1987-05-08

Hon. Andre Ouellet (Papineau):: Two weeks ago, Mr. Speaker, Montreal's Jacques Cartier Bridge was again the scene of serious accidents, including one which resulted in the death of a Montreal south shore woman resident. It so happens that for several months now the Minister of Transport (Mr. Crosbie) has had on his desk the Trafix consultant firm report recommending quite realistic and practicable measures to make that bridge safer.
We Liberal Members of the Montreal region wonder just how much longer it will take before the Conservative Government reacts, just how much time before the Minister of Transport realizes the seriousness of the situation and heeds the advice of the Ports Canada Police Fraternity and of his own advisers who are urging him to take action. He has to assume his responsibilities before more accidents occur.


NATIONAL FOREST WEEK
Mr. Ted Schellenberg (Nanaimo-Alberni):: Mr. Speaker, as you well know, in British Columbia money really does grow on trees. Over $1 billion annually is generated in taxes and direct revenues from B.C.'s forest industry.
Today is day six of National Forest Week in Canada. As a Member of Parliament representing a forest riding, including Port Alberni, the Forestry Capital of Canada, this week is especially meaningful to the citizens of my home province. This year close to 90 British Columbia communities are joining with other communities across Canada to recognize our
most valuable natural resource through community events, fairs and other festivities.
Much like the people of British Columbia, the forests of our province are undoubtedly one of the nation's greatest assets. One out of every three jobs in British Columbia depends on the forest resource for their livelihood. Ten per cent of our national economy is fueled by our forests.
Clearly money does grow on trees. Today, during National Forest Week, we recognize the contribution our forests make to the lives of all Canadians.


ROAD SAFETY
Mr. Ian Waddell (Vancouver-Kingsway):: Mr. Speaker, I have before me the coroner's report on the death of Edward Siemens, a Vancouver teenager who was a very great athlete. He and three other teenagers had been travelling in Vancouver late at night. They ran out of gas and manoeuvred their car into a self-service gas station.
The report indicates the power steering was very stiff and they were having difficulty manoeuvring the vehicle past the gas pumps. The right front of the vehicle impacted the gas pump and somehow the hose of number two pump caught the bumper of the car ripping the hose from the pump and breaking the on-off lever. This sudden disruption then caused the gas to be dispensed uncontrollably on to the ground surrounding the gas pump island area.
Mr. Siemens got out of the car. The electrical spark was still on, a fire broke out and engulfed Edward Siemens, and he died.
The report has a lot of good recommendations including larger islands, proper signage, fire extinguishers, two-way intercoms, proper training procedures, electrical shut-off switches and so on, but I want to bring to the attention of the House one particular recommendation, and I quote:
We recommend a public awareness program as to the dangers of gasoline at
self-service gas stations. This program should be province-wide.
I think it should be Canada-wide. I hope we can learn from Edward Siemens' death so we can prevent this kind of tragic death of another teenager or anyone else.

May 8, 1987


INTERNATIONAL ASTRONOMY DAY
Mr. Dave Nickerson (Western Arctic):: Tomorrow, Mr. Speaker, May 9, is International Astronomy Day. Amateur and professional astronomers the world over will take this opportunity to participate in special activities designed to make the general public aware of the joys of astronomy.
These activities in Canada will be coordinated by the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada which will mark the day by paying tribute to Mrs. Helen Sawyer Hogg who devoted her life to astronomy and the scientific popularization of this discipline.
The theme of this year's celebrations comes from one of Mrs. Hogg's works entitled The Stars Belong To Everyone. The House is pleased to extend its best wishes to all participants.
* *
*


HISTORIC EVENTS
Mr. Joe Reid (St. Catharines):: Mr. Speaker, after five years, World War II came to a slow and grinding halt. My war between Nijmegen and Arnhem was literally bogged down. It was on April 27, while on brigade staff, that I delivered the message: "Fire only when fired upon".
On May 5 General Foulkes accepted the surrender of the German forces in Holland. The lights went up. There were no more black-outs. We shook hands. We were still alive.
On May 7, in a brief ceremony at Reimes, General Jodi signed the surrender document, with hostilities to cease the next day. Thus, World War II ended on May 8, 1945.
Canadians will be forever remembered in the Netherlands with these words: "Thank you, Canada, for giving us our freedom".
Canadians lie buried in 74 different countries. May 8, 1945, was Victory Day-freedom so bitterly won.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Maurice Foster (Algoma):: Mr. Speaker, Ontario corn producers are suffering tremendous uncertainty as a result of the latest move by the United States to fight the countervail which Canada recently imposed on highly subsidized U.S. corn. The 85 cents per bushel countervail assists Canadian farmers by imposing a price on U.S. corn which is more in line with Canadian prices. The effect of the U.S. Farm Bill has been to depress corn prices severely and artificially thereby unfairly hurting our corn producers. This action by Canada was necessary.
The latest U.S. proposal would provide by law $500,000 to American farm groups who want to fight against the fair and necessary 85-cent Canadian countervail on corn. Whereas Canadian corn producers have paid their own legal bills, we see in this case the real possibility that the United States Treasury will be pitted against the already hurting Canadian corn producers. This U.S. financial assistance to farmers is in itself another subsidy to U.S. producers who are already among the most highly subsidized in the world.
I call upon the Government to protest this action immediately and do whatever it can to block such an unfair U.S. plan.


LABOUR CONDITIONS
Mr. Nelson A. Riis (Kamloops-Shuswap):: Mr. Speaker, while there are some encouraging signs in today's employment figures, the jobless situation in most of Canada remains at an excessively high and totally unacceptable level.
The jobless figure for central British Columbia is 4 per cent higher than it was a year ago, while the jobless numbers for young people remain at virtually immorally high levels.
Youth unemployment in British Columbia has increased by 157 per cent during the 1980s, yet the Government has only provided summer job funds equal to those of last year. With no Expo jobs this summer, the job prospects for students and other young people in British Columbia will obviously be worse.
The federal Government has refused to recognize this critical fact in its funding for Challenge '87. While the Government points out that more than 90 per cent of all new jobs in Canada occur in the greater Toronto area, it should recognize that there is a Canada beyond Toronto in southern Ontario.
The unemployment crisis is continuing in all regions of Canada and is even increasing in the Province of Newfoundland. It is time the Government acknowledged this human tragedy and took immediate steps to bring it to an end.
May 8, 1987


DECLINE IN UNEMPLOYMENT LEVELS
Mrs. Mary Collins (Capilano):: Mr. Speaker, judging from the statements yesterday of Hon. Members opposite, and in fact the one just made by the Hon. Member for Kamloops- Shuswap (Mr. Riis), one might think that the Government has been negligent in its programs for youth, particularly our unemployed youth.
If the NDP and the Liberals would drop their partisan blinkers and take the time to examine the facts, they would see how the Government's policies are working. This morning we heard that unemployment is at its lowest level in five years, down to 9.3 per cent nationally.
How have we been able to bring down the unemployment rate by almost 2.5 percentage points? Well, it is mostly because of the sound economic policies of the Government, but also because of our very successful job-creation programs.
In my own riding of Capilano, for instance, the Challenge '87 program will create 187 jobs for students this summer. Over $350,000 in federal money has been committed to help give students valuable job experience. It is only one of many programs which is helping the people in my riding.
This is only one component of our job-creation program. The success of our total effort is there for all to see, as we beat down the unemployment rate and create jobs for all Canadians.

[ Translation]


TRANSPORT
Mr. Robert Toupin (Terrebonne):: Mr. Speaker, today I met with representatives of Local 375 of the International Longshoremen's Association, who condemned the hazardous situation prevailing in the Port of Montreal, where the accident rate is one of the highest in Quebec. Last year, there were 500 accidents. This was brought to the attention of the former and the present federal Minister of Labour (Mr. Cadieux), with no results. Deaths like that of Mr. Rene Leboeuf remain unexplained.
The ILA condemns the unconscionable attitude of Mr. Arnold Masters, President of the Maritime Employers' Association and a member of the Board of Directors of the Port of Montreal, and it is also critical of Mr. Masters' ties with the Prime Minister of Canada (Mr. Mulroney).
Furthermore, the ILA local has complained that negotiations to renew their collective agreement are now at an
impasse, that the situation is deteriorating and going from bad to worse.


STATUS OF WOWEN
Mr. Nic Leblanc (Longueuil):: Mr. Speaker, the Mulroney Government has made women's economic and social development a priority. The following is proof that it takes its commitment seriously. There are more jobs for women. There are 355,000 more women on the labour market than in September 1984; women's unemployment has dropped 2.3 points since the election; and the number of unemployed women has dropped nearly 100,000, compared with an increase of 243,000 under the Liberal Government. The 1986 Budget is a good deal for women. Advance payments of $300 for the child tax credit were made to families with incomes of $15,000 or less in 1985. We have done more for women in two years than the Liberals did in 20. That is why today, women are glad they elected a Conservative Government.
I want to take this opportunity today to wish our mothers a happy Mother's Day this coming Sunday.


INDUSTRY
Mr. Fernand Robichaud (Westmorland-Kent):: Mr. Speaker, the Maritime Lumber Bureau has issued a chilling estimate that more than half of the 7,300 sawmill workers in the Maritimes will be laid off within a year if the lumber export tax is not removed. The loss of so many jobs will threaten the very survival of a number of communities in the region where lumber mills are the mainstay of the economy. A case in point is Juniper, New Brunswick, whose survival depends on Juniper's continued lumber operations.

