office is headed by a person who is disabled, and the majority of people who work on the committee have some type of disability. We have five main pillars of work: health, education, employment, access and transport, and attention to the public in all government offices--quality attention.
That's a very basic introduction to what we do. I think this shows you that President Fox is indeed very committed to the issues of people with disabilities. On an international level he has launched a proposal to see if we cannot arrive at a UN convention on the dignity and the rights of the disabled.
Now I'd like to introduce those who are accompanying me in the delegation, all of whom work very hard on the different projects and programs we're carrying out on a horizontal level on behalf of the disabled.
First is Beatriz Borges, who belongs to the national system for the complete development of the family.
º (1620)
Ms. Beatriz Borges (Coordinator of technical and vocational evaluation and training, Department for the Integration of the Family): Good afternoon. I'd like to thank you for your presence here. I'd like to thank Joan for the invitation, as well as the Government of Canada.
I work with a group of people who concentrate on assisting vulnerable groups. This includes the disabled, children, and the elderly, and we're looking at how they can integrate into employment.
In this program I'm on, which is to integrate people with disabilities into the labour force, we deal with people who have disabilities that are motor, auditory, visual, and intellectual, and these are people between the ages of 14 and 50.
We work with a series of professionals in the area of the labour market. We also work with psychologists who work on career orientation or vocational orientation, all of this in the field of integrating disabled people into the labour market.
The first stage is within an institution with the disabled. We look to see what these people's interests are, what their skills are, what their aptitudes are, and then we try to find out what area they might be interested in for employment.
The second part is our contacts with companies that might be interested in employing disabled people. In this work obviously what is of great interest to us is to get business people to be familiar with our program, and on our side to know exactly what the jobs entail in detail so that we can find the appropriate people who can be integrated into those workplaces.
We try to ensure that the disabled are taken on under the same conditions of employment as other people who are working in that same workplace; that is, that they would have the same rights and the same obligations. After six months on the job we do a follow-up.
In the capital city in Mexico we have the rehabilitation centre where I work, but there are also five other agencies that concentrate on integrating into the labour force. They're all outside of the health service as such, so you'll find one of them at the ministry of labour and others with industry associations or within the communities.
Thank you.
º (1625)
Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation): This is Dr. Aleksi Asatashvili. He works on the national commission for human rights. He's going to attempt to do it in English.
Mr. Aleksi Asatashvili (Director General, International Relations, National Commission on Human Rights): I will attempt. Thank you very much. If something is not clear, please don't hesitate to stop me and I will try to make things clear.
I would like to first thank you very much for the opportunity to make this presentation, which is not formal. I would like to make a difference between what government does and what I do as a representative of our national human rights commission.
As you see, any of these agents that are present here represent the government in some way, except myself and Zintia Almaguer.
The Mexican national commission for human rights is a totally autonomous institution. What we are doing is trying to supervise the actions, or omissions of action, on behalf of governmental agencies. There is a slight difference--not quite a slight difference, I would say--between the competencies of the Mexican national human rights commission and what is known as the Canadian one. For instance, we have no competency in private cases. We are dealing with human rights violations when one of the federal authorities is implicated.
In this sense, we have a powerful tool, which is non-binding general public recommendations to federal authorities and also the activities that are focused not only on the defence but also on the promotion of human rights. In this sense, and regarding more precisely the points of the question of people with disabilities, we just try to qualify the application on a national level of international standards. Afterwards we try to analyze some national initiatives, legislative initiatives, and then we decide to promote them, support them, or not.
Right now there is a big, very interesting discussion in the parliament of Mexico about three or four pending initiatives in this sense. We definitely agree with two of them and we do not agree with one of them. I would not like to touch these details right now--maybe afterwards if it is necessary.
That is briefly the presentation. I would like to thank you again for this opportunity and to be part of this delegation. Thank you.
º (1630)
Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation): Also with us is Martha Brambilia, who is responsible for technical cooperation between Mexico and Canada and the European Union, and she's with foreign affairs.
