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Michael Ignatieff makes a strong stand for pay equity

Ottawa – Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff re-introduced his private member’s bill today that would, if passed, ensure the human right of pay equity could not be bargained away.

“This bill repeals measures in the last budget that put pay equity on the bargaining table--because no human right should ever be subject to negotiation,” said Mr. Ignatieff.  All Canadians, regardless of gender, deserve the full protection of their government and equality in the workplace.”

In Budget 2009, the Harper Conservatives attacked the rights of Canadian women by undermining pay equity.  Mr. Ignatieff’s private members bill calls for swift action to implement the recommendations of the 2004 Pay Equity Task Force, including a new pay equity commission to ensure pay equity in the federal public service, Crown corporations, and federally-regulated corporations.

Four months after first introducing his private members bill, Mr. Ignatieff had to re-introduce it today because of the delay caused by Stephen Harper’s prorogation of Parliament.
 
“Despite the Prime Minister’s best efforts to make pay equity go away, we will not stop until the human right to equal pay for work of equal value is recognized,” said Mr. Ignatieff while re-tabling the bill. “Unfortunately, the government’s attacks on women’s rights continue with new funding cuts and now a part-time Status of Women minister.”

The latest step backwards on women’s rights comes from the government’s decision to cancel funding to the Pay Equity Coalition, a New Brunswick-based non-governmental organization that advocates for equal pay between men and women for work of equal value.

“The first order of business for our new Minister of State for the Status of Women must be to reverse the government’s attack on women,” said Mr. Ignatieff. “As a former Labour Minister, the new Minister of State for the Status of Women should understand the need to create a truly proactive pay equity commission.”

While former Status of Women Minister Helena Guergis was dumped from cabinet on Friday while being investigated for criminal and unethical activity, she also left behind a record of regressive attacks on women’s rights.  The task of fixing this broken file falls to the new Minister of State for the Status of Women, Rona Ambrose, who must also split her time as Minister of Public Works and Government Services.

“Forty years after the Royal Commission into the Status of Women that did so much to advance women’s equality in our country, we are renewing our commitment to true equality of opportunity for every Canadian,” concluded Mr. Ignatieff.

 

Pay Equity facts:

•    Today in Canada, women on average earn seventy-two cents for every dollar earned by their male colleagues.

•    Women with children earn fifty-two cents for every dollar earned by their male colleagues.

•    Two-thirds of all minimum wage earners are women, and women are over-represented among part-time and unpaid workers, as well as those in the lowest income bracket.

•    Among top-earners, men outnumber women by more than 333 percent.

Conservative attacks on women’s equality in Canada:

•    Turned a woman’s fundamental right to pay equity into something up for grabs at the collective bargaining table.

•    Cut the operating budget of Status of Women Canada by 43 percent, while removing the word “equality” from the mandate of its Women’s Program.

•    Banned the words “gender equality” from the lexicon of the Foreign Affairs department and embarrassed our Canada on the world stage by excluding reproductive health from our G8 plans.

•    Removed the Gender Equality unit in the Human Rights Division of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

•    Eliminated funding for the Court Challenges Program that low-income women used to fight discrimination.

•    Axed the $1-billion annual Liberal early learning and child care agreements that would have made childcare affordable for low-income women and freed up their time to work.

•    Axed the Kelowna Accord which would have provided much-needed health, education and economic development funding to Aboriginal women.

•    Eliminated the National Child Supplement.

•    Failed to produce their ‘Action Plan’ – announced in Budget 2008 – to advance equality for women by improving their economic and social conditions and their participation in democratic life.

•    Ignored a November 25, 2008, motion passed unanimously in the House of Commons to develop a violence against women prevention strategy.