According to the study by the Maritime Lumber Bureau, if the Juniper plant closes down, the Government will have to pay more than $10 million annually in social benefits. Mr. Speaker, I am sure you will understand how important it is to exempt the Maritime provinces from this tax. Once again, I would urge the Government to take appropriate action.

May 8, 1987
Oral Questions


ASTRONOMY
Mr. Bill Tupper (Nepean-Carleton):: Mr. Speaker, through a collaborative agreement signed recently between the National Research Council and Britain's Scientific and Engineering Research Council, Canadian astronomers will have access to 25 per cent of the observing time on one of world's best ratio telescopes operating at sub-millimetric wavelengths, a previously inaccessible spectral window on the universe.
This facility, the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope, will start operating this June on the 4,300 metre high summit of Mount Mauna Kea in Hawaii. Mauna Kea is one of the world's best astronomical sites because of its very dry atmosphere and the absence of light pollution. For this reason, a growing number of major telescopes operate there at visible, infrared and millimetric wavelengths, including the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope, a world class facility used by Canadian astronomers working in the visible part of the spectrum.
The National Research Council will also give Canadian astronomers convenient access to the new frontier in astronomy, the unprecedented resolution and spectral coverage of the Hubble Space Telescope. Located far above the earth's atmosphere, the Space Telescope will provide opportunities for dramatic new discoveries when it is put in earth orbit in two years.
The next decades will truly be a rewarding time for Canadian astronomers and scientists.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Miss Aideen Nicholson (Trinity):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance. There was a time when Canadians knew that there were some rights they could count on: access to our social programs, for one, and, for another, that staple foods, the necessities of life, would not be taxed.
When the present Government came into office and embarked on its deficit-cutting program, Canadians were shocked at its insensitivity. It will be a long, long time before they forget that this is the Government that tried to tamper with senior citizens' pensions.
Now that the Finance Minister has announced his plan to introduce a new comprehensive sales tax on all goods and services, will he tell the House, yes or no, whether or not he is planning a bread and milk tax?


Hon. Michael Wilson (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, I thought that when the Hon. Member started her question about rights and the rights of Canadians, she was going to ask me a question about the unemployment rate and why it is down to its lowest level in five years at 9.3 per cent. Our Government has created 778,000 jobs since it took office.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Some of the weak areas that had been under pressure in manufacturing have now turned around. I believe my colleague, the Hon. Member for Capilano, will be very pleased to know, and the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap that-


Mr. Broadbent:: Answer the question. Make a statement on motions.


Mr. Gauthier:: He wants to cover the polls too.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Speaker:: I would remind the Hon. Minister who, I am sure, does not need any reminding, that there is an appropriate place to make statements and it follows one of the rubrics in Routine Proceedings. Perhaps the Hon. Minister could concentrate on the question that was asked and answer it.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Thank you very much for correcting me, Mr. Speaker. I got distracted by this good news.
In response to the Hon. Member's question, I have indicated that there will be a White Paper on tax reform June 18. At that time there will be a comprehensive proposal for tax reform put before the House and that particular question will be answered fully.


NATIONAL SALES TAX OPTION
Aideen Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, the Minister has said that some provinces are interested in his idea for a national sales tax although he will not say which ones. Will he tell the House what information the provinces have on which to base their interest? Has he made them a concrete proposal or do they too have to wait until June 18?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, over the course of the better part of the past year the provinces and the federal Government have been meeting extensively on tax reform. Both Ministers and officials have attended these meetings and they have provided a very fruitful, worth-while and constructive degree of consultation between us. It was during the course of these discussions on both personal and corporate income taxes as well as on sales tax reform that there was a consensus at the last meeting. The provinces asked
May 8, 1987

me to keep the option of a national sales tax open. That is what we are doing.
I have made it clear that the Government is committed to a comprehensive-based multi-stage tax as I indicated in my statement of Wednesday. Just how we implement that and what mechanism we will use will be the subject of further consultations with the provinces.


CONSUMPTION TAX INQUIRY
Aideen Nicholson: Mr. Speaker, some experts have estimated that layering on a federal sales tax of 7 per cent or 8 per cent to the existing excise taxes and the provincial sales taxes will mean that Canadians will be paying a consumption tax of about 20 per cent. Can the Minister confirm this? If not, is he willing to give us his estimate?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I know that the Hon. Member is known for her impatience and for her desire to get on with the job and I appreciate that. We want to get on with the job as well, but the answers to those questions cannot come in a piecemeal fashion. That is the purpose of comprehensive tax reform and that is the purpose of the White Paper that we will be bringing down on June 18. If the Hon. Member would just exercise a little bit of patience, I am sure she will be quite satisfied with the answers she receives at that time.


INQUIRY WHETHER GOVERNMENT INTENDS TO TAX RENTS AND HOUSE SALES
Mr. Alfonso Gagliano (Saint-Leonard-Anjou):: Mr. Speaker, I also wish to put a question to the Minister of Finance.
According to the Minister's statement in the House last Wednesday, the new federal sales tax, whatever form it may take, would be applied uniformly to all goods and services.
Could the Minister inform the House whether he intends to tax residential rents and sales?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I think I have to give the Hon. Member the same answers I have just given to his colleague. To answer these questions piecemeal in advance of the White Paper is surely not the appropriate way to reveal to Canadians the full impact, both positive and negative, and all the implications of tax reform. It should be done at one time so people can judge not only in response to one particular question but to the full impact of tax reform and how it affects them and others in whom they may be interested. That is the purpose of the White Paper and I am sure the Hon. Member should be able to wait until June 18 to get that answer.
Oral Questions


INQUIRY WHETHER POPULAR FOOD PRODUCTS WILL BE EXEMPTED OR TAXED
Alfonso Gagliano: Mr. Speaker, in the Minister's statement last Wednesday, it was clear that whatever form the new federal sales tax would take, it would apply uniformly to all goods and services.
Canadians are therefore wondering where the exemption comes in.
My supplementary is as follows:
Whatever the new federal sales tax turns out to be, will popular food products such as pizza, spaghetti, hamburgers, hot dogs and other kinds of snack foods be taxed or tax exempt?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I will have to give him the same answer and I do not want to use up the time of the House repeating it.
[DOT] (U25)


EFFECT OF TAX REFORM ON AVERAGE FAMILY
John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, I will try to be a little more successful with the Minister. I hope he will be more forthcoming than he has been so far today, indeed the past two days when he has refused to assure Canadians that the Conservative Government will not put a new tax on food.
The Minister is boasting about tax reform. If it is going to be genuine reform then presumably Canadians will not be paying any more after tax reform than they were when the Government was elected in 1984. Will the Minister at least assure the average family that following this so-called tax reform package their taxes will not be any higher than when the Conservative Government was elected in September, 1984?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I am not able to pull those numbers out of the top of my head.


John Edward Broadbent: Funny, you could pull others out.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: However, I am sure the Hon. Member will be well satisfied with the results of tax reform. The balance of taxation will be fairer as between different income groups, corporate and personal income tax, and different parts of industry. One of the key objectives of tax reform is to provide a more equitable balance of taxation among all Canadians.


John Edward Broadbent: Average Canadians want a fairer system but they also know the Government has overtaxed them and they want to pay less taxes, not simply have a fairer system.


REQUEST FOR GUARANTEE ON TAX LEVELS
John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, since becoming Minister of Finance he has inflicted upon the people

May 8, 1987
Oral Questions
of Canada three Budgets and one budget statement. Gasoline taxes and the federal sales tax have both been increased three times. There were two major increases in income taxes. Considering the increase in the burden on the average family amounts to several hundred dollars since September, 1984, will the Minister at least guarantee that taxes will not be any higher after reform than when he was elected? Yes or no?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, I think I effectively answered that question in response to his first question. If he wishes to check with his colleague, he will know that I said yesterday that a good majority of Canadians will be paying less tax after the impact of both personal and sales taxes. That is a good step forward.
The Hon. Member should also look at the broader picture here and understand what we have done to make the tax system more fair. We brought in a minimum tax. We removed the scientific research tax credit. We made the rules on limited partnerships much fairer and tighter to avoid abuse. We removed the carve-outs. We removed the financing of yachts and hotels, things like that which gave upper-income Canadians and companies some tax breaks that average Canadians were not getting. That is what 1 mean when I say we are trying to get a fairer tax system. We are well on the road to doing that. We have made some good changes so far. That process will continue into tax reform.


John Edward Broadbent: The Minister also gave rich Canadians a $500,000 lifetime capital gains tax exemption.


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Darling:: Tell the farmers that.


John Edward Broadbent: He left that out of his little list.


INQUIRY WHETHER FAMILY WILL PAY MORE TAX THAN IN 1984
John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, the middle class wants to know whether this family is going to pay less or more after the tax reform than it did in 1984. The Minister ought to answer this question today. Is this going to be a frank and forthright reform of our tax system, yes or no?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, let me respond to that most inappropriate preamble. The capital gains tax exemption was directed primarily at farmers and small business people.