Ms. Martha Laura Brambilia Fausto (Advisor, Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs): I'm with the ministry of foreign affairs in Mexico, and we are the focal point for cooperation between Mexico and other countries. Although we don't directly deal with the issues of the disabled, we do manage projects on people with disabilities. In this particular case we have one with Spain for children with disabilities, and we think this would be an excellent opportunity for us to develop a project with Canada.
Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation): Also with us is Mr. Eloy Gonzalez, who is assistant to the executive secretary of economic development.
Mr. Francisco Eloy Gonzalez (Assistant to the executive secretary of Finance, Mexican Ministry of Finance): My understanding in English is good, but my speaking is not good enough, so I would like to ask Maria Elena for translation.
The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi): Please, go ahead.
Mr. Francisco Eloy Gonzalez (Interpretation): First of all, I'd like to thank you for this invitation to come to Canada. I think the meetings we're starting to hold today and will do through the rest of the week will be very fruitful for us.
I'll divide my presentation into four separate sections: first I'll explain exactly what the ministry of economic development does, because it is often misinterpreted; second, how we can integrate strategies for the disabled into the work our ministry does, together with the committee of the presidency; third, how we organize that work on behalf of the disabled internally within the ministry; and fourth, the challenges we face and what areas it might be possible for us to cooperate on between Canada and Mexico.
Within the ministry of the economy our mission is to create the necessary environment to strengthen a level of competitiveness in the small and medium-sized businesses. Our activities in this area are fivefold: first we design and promote development of entrepreneurial abilities; second, we try to create a context in the economy that will favour the development of these small and medium-sized businesses; third, we make every effort to strengthen our internal market as well as ensuring that the conditions are established to increase our share on foreign markets, and this is where the free trade agreements come into play; fourth, we support the development of projects to help develop business and small and medium-sized companies in the remote and very distant areas, especially in the promotion of employment; and fifth, we try to ensure that there is a balanced development in the different regions and the different sectors of our economy.
The Mexican government has set up within the presidency a subcommittee on the economy, which is chaired by our ministry of economic development, and the work is in five different areas: first is the financing of productive activities, and this is especially designed for low-income persons, so we finance, try to finance, and train so that they can enter into some type of productive activity; second is our foreign trade front, to try to import vehicles that are adapted for people with disabilities; third, internally, we carry out negotiations and discussions with the private sector to see if we cannot obtain discounts for people with disabilities at shops and pharmacies; the fourth area of work is in our standards--we're undertaking work on revising our official standards to take into account people with disabilities; and the fifth area of work is that of consumer protection.
Insofar as the challenges we face that are related to our areas of work, we would like an exchange of information with the Canadian government and the experience you have had in Canada in terms of areas of production within the economy where the government finances and trains and attempts to implement adapted technologies for people with disabilities.
Another area we'd be interested in is any information on consumer rights in this particular area, as well as an exchange on possible international standards adapted to people with disabilities.
That's all. Thank you.
º (1640)
Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia: [Witness speaks in Spanish]
Ms. Jessica Baños Poo (Senior Advisor, Gender and Disability Issues, Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs): Thank you. I will try to speak in English as well, just to make my intervention more fluent.
I'm the adviser for gender and disability at the undersecretary for global affairs of the Mexican ministry of foreign affairs. I have been coordinating the project of having an international convention on the rights and dignity of persons with disabilities. Last June we organized an expert meeting in which 44 international experts participated in a very rich debate about what the convention should include, which rights and for what.
After that meeting we prepared a document to present as a Mexican proposal. The presidential office, civil society, and Congress participated, and we also took into account of course all the views that were expressed at the expert meeting.
After the first ad hoc committee that was held at the UN discussing this new international legally binding instrument, Canada co-sponsored with Mexico a decision on accessibility to UN premises, which was very important, so that the NGOs that were interested in participating in the ad hoc committee could do it.
Mexico also co-sponsored a resolution with the European Union concerning participation of NGOs in the negotiations, and all NGOs are allowed...if they have activities that are relevant to the matter, they can all participate directly in the negotiations of the convention.