John Edward Broadbent: Restrict it to them.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: The Hon. Member is expressing some concern about small business people. I am very proud that this particular initiative has encouraged small business people to create more jobs. Look at the number of new companies which has been created, and each company is creating more jobs. That is why 778,000 jobs have been
created since September of 1984. I believe 80 or 85 per cent of the jobs have been created by that community which has been encouraged to do so by the policies of the Government.


POSSIBILITY OF FOOD TAX QUERIED
Mr. Jacques Guilbault (Saint-Jacques):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance. Millions of Canadians living below the poverty line are worried that their food will be taxed and the Minister is doing nothing to soothe their fears. On the contrary, mixed signals are coming from the other side of the House. Yesterday the chairman of the finance committee said:
I'm not getting worried about taxing food. I mean if you're going to tax
clothing in this cold climate why wouldn't you tax food. If you're going to tax
home heating oil, why wouldn't you tax food?
That worries us and that worries millions of Canadians. I would like the Minister to quit his fancy figure skating. Yes or no, will food be taxed? I hope he will say no.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, if admonishments are to be made across the floor of the House of Commons, 1 would admonish the Hon. Member not to quote as selectively as he has just done.
One of the key elements of any sales tax reform, which has been widely recognized as being progressive by the social policy groups of the country, is the inclusion of a low-income refundable sales tax credit which will change the nature of sales tax for the low-income Canadians to whom the Hon. Member has just referred. That is a very progressive element of tax reform and that is one of the reasons I say that the tax reform we will bring in will be seen as fair.


REQUEST FOR CLARIFICATION
Jacques Guilbault: Mr. Speaker, the Minister just mentioned that a tax credit might be used to help those in need and on low incomes. Are we to conclude this is an admission there will be a tax on food and that low-income Canadians will get a tax refund? Is that what he meant in his previous answer?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, if the Hon. Member had listened carefully he would have heard that I said a refundable tax credit. In other words, cash would be put back into the pockets of low-income Canadians to offset the impact of any sales tax proposal.


Mr. Axworthy:: What are they to be taxed on?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: the White Paper is to set out in broad terms the specific proposals of the Government on tax reform.


Lloyd Axworthy: Does it include food?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Exercise some patience, Lloyd. Exercise some patience.


CHILD CARE
Ms. Margaret Mitchell (Vancouver East):: Mr. Speaker, my question is also for the Minister of Finance. Yesterday the Minister of National Health and Welfare publicly admitted his disappointment in the recommendations of the Special Committee on Child Care because they will not extend the supply of badly needed child care spaces. He said that over 2.5 million children need care right now.
Does the Minister of Finance agree with child care experts across Canada that the $400 million cost of tax measures which was recommended by the Special Committee on Child Care will not create desperately needed child care services? Will he recommend that this amount of money be spent on quality child care services instead?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, as the Hon. Member knows, there have been a number of proposals on child care. The Government has said that it will be responding. The Prime Minister has initiated a process of discussing these proposals with the provinces. My colleague, the Minister of National Health and Welfare, has that process well under way. There will be a response from the Government in due course. That is the type of question which will be responded to at that time.


REQUEST THAT GRANTS BE PAID TO PROVINCES
Margaret Anne Mitchell: Mr. Speaker, the crisis in child care is here now. If, as the Minister says, there are more parents working, their children are in addition to the over two million children which need care. We need immediate action as well as long-term planning.
While waiting for the completion of this long-term process, during which children could grow up, will he allocate the $300 million which is reserved in the Estimates for health and welfare to direct grants to provinces to deal with the child care crisis? Incidentally, this would create over 20,000 new spaces each year.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has initiated a process which-


Margaret Anne Mitchell: The Prime Minister promised child care action.
Oral Questions


Michael Holcombe Wilson: The Hon. Member is chirping over there. We must understand that a process is under way.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: A crisis is under way.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: This is a federation. The provinces are part of the federation and have direct responsibility to deliver child care. The Hon. Member should understand, particularly in light of the support which her Party has given to the Meech Lake Agreement of last Thursday, that it is important that we allow federal-provincial processes to work. That is what is happening. It is a very productive process.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: In the meantime you can do something about the crisis.


Michael Holcombe Wilson: In a very short time there will be reports from the Government of Canada.


AGRICULTURE
Maurice Brydon Foster: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Deputy Prime Minister. Yesterday angry farmers picketed the Prime Minister outside North Battleford and demanded a commitment to a deficiency payment for the 1987 crop year. Canadian farmers simply cannot survive on $2.50 a bushel for their best wheat when American farmers are getting over $6 a bushel.
When is the Deputy Prime Minister going to stop stonewalling farmers? When is he going to end the uncertainty? When is he going to make it clear what deficiency payment or assistance will be provided for the 1987 crop year?


Hon. Don Mazankowski (Deputy Prime Minister and President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, certainly not to minimize the very serious problems in agriculture, I do not think that a demonstration by 40 members of the New Democratic Party is something about which one would want to get overly alarmed.


Some Hon. Members:: Shame, shame!


Donald Frank Mazankowski: It was probably well orchestrated. The fact is that, as has been indicated in this House on many occasions, the Minister of Agriculture and the Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board are working very closely with the farm leaders to address not only short-term but long-term plans.
When the Hon. Member suggests that wheat is averaging $2.50 a bushel he is somewhat inaccurate in that for domestic consumption the price is $7. When you consider the impact of the deficiency payment, the covering of the losses in the Pools,

May 8, 1987
Oral Questions
the transportation subsidies, and all the other programs, it works out to considerably more than $2.50 a bushel. In the interest of honesty he should state that categorically so that this issue is not confused.


FARM DEBT REVIEW BOARDS
[Stage Direction]
Mir. Maurice Foster (Algoma): Mr. Speaker, the farmers want a commitment about a deficiency payment for the 198788 crop year. I hope the Deputy Prime Minister will give consideration to that.
A week ago today the Government started foreclosures on FCC loans, over 6,000 of which are in arrears by more than two years. The farmers picketing the Prime Minister in North Battleford yesterday and the select 15 who attended his farm meeting in Saskatoon, who supposedly are the hard-core Tory supporters, told the Prime Minister that the Farm Debt Review Boards are biased in favour of the banks.
Is the Deputy Prime Minister willing to bring in new legislation to ensure that the Farm Debt Review Boards help farmers and are not only biased in favour of the banks and helping farmers off the farm? We want to keep the farmers on the farms.
Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure under what licence and authority the Hon. Member pretends to speak for all farmers. It is interesting to note an article in today's Edmonton Journal about a coalition that is being organized which recommends that the national Government should consider providing less subsidization rather than more subsidization.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Did you organize that?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: In terms of addressing the problem, deficiency support is certainly one element of the cure. However, clearly there are some longer-term steps that have to be taken, such as resolving the international marketing situation on which this Government is taking a strong position and exercising strong leadership.
As far as his comments with respect to the Farm Debt Review Boards are concerned, I think the success rate is very commendable, at some 65 per cent or 66 per cent. If there are some problems and concerns with regard to the manner in which they are functioning, I am sure the Prime Minister would be interested, as I would be interested to know about that. If the Hon. Member has any specific cases or evidence that the Farm Debt Review Boards have been operating in a manner unfair to farmers, I wish he would bring that to the attention of the respective Ministers.


DEFICIENCY PAYMENT-PRIME MINISTER'S TALK WITH FARMERS
Mr. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: Mr. Speaker, perhaps some of those New Democrats could have helped fill those empty seats in Lethbridge.
My question is directed to the Deputy Prime Minister. Yesterday the Prime Minister met some 16 hand-picked Tories in a tool-shed near Saskatoon. Perhaps they should have taken him out to a wood-shed rather than a tool-shed.
In light of the Prime Minister's statement to those 16 handpicked Tories that: "We must make sure that farmers survive until the trade war is over", does this mean that the Prime Minister is committed to a deficiency payment for the crop year 1987-88? Is it an indication that he means there will be a new deficiency payment?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I do not know why the Hon. Member takes exception to the fact that the Prime Minister is meeting with actual farmers, farmers on the land. Why would he take exception to that?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


An Hon. Member:: All seven of them.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Perhaps it represents the narrowness and shallowness of the Hon. Member.
The Prime Minister has said time and time again that the Government will not stand idly by and see the farmers go down the tube. We will fight this on various fronts at the international level. We will fight it by reducing input costs, and we will fight it by direct support to the farmers, as we have done, as we are doing, and as we will continue to do.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: This guy sounds more like Allan MacEachen every day with his non-answers.


FARM CREDIT CORPORATION-ENDING OF LOAN MORATORIUM
Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, during the Prime Minister's three-day photo opportunity on the Prairies, these hand-picked Tory farmers told him that there was a crisis. In light of that and the fact that he has refused to meet the leaders of the Wheat Pools, is the Prime Minister prepared to reverse the callous decision of the federal Government to end the moratorium on Farm Credit Corporation loans? Is the Prime Minister at least ready to reverse that callous decision in order to help some of the farmers survive?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister is not refusing to meet with the representatives of the Pools. He has met with them before and will meet with them again.


John Edward Broadbent: At the next election.
May 8, 1987


Donald Frank Mazankowski: The Leader of the socialists says: "The next election". He may want to reconsider that because if he is interested in being fair he knows that the Prime Minister has met with all farm leaders, including the leaders of the Pools. My understanding is that he will be meeting them again in May or June.


Nelson Andrew Riis: You sound defensive.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: I am not defensive in the least. The fact of the matter is that we have a proud record on agriculture and I am simply trying to correct some erroneous and false statements that are coming from the mouths of the western Members representing the socialists.
The fact is that the Minister of Finance and the Minister for International Trade will be meeting with the OECD, and agriculture will be at the top of the list. That is where we will find the long-term solution.
In the meantime, as I have said, we are providing support on a direct level. We are reducing input costs and we will continue to work hand-in-glove with the farmers to work out a solution that will be seen as reasonable and fair to them as well as to all Canadians.


SENATE REFORM
Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Deputy Prime Minister. According to the agreement reached by the Premiers and the Prime Minister last week, there is an interim arrangement whereby the provinces would put forward nominees to the Senate. As the Deputy Prime Minister may know, western Liberals, in the spirit of Senate reform, have put forward the proposal that those nominees-


Some Hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Michael Holcombe Wilson: You will never make it, Lloyd.


Lloyd Axworthy: Is there something tickling their interest, Mr. Speaker? They have put forward the proposal that those nominees coming from the provinces should be chosen by an election of the people in each of the provinces. Does the federal Government favour that proposal, provided that those provincial nominees would be selected or chosen by way of general election in each of the provinces? Will the Government guarantee that if that was the case it would automatically accept those nominees as members of the Senate?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I am not sure
Oral Questions
whether the Hon. Member is making that representation as an official policy of the Liberal Party. If so, he had better get his act together with his Leader because today he is reported as saying that the "accord snuffs out chances of an elected Senate". Those are the words of the Leader of the Liberal Party. Maybe they should get their act together and then come to the House to present their position.


PROPOSAL TO ELECT SENATORS
Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, I will ask the same question. Does the Deputy Prime Minister believe that the present accord snuffs out an opportunity for an elected Senate and, if so, will the Government be prepared to accept a proposal that would at least indicate a willingness to begin finding ways out of the conundrum that has been posed, and ensure that in western provinces where people want an elected Senate it could find a way through this particular arrangement where at least that process can begin?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I guess the Hon. Member is asking whether I agree with him or his Leader. The fact is that I agree with the Prime Minister and the First Ministers who signed an accord. Obviously, if the western Premiers signed the accord and were committed to the process of an elected Senate, I would think that they would see this is a step forward, as do we.


INDUSTRY
Mr. Rod Murphy (Churchill):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Deputy Prime Minister. He knows that there is a crisis in the meat-packing industry in western Canada and that plant after plant has closed in Winnipeg, Manitoba, over the last five years. Considering that the Prime Minister is in Winnipeg at this time, does the Government have any intention to make sure that there is a strong, viable meatpacking industry in the City of Winnipeg?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member said that there was a crisis in the meat-packing industry in western Canada. I am aware of a number of companies that are actively seeking and proposing to expand meat-packing facilities in western Canada. This is one of the matters that is under consideration by the Minister for Regional Industrial Expansion. I think the answer to the Hon. Member's question in terms of western Canada is that the future is bright.

May 8, 1987
Oral Questions


WINNIPEG MEAT PACKING PLANTS
Rodney Edward Murphy: Mr. Speaker, the workers at those plants that are closing down and the farmers who deliver their goods to those plants do not think that it is a great economic situation. Will the Government do anything at all to maintain the meat-packing plants in the City of Winnipeg?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, my answer is the same. I have indicated that the prospect for expansion of the meat-packing industry in western Canada is fairly bright. That is evidenced by the fact that a number of companies are considering expanding their operations there.
I know that the matter raised in the Member's specific question has been considered by the Minister of Regional Industrial Expansion. It is also my understanding that proposals have been offered to encourage those facilities to stay. However, that is essentially a decision that has to be made by the companies themselves. I know that the socialists like to interfere, with their grand scheme, but there are certain-


John Edward Broadbent: Sterling Lyon used to say that.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: -there are certain decisions that we believe must be left to the market-place.


SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
William Tupper: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of State for Science and Technology. Several witnesses appearing before the Standing Committee on Research, Science and Technology recently raised a concern about a cut-back of an NSERC scholarship program that would provide students with a valuable summer work experience in industrial laboratories and universities. Could the Minister tell us this morning why NSERC has decided to deprive students of this valuable work experience, especially at a time when its budget was increased by some S700 million or $800 million?


Hon. Frank Oberle (Minister of State for Science and Technology):: Mr. Speaker, what my hon. colleague and friend is talking about here is a decision that was made last year by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council to rearrange its priorities with a view to strengthening its operating grants program which has resulted in the admission of over 400 new researchers into the program. This was a rearrangement of priorities. It is unfortunate that it has to take place from time to time. But there are still quite a number of
summer students who will gain the work experience about which the Hon. Member is talking.


FILM INDUSTRY
Mrs. Sheila Finestone (Mount Royal):: Mr. Speaker, last February the Minister of Communications announced with a great deal of fanfare a new licensing policy which would enable Canadian film distributors to reinvest in the production and promotion of Canadian-made films. In the absence of the Minister of Communications I direct my question to the Deputy Prime Minister.
Are the pressures that are being brought to bear on Canada by the U.S. Congress and the American film industry giving the Canadian Government second thoughts about this film distribution policy? Is this another scorched-earth undertaking? Why has the Government delayed introducing the Minister's announced legislation which she herself has termed a direct cultural benefit vital to the development of a healthy Canadian film industry?


Donald Frank Mazankowski: Mr. Speaker, I am advised that the Minister of Communications has met with representatives of the American film industry in an attempt to persuade them that this proposal would not restrict the entry of American films into Canada. Those discussions are ongoing. I think it is a matter of setting the record straight and educating our American friends to this reality. That is the sort of dialogue that is going on at the present time.


INTRODUCTION OF LEGISLATION
Sheila Finestone: Mr. Speaker, the Minister may not be intimidated but I wonder if Cabinet is being intimidated. I want to know when the Government will honour the Minister's commitment made last February to the Canadian film industry. Is the Government going to wilt under this heavy American pressure or will it undertake to introduce this policy before the end of June?


Hon. Pat Carney (Minister for International Trade):: Mr. Speaker, I should point out that the efforts of the Minister of Communications and the Government-


Sheila Finestone: Yes, what about yours?


Pat Carney: May I be allowed to finish, Mr. Speaker?
The efforts of the Minister of Communications and the Government have made this policy possible for the first time in 50 years. It is the first time in 50 years that any Canadian Government has tried to open up the film distribution business in Canada to Canadians. I would like to point out that only 3 per cent of the screening time in Canadian theatres is available
May 8, 1987

Oral Questions STATUS OF WOMEN
for Canadian films. That is why the Government is acting on this issue. Legislation will be introduced.


MESSAGE SENT BY MEMBERS OF UNITED STATES CONGRESS
Mr. Steven W. Langdon (Essex-Windsor):: Mr. Speaker, let me see if I can pin down precisely what is happening in this case. Will the Deputy Prime Minister confirm that most members of the Ways and Means Committee of the U.S. Congress and Senator Lloyd Bensten, the head of the U.S. Finance Committee, have written to the Government with respect to this Bill? Have they tied what they have written to whether or not they would support free trade when the issue goes from Canada to the U.S. Congress later this year?


Pat Carney: Mr. Speaker, both the Deputy Prime Minister and myself have indicated that we feel that some Americans have over-reacted to this proposed policy and have blown it all out of proportion. Any adverse impact on the U.S. industry in Canada would be small compared to the continuing profits, and would be infinitesimal compared to the U.S. trade surplus in the trade and cultural goods and services area, which is $1.3 billion per year. We feel that the concern being expressed in the U.S. is understandable. While Americans have had this kind of access to this market, we intend to make sure that the distribution process is more open to Canadians. 1 do not understand why the NDP is constantly opposing this initiative to protect our cultural industries.


POSITION OF UNITED STATES
Steven W. Langdon: Mr. Speaker, I asked a very straight question about whether, in fact, communications had been received. I am sorry that the Minister has not the heart to give a straight answer. Does the Minister not have a clear sense that this kind of blackmail being exercised at this stage shows us precisely the kinds of dangers that we will see in the future if we get ourselves into a position in which we are so tied to the United States that it can go after every piece of legislation here which it does not like and threaten us with either elimination of the trade treaty or with not signing it?


Pat Carney: Mr. Speaker, I fail to understand how the NDP can suggest that we are so tied that our move in film distribution would tie us further to the Americans. Our whole point is that 97 per cent of the films shown in Canada are not Canadian films. Our effort is to try to untie the distribution process so that Canadians have more access.
In terms of the specific questions about exchange of letters, that is public information. Senator Bensten has written the Prime Minister about his concern. The Prime Minister has responded saying that he feels that this is an issue which should not cause any concern to the Americans.


BLACK WATCH REGIMENT-PARTICIPATION OF FEMALE MEMBERS IN TROOPING THE COLOUR CEREMONY
Mary Collins: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. This morning an incredible article appeared in The Montreal Gazette indicating that female members of the famous Black Watch Regiment would be excluded from the trooping of the colour when the Queen Mother visits Montreal next month for the regiment's one hundred and twenty-fifth anniversary. I understand that, apparently, the female members of the regiment do not wear kilts. I hope that the Minister will not skirt around this issue.
Given the Minister's very good record in promoting equality for women in the Canadian Armed Forces, can he confirm today that, first, the story is not true and, second, that the women members of the regiment will participate in the trooping of the colour?