As we expressed in the ad hoc committee, and as the experts expressed after the expert meeting that was held in Mexico--and that's the position Mexico took--the new convention should be a convention on human rights, on the human rights and dignity of persons with disabilities. So the idea is to have a convention that adapts the current existing human rights, to adapt those rights to the particular circumstances of persons with disabilities so as to eliminate barriers to the full enjoyment of these rights.
In the ministry we have also been interested in having new legislation against discrimination in Mexico. Last year there was a civil commission that prepared national legislation, and President Fox took this initiative and sent it to Congress about two weeks ago. The law is currently being determined in Congress, and we think we will have the law very soon.
One of our main purposes for being here is to exchange views, experiences, on how Canada has worked with disability issues in education, employment. Yesterday we had a very interesting exchange of views with the ministry of human resources. We think we can learn a lot from Canada's experiences. So when this law passes, our country will have to make some regulations in different ministries to adapt these new laws. We think perhaps we can create a mechanism with Canada so that we can exchange views.
º (1645)
Last year Canada won the Franklin Delano Roosevelt International Disability Award, and you have had 20 years of experience in those issues.
We want to propose a mechanism in which we can exchange expertise, ideas, in regulation or in better practices, for example.
I would like to ask if my request could be established in the report of this meeting and be brought to the attention of the Minister of Human Resources so that we can remain in contact and continue to exchange our views. We really are interested in continuing to work together. It's not about funding or corporate funding, but about learning from the regulations you have here, how they have worked, and exchanging views and expertise.
Thank you.
Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation): Finally, we have with us Zintia Almaguer Salazar, who in fact works with the private sector in one of the most important companies in Mexico. She's the program coordinator for the program for people with disabilities.
Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar (Coordinator, Employment Programs for Persons with Different Abilities, FEMSA): Hi. Thank you very much for inviting me to come to Canada to share the information we have in our country, in the government, with you, and also for sharing your experience with us.
FEMSA is the largest beverage company in Mexico and one of the leaders of Latin American beverage companies. We export our products to the United States, Canada, and selected countries in Latin America and Asia.
FEMSA began operating in 1890, with the foundation of the brewery company of Cervecería Cuauhtémoc. We've been working with disabled people for a long, long time, since our foundation. But nowadays we're opening the door wider. This is how we say it in our promotion. In June 2001 we started this program. Before that it was difficult for people with disabilities to be hired in my company.
We have a few employees, around 45. That was before, but now we are trying to open more opportunities. We work with different kinds of disabilities: motor, hearing problems, visual and speaking impairments, silent people, and also those with intellectual limitations.
We at FEMSA believe in the rights that each person deserves in Mexico, and we are in a process--we have more than 42,000 employees at FEMSA, but we have around 75 or 80 people who have disabilities. We are working so hard, and this is a challenge for us.
Yesterday we were talking about what is the big challenge for me to have responsibility for this program in my company, and I say it's the culture. The culture in Mexico is not for this kind of program, but we are working on that, and I guess if we are together, even when we try to get experience from other countries, it will be stronger for the people who come behind us.
Thank you.
º (1650)
The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi): Finito? Did I say that properly?
I'd like to thank you very much for your presentations here. Just so we know where we are with time, because the votes in the House overran and cut into our time, I've checked with members of the committee and we will go to approximately 5:15, if that's agreeable.
At this time I'd like to turn it over to the committee. Mr. Elley, if you have any questions or comments, or maybe a brief introduction to let them know exactly who we are, go ahead.
Mr. Reed Elley (Nanaimo—Cowichan, Canadian Alliance): Buenos dias. That's about the only Spanish I will attempt, except hasta la vista later on.
Thank you very much for coming. It's our privilege to have you come and share with us the experiences of working with disabled people in Mexico.
Will you want to translate this?
Ms. Maria Elena Sandoz (Interpreter): I believe they will all understand sufficiently.
Mr. Reed Elley: Just by way of introduction, my most important role is that I am the father of a disabled child. That's my most important role. Beyond that, I'm also a member of Parliament, and I've already introduced myself to you.
So I come to this committee and to our discussions with a vested interest, representing and advocating for my own daughter, and then to see that as a government and as a people in Canada we provide the best environment and the best resources for our disabled population in Canada.
I think in some respects, as I read the material, we have similar populations in terms of the percentages of disabled in our population. We are working at varying levels of cooperation with groups in both our respective nations. It certainly isn't for any of us on this committee to say that we're at one level and someone is at a different level. I think we're all working in our own experience towards trying to do the best we can.
This is just a small question for Zintia. You mentioned that in your company you have 42,000 employees?
º (1655)
Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar: Yes. I am also including a Coca-Cola company we have in Argentina.
Mr. Reed Elley: I think you said that within that population of 42,000 there are only 70 to 80 who have disabilities.
Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar: Yes.
Mr. Reed Elley: Of course, our experience here has probably been similar in the sense that it's very hard to integrate disabled people into the workforce in that employers aren't always eager to do that.
You have 42,000 employees and 70 who have disabilities. Are you having the same struggle then in Mexico to integrate disabled people into the workforce? That's a fairly small number for a large corporation.
Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar:
Yes. It's a very small number, but it's because it's just to start, a year and a half....
In the last year I have been promoting the program. We have work centres in the whole country in Mexico, and I travel a lot trying to promote the program and the process for hiring people with disabilities.
This program is brand new in Mexico for the biggest companies. It has existed since 1950. But it's difficult for companies because of the accidents and all the questions that must be asked when you are hiring people with disabilities. There are also the architectural barriers in Mexico. From last year until now...the public has access now. It is opening accessibility for people with disabilities. Before, people with disabilities would stay at home, just people with polio. I have seen one person in my career who is starting--just one person--and that's not too much.
Mr. Reed Elley: Just a very quick question to follow up, and then I'll pass it on to one of my colleagues.
So this is a real struggle to integrate. Is your government helping by passing legislation like employment equity and working to try to integrate? Do you have employment equity legislation in Mexico?
Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar: Yes.
Mr. Aleksi Asatashvili: I would disagree. I have an autonomous point of view, if I might disagree with my colleagues. As an autonomous legislative body, as we discussed yesterday, there is no legislation on labour equity. There are some dispositions and different legislative bodies, such as on the topic of health care or labour, etc. But definitely there is a big legislative vacuum in that case.
As we are touching on this case, I would like to add some observations from my part. As I mentioned, there are some legislative initiatives right now passing through the National Congress. The human rights commission thinks, and I do too, that those initiatives or projects are not ready to be adopted--I am very sorry to disagree with my colleague from the foreign office. Why? Because we see their lack of integrated point of view towards the human rights of persons with disabilities, and clearly we see that there are some particular interests of some governmental institutions through those initiatives, those projects.
What a real priority of the Mexican government should be--and I'm going to help them out in this case--is the project on an international convention. Jessica just mentioned the process, the first meeting of the unilateral committee in New York at the United Nations. She mentioned also the role of the Mexican government and that of the Canadian government.
I will be precise in this case. Still, from the point of view of an autonomous institution, we feel--the human rights commission feels--that the Mexican government has not stated clearly its point of view on the point.
So I would like to use this panel to ask you formally for your intervention. Maybe it is possible for you to formalize a petition to the foreign affairs department. I think that is the right name in Canada? Yes. It's just to clarify the point of view about the convention, about the project on the convention. I'm saying this because Canada's government has stated formally that it supports, or it is supporting, this international conventions project, but in fact we--again, autonomous institutions--do not feel the real commitment.
So that would be all for my part, and I would thank you to formalize that petition.
» (1700)
The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi): For your information, there was a letter forwarded from this committee, drafted by this committee, to our foreign affairs minister, the Honourable Bill Graham. We have not received a response to that that I'm aware of at this time. I can tell you it addresses exactly the point that you bring up. The department is undergoing a review of the policy, so I think it would be appropriate at this time for you to make that request and then for us to in turn make that of our foreign affairs department. That has been put forward, and we'll certainly follow up on that.