Hon. Perrin Beatty (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, both as Solicitor General and as Minister of National Defence I have had the privilege of working with women who are in occupations which were previously reserved for men. In every single instance of which I am aware they have acquitted themselves admirably.
If the male members of the Black Watch are going on parade for the Queen Mother, then the female members will be on parade as well.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
V *	*


IMMIGRATION
Mr. Sergio Marchi (York West):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Immigration. It concerns the growing lucrative and illegal industry of unscrupulous immigration consultants. I have raised repeated requests in this House that the Government clamp down on these operators. Instead, we have to rely on a front page investigation in The Toronto Star today which shows that one John Santos has earned at least $600,000, lives in a European villa by the ocean, and owns a $50,000 Mercedes, thanks to the proceeds of his illegal refugee scams. This is typical, and it is going unchallenged.
I would like to ask the Minister this. Rather than continue to turn a blind eye to these operators, rather than legislate against genuine refugees, and rather than slap on visa after visa, will the Minister not move forcefully and immediately to eliminate the source of this cancerous activity rather than simply dealing ineffectively with its symptoms?

May 8, 1987
Oral Questions
[ Translation]


Hon. Benoit Bouchard (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, on several occasions, I have indicated in this House to the Hon. Member for York West that we have had to use the means available in this country to take action against these people. I agree that this is a difficult and unacceptable situation.
I repeat that whenever we are made aware of so-called dishonest actions in whatever area, we refer the cases to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police for an investigation and, if necessary, we ask the Minister of Justice to institute legal proceedings.
The RCMP has now completed its investigation and made the necessary representations to the Department of Justice; I suggest we should wait for the result. Should the Department of Justice feel the need to prosecute, it will certainly do so.


Sergio Marchi: Mr. Speaker, Canadians are getting tired of that same answer. Is it not ironic that the number of refugee scams has intensified with each stringent measure the Government has announced along the way?


REQUEST THAT PROSECUTIONS BE INSTITUTED
Sergio Marchi: Given that there are elaborate schemes and networks of rings operating in Turkey, Portugal, Lebanon and now even in Brazil, we need two answers; first, we need to send out a strong signal by immediately legally prosecuting these operators and; second, we must avoid stringent legislation such as that announced on Tuesday because it only serves to encourage more people like John Santos who will take advantage of the real life-threatening situation facing refugees, thus forcing them through the back doors of our country and other countries of the world.


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for York West may think whatever he pleases of the legislation tabled on Tuesday. We know what Canadians think of it, and that is quite good enough for us.
Now, if the Hon. Member suggests that we should disregard the normal procedures in this country for legal prosecutions, if he has devised a new set of procedures which would make it possible for us to disregard the recommendations of the Department of Justice and the RCMP, he should come right out and say so.
But as long as I remain Minister of Employment and Immigration, I will continue to use the procedure provided for in this country.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I will recognize the Hon. Member for Windsor-Walkerville, followed by the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence.


LABOUR CONDITIONS
Mr. Howard McCurdy (Windsor-Walkerville):: Mr. Speaker, a few moments ago the Minister of Finance said he was excited about this month's unemployment figures. Before he breaks out the champagne, I would like to get the impression of the Minister of Employment and Immigration about the situation in Newfoundland where the unemployment rate is 4 per cent higher this year than last year. One thousand additional people found themselves on the unemployment rolls and the youth unemployment rate is 33 per cent. What is the Minister's impression of those figures? And what is he going to do about it?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, the New Democrats are singletrack minded. The unemployment rate went up in only one province this month. I wish the Hon. Member would refer to British Columbia, among other provinces, where unemployment has declined by 1 per cent. In terms of unemployment we have reached a five-year low and the over-all job creation situation in this country has not been so promising in six or seven years.
The Hon. Member should single out a province which we all agree is experiencing economic expansion problems which we have addressed. Among other things, this year we have invested $5 million more than expected in the Atlantic provinces through the employment development program.
I would suggest that Canadians are enthusiastic about our job creation performance, and the figures speak for themselves.
All I can do is urge the Hon. Member for Windsor- Walkerville to look at them.


REQUEST THAT PRIME MINISTER VISIT NEWFOUNDLAND
Howard Douglas McCurdy: Mr. Speaker, may I suggest to the Minister that, having finished his trip out west, the Prime Minister may want to go to Newfoundland and explain how good things are in British Columbia to the unemployed in Newfoundland?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, I can understand why the Hon.
May 8, 1987

Member feels so disappointed because any Friday is always the best time to convey good news to Canadians.
One more comment with which he will agree, I am sure. For the past five months Canada has experienced a steady employment increase in the manufacturing sector. I know my colleague is a specialist and fully appreciates the fact that this entails firm growth in a number of other sectors over the coming months. Even the New Democrats ought to be pleased when the figures are excellent.

Privilege-Mr. Thacker
Member agrees, I will check with the department and give a more specific answer pretty soon.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: It is my duty pursuant to Section 9 of the Representation Act, 1985, to lay upon the table a certified copy of the 1987 report of the Electoral Boundaries Commission for the Province of New Brunswick.


Mr. Roland de Corneille (Eglinton-Lawrence):: In the
absence of the Secretary of State for External Affairs and because the Deputy Prime Minister has just left, I address my question to the Minister of Finance. In view of the fact that international students studying in Canada contribute about $400 million each year to the Canadian economy, and in view of the fact that differential fees and bureaucratic red tape have discouraged foreign students from coming to Canada to study, why has the Government allowed a 43 per cent drop in the number of international students over the past few years, to the great detriment of our economy?


Michael Holcombe Wilson: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member has posed a question which has a number of very precise details about which, I am sure he will understand, I am not fully briefed. However, I will bring that question to the attention of the Secretary of State for External Affairs upon his return from Europe.


ENTRY OF FOREIGN STUDENTS TO WORK PROGRAMS
[Stage Direction]
* *
*

Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The Chair has received notice of a question of privilege from the Hon. Member for Lethbridge- Foothills.


Mr. Blaine A. Thacker (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege. The Hon. Member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom) has inadvertently, I am sure-probably by listening to the national media

insulted all of southern Alberta and its warm hospitality, and that affects my rights and privileges.


Some Hon. Members:: Order.


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary question is addressed to the Minister of Employment and Immigration. What is being done about the fact that international students are often denied entry into the work co-operation programs, and in the case of those students who are allowed to work, the Government makes them pay pension and unemployment insurance deductions but will not allow them to have the benefits?
[ Translation]
Why maintain this unfair practice when obviously it discourages students who would otherwise seriously consider studying in Canada?


Benoît Bouchard: Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend will understand that I would like to give a very specific and accurate answer as well as be sure about the figures put forward. If the Hon.


Blaine Allen Thacker: I ask him to withdraw the allegation because I can assure the Hon. Member, as his colleague in this House, that over 700 people jammed the ballroom in Lethbridge and overflowed into the corridors outside.


Some Hon. Members:: Order.


Blaine Allen Thacker: One lady even had to be taken out by doctors because of the heat and the crush. I ask the Hon. Member to withdraw because he knows southern Albertans have given warm hospitality to the Prime Minister.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I believe the Hon. Member has made his point. I am not sure it is a question of privilege.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: May I just say, Mr. Speaker, that I am the last Member in the House who should question the wisdom of the reporting of the fourth estate.
5900___________________________________
Privilege-Mr. Weiner PRIVILEGE


ALLEGED INACCURACY IN MINISTER'S ANSWER
Hon. Gerry Weiner (Minister of State (Immigration)):: Mr. Speaker, further to the question of privilege raised yesterday by the Hon. Member for Laurier (Mr. Berger), I would like to clarify my response to the Hon. Member for York West (Mr. Marchi) on page 5796 of Hansard and the misunderstanding over the omission of the word "not".
The first opportunity I had to read Hansard was following the Hon. Member's question of privilege yesterday. I had my staff check the video. What I clearly said was that: "the first step is not a pre-screening". I am advised by a member of my staff that in a review of the "blues" the word "not" was omitted.
I apologize for any inconvenience this matter may have caused the Hon. Member or the House.




Mrs. Gabrielle Bertrand (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 106(8), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the Government's response to Petition Nos. 332-1564, 332-1612, 332-1621, 332-1649, 3321733 to 332-1744 inclusive, 332-1804 to 332-1810 inclusive, 332-1829, 332-1877 to 332-1879 inclusive, 332-1914 to 3321917 inclusive, 332-1923 to 332-1925 inclusive and 332-2009.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, although it is unfortunately a little late because the Government has used closure on a number of occasions to choke off debate on Bill C-22, the Bill to amend the Patent Act, we are still receiving petitions to present.
It is a pleasure and an honour to present, pursuant to Standing Order 106, a petition on behalf of a number of petitioners from the constituency of Kamloops-Shuswap who are of the impression that federal Government proposals to change the Patent Act relating to prescription drugs will increase drug prices for average Canadian consumers and will severely restrict their ability to buy necessary prescription drugs.
May 8, 1987
They ask the Parliament of Canada to reject these proposals. There is still chance that might happen if the Senate were to hear these petitions, evaluate the information before it, and stop this punitive legislation.