If I can move on in the interest of time here, Madame Dalphond-Guiral, please.
[Translation]
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral (Laval Centre, BQ): Good morning. My name is Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral and I am a Bloc Québécois member, therefore I come from Quebec.
Before entering politics, I worked in the health sector for almost four decades, which is quite long, and I worked mostly with children, a group that I know very well. Children grow up and become adults.
There is no doubt that the integration of disabled persons or persons with limitations has to go through employment. Everybody cannot do any type of job, but everybody is capable of doing certain things.
Mexico's economic situation has changed since the signing of the recent agreements with Canada and the United States, but I think everything is not perfect. In the states, the governments'objectives are rarely attuned to the needs of the most vulnerable people.
You certainly have very powerful trade unions in Mexico. I'd like to know the importance of the integration of disabled persons in those unions which, here at least, are important on the political level. I suppose it's the same in your country.
My question is directed to anybody who could answer it.
» (1705)
[English]
Ms. Zintia Almaguer Salazar: My company has a few persons with disabilities also in unions since 20 and 30 years ago and it's not a problem.
We've been working for so long, but the problem is the architectural barriers. This is one of the problems.
But, no, there are no problems.... I guess since last year and into the future it will be easier to understand that people with disabilities can work in any position.
Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia: I'd like to add to the access...Zintia is talking a lot about access, which is one of the biggest barriers. We also have transportation and so on.
But my office is now working for a national standard on access. It is going to be working maybe next year, January or February, and with that standard we are going to make more and better access. If somebody is going to start a new building, it has to be with access. There's going to be access.
Ms. Beatriz Borges (Interpretation):
I'd like to answer Madeleine on the issue of the participation of the trade unions. In Mexico the trade unions, for the last few years, have not been as strong as they were historically. But historically we have been working far more with the companies than we have with the trade unions. Some of the trade unions have supported our work and others have set up obstacles to the employment of people with disabilities.
That is really one of our challenges, to start to work more with the trade unions.
The Acting chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi): Excellent.
I'm certainly not here to cut off debate, but we are looking at time and I have two more members who I know would like to speak. Then at the end we'd like to have a photograph as well. And I do have other members who have other commitments. So at this time, if I could just move along, I'll turn it over to Ms. Lill.
Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP): Thank you for coming. Canada has a Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which means a great deal for persons with disabilities. In 1985 it came into being, and persons with disabilities were covered. So we have a law, a charter, that people hold up and say, we belong here too. And that's critical. It's very important.
That doesn't end the problems. There are many problems with poverty, with discrimination in the workplace, problems with housing, with mobility, accessibility to buildings and getting around, and we struggle.
I'm a member of the New Democratic Party, so I'm an opposition member.
In this committee we all struggle to put forward the issues of income support, disability support, tax breaks for persons with disabilities. We have our struggles here.
We are very interested in working with you in Mexico, and we are delighted that you're here. We will share what we have been able to achieve. We have a long way to go, though. We believe that.
So thank you for being interested in what we've accomplished, and we'll help you in any way we can.
» (1710)
The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi): Thank you, Ms. Lill.
I must say, to Ms. Lill's credit...she mentioned our little committee. Oftentimes we table a report and the government in response tables another report that really doesn't address what we recommended. Ms. Lill was quite successful three weeks ago in tabling a motion in the House to that effect, expressing our dissatisfaction with the government's report. I don't remember how many members were in the House for the vote that day. I believe it was around 230--she has it at 234. One by one, we all approached our whips--I can speak for our party--and we said, look, we're going to have trouble in there if we don't support this. The vote in the afternoon was 234 in favour of Ms. Lill's motion and zero the other way.
So we're small, but we can be effective. We just have to take every little battle one at a time.
Nancy.
Ms. Nancy Karetak-Lindell (Nunavut, Lib.): Thank you. I'm the member of Parliament for Nunavut, which is in Canada's eastern Arctic.