EXPORT AND IMPORT PERMITS ACT


Pat Carney: for leave to introduce Bill C-57, an Act to amend the Export and Import Permits Act.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Shall the Hon. Minister have leave to introduce the Bill?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, Bill read the first time and ordered to be printed.

[Stage Direction]
MEECH LAKE AGREEMENT On the Order: Government Notices of Motions:
May 6, 1987-The Prime Minister:
That this House endorses the Meech Lake statement of principles approved by all First Ministers, April 30, 1987 as a basis for Quebec's participation as a full partner in the Canadian Constitution, and as a basis for the establishment, in the spirit of equality and fairness, of a process for considering further constitutional reforms.
['Agreed.', 'May 8, 1987']
Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Pursuant to Standing Order 24(2), this Government Notice of Motion stands transferred to and ordered for consideration under Government Orders later this day or at the next sitting of the House.



Gabrielle Bertrand: Mr. Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Shall the remaining questions stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.

May 8, 1987



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
ALLOTTED DAY, S. O. 82-STATUS OF WOMEN Ms. Margaret Mitchell (Vancouver East) moved:
That this House condemns the Government for failing to recognize the real value of women's work in the workplace, the community and in the home with tangible policies that would ensure adequate incomes, removal of barriers and full opportunities for equal participation in decision making and in the political life of Canada.
She said: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak on behalf of the New Democratic Party today on the motion which indicates that we indeed condemn the Government for failing to recognize the real value of women's work in the workplace, in the community, and in the home. We feel that it should be recognized with tangible government policies, not just words, which would ensure adequate incomes, the removal of many barriers still remaining, and full opportunities for equal participation in decision-making and in the political life of Canada.
On Sunday, children young and old across Canada will celebrate Mother's Day to show their love and appreciation for the person who in most families still assumes major homemaking responsibilities as well as often works in the workplace and contributes in many ways to the community.
A few weeks ago we celebrated secretary's week. It was a week when bosses took their secretaries to lunch and often continued to pay low wages for the rest of the year.
Most women would agree that it is certainly nice to be loved and officially appreciated. We agree that this should be done not only once a year but on a year-round basis. It would be very nice if women had equal opportunities in all areas of their lives, including shared parental responsibilities and adequate income year-round.
The Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) has talked about equality quite frequently. Elis words look good on paper. We approve of the statement made at the First Ministers' Conference in Vancouver. We also approve of the appointment of two women judges. It was a major step forward.
However, most federal government policies-and it is policies which really count for women-lag far behind. While the policies and the legislation do not meet our expectations, I must say that the actions, the behaviour, and the attitudes of many Tory back-benchers are completely unacceptable. These days many of them seem to be scurrying about, extolling patriarchal values, eating illicit muffins, and trying through committees to move us backward in time as far as equality is concerned.
The Government has stated very strongly that it is for equality. Unfortunately it is being denied in the process. I have participated in two committees which have travelled across the country and spoken with women's groups. My sisters on the
Supply
other side of the House would agree that we want to be proud that all Members of Parliament are supporting equality and are trying to show appreciation to the many millions of Canadian women who have worked hard for equality over the past 15 years, and even before then. I am referring to the challenge which is under way regarding Secretary of State funding for women's programs. I will return to it later.
The New Democratic Party wants to pay tribute to millions of Canadian women who have worked long and hard to remove barriers for women. There are literally millions of them involved in different organizations across the country. They insist upon equality. Perhaps it is sometimes a little hard for a Government in power to take.
There will be a very strong lobby from the National Action Committee on the Status of Women on Monday. At least, I hope it will be very strong and well-informed as it always is. Women's groups like the NAC lobby constantly for legislative reform.
Women in the women's movement and organizations across the country, including organizations which have existed for many years, such as the Canadian Council of Women, give each other mutual support while they are working toward a change. Literally millions of Canadian women, as I said, are declaring that they will not go backward. They resent having to spend time and energy defending what they now have. They really resent reactionaries.
I know there are many Tory back-benchers who feel very strongly about equality, and I see some of them sitting in the House today. However, having been on two committees, I can tell the House that there are many who are not convinced and are actively working in the other direction.
I should now like to concentrate upon issues of concern to women who work in the workplace, in the home, and in the community. I remind Hon. Members very quickly, in the time available, of the barriers to equality that still exist about which we all know. In fact, in some areas they are increasing. We are concerned that we need effective, tangible government programs and policies to deal with the problems, to come to grips with the increasing and incredible poverty faced by women and the violence they are still facing despite all of us trying to work on the issue. They are faced with many inequalities, including very little participation in decisionmaking levels of all areas of life in Canada, but particularly in Government.
Very quickly on the economic situation for women, and I know my colleague will be commenting on this in more detail later, I regret to say that it is not improving. Let us have a look at the facts. First, let us consider the wage gap between men and women. Women's wages we know have been lower than men's for some time. It is appalling that the gap is increasing. In 1984, the average wage for women was 65.5 per cent of the average wage for men. Last year it was 64.9 per cent. It is
[Stage Direction]
May 8, 1987
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worsening. I was quite shocked to hear that in British Columbia, my province, women are earning 61.6 per cent of men's earnings. That is, women are earning 61-cent dollars, and yet there are so many of them, more than in any other province, who are raising families alone and who are in desperate poverty.
There is no question that we need much stronger equal pay for work of equal value, not only in the Public Service, the federal jurisdiction, but throughout society. We need enforcement of employment equity. We need pay equity legislation nationally as well as provincially.
Women continue to work primarily in low-paying job ghettos. The Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women has done studies on the Canadian Jobs Strategy programs and so has the Canadian Congress on Learning Opportunities for Women. In both studies it found that the Canadian Jobs Strategy is not helping to improve the situation for women. It is just reinforcing the trends that are there. Many of the training programs and job opportunities are in pink-collar jobs. Women are being directed to the low-paying job ghettos, even for re-entry programs. This is not improving the situation. We have to use government programs to open up new opportunities in non-traditional jobs and into jobs that are better paid, something that is not happening through the existing training programs.
We do not have effective affirmative action yet in our federal service. We must have a new look at the employment equity legislation from the point of view of making it mandatory. Women continue to be the major players in part-time jobs. Some people will say that that is fine because they have children and they just want to work part-time. Maybe that is the case sometimes but it is not all the time. There are many women who do not have much choice. Regardless of why they are part-time workers, they surely have the right to decent rates of pay, to benefits, to be able to pay into the Canada Pension Plan and so on. We asked the Minister responsible for the Status of Women, who I am glad to see in the House today, to look at the Canada Labour Code and to bring in reforms that will speed this up and help to cover prorated benefits for part-time workers, 70 per cent of whom are women.
We believe also that women's jobs are being threatened by certain government policies, certainly by privatization, often into non-union job categories by contracting out within groups like Canada Employment where we find more and more of this. As well I will include deregulation. There has not been protection for women. I hope there will be a serious in-depth study of the impact of these government policies.
In my question earlier today I mentioned that working parents have over 2.5 million children who need care. Workers who are parents, both men and women, need improved maternity and parental leave. Here again, I hope the Government, led by the Minister responsible for the Status of Women, will make sure that unemployment insurance coverage is improved to cover longer periods of benefits, certainly for maternity. Eventually over a number of years, we would like to allow maternity leave to 41 weeks with increased
benefits so that women and men, fathers and mothers, will have a choice during the first year of their child's life to be at home with the infant to help in its development and to enjoy that period. Most people who have to work are unable to do that, unless we have improved parental benefits. We are far behind European countries in that respect.
I want to spend a minute on child care. We know that this is absolutely critical for women in the workforce, for women in the home and for women working in the community in various roles. We need a very flexible, comprehensive, affordable and quality system of child care. That is why we want to have immediate action on the current crisis as well as long-term funding to ensure that children across the country and parents, particularly women, will have good quality child care and will not be worried about the kind of inadequate care or lack of care altogether with which they have to deal today.
I must say with all due respect that I hope the members of the Special Committee on Child Care were not reflecting government positions, but the Conservative Party has not fully accepted the current trends in families. We should not be spending time trying to go back to the old system of families. Changes have taken place. The majority of women are in the workforce and they will continue to be in the future. It is an irreversible trend; it is not positive or negative. It is up to every family to make its own decision. We should not be making people feel guilty. We should not be trying to look back to the past saying let us have incentives for women to stay in the home, to look after their husbands and to do the things that were perhaps a little more characteristic of a patriarchal family system.
If we are going to have adequate support for all workers in the workforce and for parents in the home raising children, we must have a national program for child care. We must have no further delays. We have to get on with an emergency plan right now and with the long-term planning that is under way with the provinces. The provinces will be unlikely to do very much unless there is considerable incentive from the federal Government with bucks to expand child care spaces.
Let me come to women's work in the home. Families are changing. I hope there are chances for more men to be in the home full-time who can consider this their vocation, at least for a certain period of their children's lives. As I say, we have to accept families as they are, not as they perhaps were in our generation or in our parent's generation.
Traditionally mothers have worked long hours as home managers, care givers and experts in many aspects of human relations. I do not think that home-makers and people who perform this very important role get enough recognition. They do not get enough recognition on job resumes when they go to look for a job. We should be making sure that this is recognized. They have very important skills. They have received no pay, little time off and they have no security for later years. Many women will be on their own for various reasons when they reach middle life. I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, it is bad
May 8, 1987
[Stage Direction]
enough for women pensioners but for women in their middle years who are left alone and who have not been in the workforce suffer tremendously. They are the quiet hidden poverty group in society.
Women in the home must be recognized for their work. The kind of token $200 per year per child refundable child tax credit proposed by the Special Committee on Child Care is more of an insult than a recognition. We need to have recognition of income levels to have a real choice. Of course, family incomes need to be adequate. We recommended a couple of years ago that the child tax credit be improved substantially and that it cover average income families as well. That would have been a much better way to go. The $400 million for this kind of token tax credit is not at all a good investment. I think most women realize this.
We also pushed hard, as did many women, to have family allowances reindexed as were old age pensions. Unfortunately, the Government did not listen to women and went ahead and deindexed family allowances. We need adequate pensions for all women. There should be adequate pensions for all workers, but particularly for women. Pensions are far from adequate at this time.
I believe it is unfortunate that rather than promoting equality in families, a number of people, including a number of Members of the House of Commons, are trying to promote the old traditional patriarchal family model. We all respect our forefathers and our foremothers, but today's families and young people are moving toward more shared parenting and toward options for both parents to be in the workforce as individuals and to have a chance to really enjoy their children and their home life.
I think it is the responsibility of government Members to lobby for equality, for equal opportunities and for forwardthinking policies. They should try to convince their colleagues that we do not want to go backward. We are going forward, not out of a lack of respect but because society has changed and will continue to change.
I was most disappointed that government members on the Special Committee on Child Care and; more recently, on the Secretary of State Committee looking into funding for women's programs seemed to want to go backward and were very reluctant to recognize the policy positions on equality their own Prime Minister put forward. This is not helping support of women's groups by the Government.
There are barriers for certain groups of women who are particularly disadvantaged, in fact doubly disadvantaged. I do not have a lot of time, but I want to mention single parents. The feminization of poverty continues to escalate and is most prevalent when a mother is left alone to care for children. Families headed by women are almost sure to be poor. After separation or divorce, the purchasing power of women is
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reduced by 42 per cent while the purchasing power of men goes up by 70 per cent.
1 was very sorry to see the results of a study done by the Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women. The advisory council studied three areas; areas in Ontario, Quebec, and B.C., and found that 10 per cent of all families in the Vancouver area are headed by women, most of whom have very low incomes. In the other two provinces, that figure is 8 per cent. Nationally, 60 per cent of all single-parent families headed by women live in poverty.
We would be willing to work with the Government on a major review of the situation of single-parent families. We should look at the entire question of the feminization of poverty and provide comprehensive programs to deal with that.
Many other women are doubly disadvantaged, including women who are battered, native women, immigrant women, women of colour, farm women and northern women. I wish I had time to comment further on them.
Finally, I want to talk about women in the community and in public life. Women contribute many millions of hours of quality time free to the community. We heard from a Quebec group, des Centres de Femmes Du Quebec, that the contribution of volunteer labour in women's centres alone is worth $2 million per year in that province.
We know that women are the ones who contribute to most of the community support services as home-makers, child care workers, librarians, school workers, hospital workers and workers in job-creation programs as well as in information and crisis centres. These women are all paid very low rates of pay. It is particularly disgusting what child care workers who are doing such an important job are paid. We must do much more about recognizing women's work in the community, both volunteer work and grossly underpaid work in essential community services.
I do not need to tell Members of the House of Commons that we are far from achieving equality in decision-making. A total of 38 women have been elected to sit in the House of Commons since 1921. On one occasion, Grace Maclnnis was the only woman Member of the House. At the current rate of increase, it will take 842 years before equal numbers of women and men are elected to Parliament.
I believe my female colleagues in the House will agree with me, that the recent First Ministers' meeting was symbolic of the lack of participation of women in the decision-making that affects Canada. There was not one woman present and I am sure it will be many years before a woman sits at that table and makes decisions on behalf of Canada.
1 mentioned some of the Government's policies which we feel do not go nearly far enough, and my colleagues will elaborate on that. We must deal with the problems of doubly disadvantaged women. We must look at the question of poverty and we must improve opportunities for women in all levels of society.
[Stage Direction]
May 8, 1987
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Mr. McCrossan:: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for Vancouver East (Ms. Mitchell) called for the Government to recognize the real value of women who work in the home by providing tangible policies. She made two points in her speech. She said that women's work in the home must be recognized explicitly and that women who work in the home do not have security in their later years.
Will the Hon. Member work toward providing such explicit recognition by supporting changes in the Canada Pension Plan designed to recognize the real value of work done in the home by recognizing it as qualifying income for participation in the Canada Pension Plan? This would provide adequate security for women in retirement.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: Mr Speaker, when 1 talk about explicit programs, I am not talking about women who are suffering from poverty now and cannot put an adequate amount of food on the table for their kids, waiting until, they are 65 before their problems are dealt with. That is a nice, comfortable rationale. People who do not deal with the present like to think that all we need to do is pat women on the head and ask their husbands to pay into a pension plan for them and maybe they will have something a bit better in the future.
We have a comprehensive policy to reform the Canada Pension Plan in order to bring women above the poverty line. Of course there must be major changes and there are different ways of doing this. We want to see what the Government will bring forward and we certainly want to recommend major changes for all women.
Most women are in and out of the workforce and do not have adequate coverage while in the workforce. If they drop out for seven years to have children, they should be building on their Canada Pension Plans during that time.
I would like to stress to my hon. colleague that we are talking about now, we have to deal with poverty and these intolerable inequities now. I really get tired of citing the statistics over and over again. We must deal with the real life situations of so many women who simply do not have adequate incomes today.


Mrs. Mailly:: First of all, I think the Hon. Member is to be commended for again demonstrating her concern for the status of women.
However, it is too bad she decided to politicize the debate on such an important matter. Mr. Speaker, when the Hon. Member has given a clear and accurate explanation of the status of women in Canada and how it remains precarious despite all the efforts that have been made and the improvements that have taken place, it always surprises me that she always finishes her comments with a highly politicized statement. I say politicized because a partisan debate tends to ignore the progress that has been made and the very concrete and responsible action taken by this Government of which I am a Member.
I think we should consider that this Government has appointed six women as Ministers, a historic first, women like the Hon. Barbara McDougall, who have made their mark in the world, as they say, with policies like Bill C-42. I don't think we ever had a federal Act before that prohibited systematic discrimination against women.
How can the Hon. Member claim that the Government is to be condemned for failing to recognize the real value of women's work in the workplace?
Bill C-42 proves that this Government-both men and women-has recognized the importance of women in the workplace. And also in the home environment, because even if we expect every woman to be a Joan of Arc and to be active in our great causes, there are women who prefer to stay at home and raise their children. Why should these women be penalized financially just because they want to stay at home?
Our Government is bearing this in mind in its consideration of a daycare program. It wants to give women a real choice. If a woman wants to stay at home, she should not be penalized financially, and she should have access to the kind of daycare that meets her particular needs. On the other hand, if she wants to enter the labour market or if she has to enter the labour market for financial reasons, there again she should have access to the services she requires.
I wish the Hon. Member would consider the fact that women are not all the same, just as men are not all the same. We look at men as individuals, so why would she have us think that women all have the same needs? The only way to solve the problem of poor women is to spend money, but not by enrolling them in training courses nor forcing them to apply for traditional jobs. Again I ask the question: Why would she fail to admit that the Department of Employment and Immigration now have special programs specifically designed for women seeking employment in non-traditional fields? Why would she fail to acknowledge that the statistics released this morning indicate that 75 per cent of jobs created for women, men and young people are permanent, that the number of part-time jobs for women has declined, and that full-time jobs are on the increase? Indeed, we are making progress. Why would she deny that? Why would she deny that our Government is committed and that the status of women is not the exclusive bailiwick of the NDP? It no longer is.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: Mr. Speaker, for someone who does not want politics to be political that was quite a speech.


Claudy Mailly: Those are facts.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: I do not know quite where to start, except to say that we are hearing examples of wishful thinking. I know the Hon. Member wants to think that Bill C-42 really gets at the problems of women, but I would like her to show me where it has resulted in substantial improvement for women in either
May 8, 1987

job opportunities or pay equity. Equal pay for work of equal value must be stressed at all levels of society, and we can start with those jobs under federal jurisdiction. It is not now a part of our policies.
I would like to ask the Member to read again the report of the Special Committee on Child Care. In no way do the recommendations of the government majority give women an economic choice. How can you say that when 60 per cent of women in the workforce are there because they have to work? If both parents were not working they would be very poor. How can you say there is an option to remain at home? I am sure some of them would like to be at home while the children are very young, but how is it an economic choice to give them a refundable tax credit of $200 per child per year? That is no economic choice, that is an insult.
I am also curious to know why the Conservative Government is going to give that amount to Mila Mulroney or anyone else with a high income and the same amount to women on welfare when it is deducted from the welfare cheque? A refundable child tax credit is a very expensive way to go for very little benefit. Why not put that money into child care services which would be available for women in the home, men in the home, and parents in the workplace? I think that is most important.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Resuming debate.


Sheila Finestone: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to join in this debate. It is most appropriate that it should start just prior to Mother's Day. I take this opportunity to congratulate all mothers, mothers in waiting, and grandmothers, of which I am one and about to be again. Today is a very special day.