I listened with interest to some of the comments you made about...I think you said attitude was one of the barriers or one of the areas you're trying to change in the country and within companies. I just want to say that that is very similar to my part of Canada.
I was interested in how you work with people in remote areas, because sometimes my part of the country has more in common with countries like Mexico as far as trying to reach out to the people in the remote areas and make them feel part of the national agenda. Because we're so far away and so spread out over such a large area, we have great difficulty in communicating with people who are living in small, remote communities. I just wonder how you reach those people and have them be part of the national agenda.
Ms. María Eugenia Antunez Farrugia (Interpretation):
The priority for President Fox and our office has been specifically the poorest people living in the remotest parts of the country.
We're building on five main programs, and one of them is the national agricultural program. We're seeking financing in order to set up productive businesses and companies in the agricultural areas. We're working together with the ministry of agriculture, the ministry of economic development, and the ministry of labour in order to set up small enterprises that will allow people to have some type of income, some type of employment, and not seek to emigrate.
The second part of the national program is that of integrating education, and so each of our public schools must include children with disabilities. That is now well under way.
The third sector is health. On December 3, Tuesday last, we signed a financing agreement to purchase wheel chairs and implements and tools that disabled people need, such as hearing aids and things like this. In Mexico this has never done before, and these are now being given to people, to needy people, who need mobility or to help them with some type of disability.
It would be an honour for us to be able to exchange any type of information you might have that would help us with our program for people in remote areas.
It's only been up and running for two or three months, so any opinions you would have or any information would be very welcome.
» (1715)
The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi): Very good. Thanks, Nancy.
A final comment? Yes.
Ms. Martha Brambilia (Interpretation):
I'd like to add something on the integration of children with disabilities in the formal education system. This is a program that's been up and running for the last four years. It attempts to integrate children with disabilities to normal, everyday school, especially those children whose parents cannot afford to send them to private school. It involves the training of teachers so that they can attend to the needs of the disabled children so that these children are not simply staying at home and can get a basic primary education.
This program has now reached 28 out of the 32 states in Mexico, and we have now trained 9,000 teachers so that they can deal with disabled children.
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The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi): I'd like to at this point thank Señora Antunez for heading the delegation here this afternoon.
Before I conclude, there are copies of two documents we can present to you, if you'd like. The first one is Promoting Equality in the Federal Jurisdiction: Review of the Employment Equity Act. It's a report of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities. This was tabled on June 14. It really speaks to fine tuning some laws relative to employment equity amongst aboriginal groups, minorities, persons with disabilities, and women. So that's the first one I would offer to you.
The second one is the government's response to that document, which was tabled in November of this year. It goes on to outline some of the positive points of the 29 recommendations here, but indeed that we have to continue to do more.
You may find these tools useful in response to Jessica's request earlier on.
Again, on behalf of the committee I want to thank you. I know we were a little pressed for time and we overran our time, but I think it was well worth it and I wish we could chat some more.
I would be remiss if I didn't recognize Joan Westland for helping us with this group. Joan, thank you very much for all you've done as well.
Jessica.
Ms. Jessica Baños: I have something to end my intervention.
The anti-discriminatory law, which is now with Congress, looks for protections for all those groups--indigenous people, women, and persons with disabilities.
We really take the opportunity again to thank you, and to thank you for your initiative of continued cooperation in practices, etc.
The law also tries--and that's where I think Canada's regulation could help. The law will protect not just civil society from actions done by the state, but also actions concerning civil society--I mean the private sphere.
Concerning the convention, for any one of you who is interested, I think the position is very clear from the Government of Mexico. We left with Minister Denis Paradis a lot of documents on the convention. So if you want to take a look at them, you can take a look at them. You will find there all the positions Mexico brought into the ad hoc committee.
The Acting Chair (Mr. Tony Tirabassi): We look forward to reviewing that, absolutely. Again, we appreciate continuing this dialogue. I think it would be beneficial to both.
On that note, I'd like to close this meeting, and now I'll turn it over to our famous photographer, Chris, for a bit of a photo shoot.
The meeting is adjourned.