Mrs. McDougall:: Do aunts get a day, too?


Sheila Finestone: Yes, absolutely, aunts and everyone else are going to have their day. Women are going to have their day.
It is important to acknowledge that there has been some significant improvement in the role of women since the late 1970s. That improvement needs to be treated with tender care so that it can grow and flourish. It only adds to the society in which we live when partners have an equal opportunity to work together to improve that society.
It would be a shame to expend the effort and energy to educate and train our daughters in the same way we train our sons, with equal pride in the attainments of both, to then not allow equal opportunity and equal choice to both, given equal competence.
Thank God for the differences between men and women and boys and girls. There are reasons why we need special policies to develop the kind of thinking that appreciates each other's role and each other's contribution to the growth and development of the society in which we live. That is the view of what I call the feminist of today, the people who recognize the ability
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of women to contribute in equal measure at all levels of our society, all to the betterment of that society.
Women have had a very special role in creating that society. Unfortunately, it has not always been willingly, but rather often imposed and to the detriment of their growth, and therefore to the detriment of society as a whole. Nonetheless, it pays to keep this whole situation in historical perspective.
Women in Canada have played an important and influential role in the advancement of social justice, not just for women but for everyone. In Canada the movement for political suffrage was led by social feminists, sometimes called maternal feminists, who believed that women voters would force the Government to improve the quality of life for all Canadians. Attaining the vote was the first step in achieving those social goals.
Those women were appalled by the living conditions of low wage, low rent industrial workers, unschooled children, destitute widows, malnourished pregnant women, and child labour in the factories. It is not to say that men liked that situation; they just did not think along those lines. There was something wrong because the dynamics involved in having women at the legislative end were absent.
When women were enfranchised federally and provincially in the 1920s and 1930s in Canada, although as late as 1945 in Quebec, the statute books blossomed with a host of amendments and new legislation which alleviated old hardships, improved the lot of neglected children, destitute old people, deserted wives, indigent mothers of families, and the physically handicapped, as well as enlarging upon the grounds for divorce and support payments. They gave women the right to handle their own money and their own property.
It was a great indignity that we could do no banking of any significance without our husband's signature on the document. Most men accepted that indignity as a fact of life as if there was nothing wrong with it. There was something wrong with it. We were persons in our own right and had every right to act individually without the constraint of laws which were ineffective and uninterested in our well-being.
The new laws have protected women in industry and prohibited the outrageous exploitation of both male and female workers, especially young people. I will not give a history lesson, but there has certainly been great forward movement since the Royal Commission on the Status of Women. All political Parties can take credit for the forward movement of women's causes throughout the country.
In particular we should pay a special tribute to the women's lobby groups which have kept the women's agenda in the foreground. 1 was very honoured, as a past president of La Federation des femmes du Quebec, to represent that group of women in our affiliation with the National Action Committee, I'AFEAS, le Cercle de fermieres, the National Council of Women and the National Council of Jewish Women. I have

May 8, 1987
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left many groups out. All these groups have been sensitive to and worked hard to put on public record the concerns of women as partners in society.
I am not extremely happy about the Tory record. All the right words have been used, all the right language is in place, and all the hyperbole is there. However, there is a lack of commitment in the form of action. Whether we talk about employment equity or employment in the workforce, the bottom line is economic independence and there are choices to be made in that regard. There needs to be some making up for the lack of equality which we have had.
Let us look at the structure of families today. We must not forget that 25 years ago most women did not work outside the home and had an average of four children. Today that structure has changed dramatically. The traditional family where children are living with their biological parents and the father is the sole breadwinner now accounts for less than one of six families.

Single wage earner families make up 29 per cent of all households. According to the November 1985 Statistics Canada figures, 57 per cent of women with pre-school children belong to the labour force. Sixty-seven per cent of gainfully employed women with small children hold full-time jobs, and the majority of women in their most reproductive years are on the labour market. In 1984, 69 per cent of women aged 25 to 34 were working. The different roles assumed by women in our society should be an incentive to implement a series of measures aimed at helping couples discharge their family responsibilities properly.
Among such initiatives, child care services are a priority. In that respect, I would point out that the Throne Speech recognized the need for child care, but instead of announcing specific measures, the Government simply decided to launch into vague discussions with provincial Governments, labour unions and private enterprise. A lot of talk, but little action.
Canadian men and women were expecting much more from this Government in the area of child care, because there is now a genuine crisis. Indeed, only 9 per cent of children who need them have places in child care services.
Mr. Speaker, the situation is totally unacceptable. Thousands of witnesses appeared before the Special Committee on Child Care and I toured British Columbia where I heard with my own ears parents complain they cannot find support services to enter the labour market, help their families, become income earners that can contribute something, improve their families' situation, and prevent them from falling into poverty. I for one find unacceptable that we are constantly awaiting action that is not forthcoming. In British Columbia, as elsewhere in Canada, we heard the same story.
Men and women across Canada expressed their disarray and problems caused by the tremendous difficulty they have finding child care places when they need to work or study.
What Canadians need and expect at this point is action rather than speeches.

Even prior to the Child Care Task Force which travelled across this land, with which I spent one week in the west, I travelled across the country on two occasions to participate in the Equality for All Task Force. I see a colleague in the House who participated on that task force and is well aware that one of the major concerns of the thousands of witnesses who appeared was the basic building block, represented by child care services, which includes a full range of services. It includes preschool children, part-time and full-time, evening hours, and, as well, the latch-key child up to the age of 14.
There are a variety of needs in this field because of the fact that women have a variety of needs. Women do not fit only one mold. They have a variety of reasons for going into the workforce, the most crying of which is to share with their partners the burden of meeting the budget needs of their families.
There is also the intellectual need of a woman who has had the opportunity of getting a proper education and wishes to have an enriched life by pursuing roles both outside and inside the home.
In addition, people have the right to make a choice. That right will be respected if we really believe in the right of equality for women.
The men and women who spoke to the task force on the need for child care were very eloquent, but we did not need a task force to learn what was needed. Our Party believes that the child care system must be based on the principles of sharing the burden and providing choices.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The Hon. Member will be able to continue her speech after lunch.
It being one o'clock, I do now leave the chair until two o'clock.
At 1 p.m. the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 2 p.m.
Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Resuming debate.


Sheila Finestone: Mr. Speaker, if we look at the National Council of Welfare report we see that the poverty rate for seniors, both men and women, has declined. Unfortunately, poverty is getting worse in respect to the condition of women who are single, elderly and those who are heads of families.
[ Translation]
I would like to remind the House that out of 10 women-led single-parent families, six are living below the poverty line, as
May 8, 1987

opposed to most groups in society. The poverty rate has not declined among single mothers in 1985. In fact, in that group, poverty has been on a steady increase for five years. The odds for a single mother to join the have-nots are five times as high as for a married woman. Women account for nearly 60 per cent of the under-privileged in the 16 to 64 age group, although they are only 51 per cent of the population. Out of 10 seniors living in poverty, seven are women. This is shameful, Mr. Speaker. This means those women account for 83 per cent of single, aged, low-revenue people.
Among single-parent families, the gap is still more telling. The probability for a woman-led family to be poor is four times that of a man-led family. Moreover, the wage gap between men and women widened in 1985, which made the headlines in all media not so long ago, on March 13. This is the first time in 18 years that women lost ground in their fight to reduce the salary gap between sexes, as indicated by Statistics Canada. I feel this is cause for concern, and we must look closer at that gap.
I think a great deal of it has to do with employment equity. The Government has often pointed to employment equity legislation as an example of concrete action which it has taken for the advancement of women. Yes, the language is good, as is the thought. All the groups that appeared before the committee when this legislation was being studied told us that Bill C-62 would be totally ineffective because it has no teeth. The goal of employment equity is to recognize the talents of individuals within the business community. This side of the House wishes to give equal opportunity to those who were discriminated against because of systemic barriers that need to be revised and reviewed.
I said that we have moved forward since 1975, but we have come to a standstill. This Bill and the need for employment equity was very obvious. I am sorry that there are no teeth in it so that we can really oblige companies to move forward.
I sit on the Standing Committee on Communications and Culture. We recently tabled in the House our recommendations for a new Broadcasting Act. We recommended that broadcasting licences include an obligation to establish an equal opportunity program in order to increase significantly the number of women and members of minority groups at all levels within each undertaking. Although data regarding the employment of minority groups in broadcasting are inadequate, we know that their members are found only too rarely in influential positions-as artists, journalists, managers and decision makers.
The broadcasting industry is already under the federal employment equity legislation. But the number of problems with that law as it is applied become very obvious when we look at broadcasting. This law applies only to employers with 100 or more employees. In the most crucial of industries where we can see ourselves on the screen and where we can see our
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values reflected through the mirror of the little window box provided by the television, this Act is of no use in promoting the well-being of women and the portrayal of women. I will tell the Minister why I say that since I think it is serious.
On the basis of 1987 data obtained from the CRTC only 39 of 268 broadcasting corporations and only 15 cable companies out of the 360 existing cable companies in Canada have 100 or more employees. Thus there is no way that the Bill can be applied. That is the dilemma.
For the reasons I have just enunciated we have recommended that the new Broadcasting Act include provisions to increase significantly the number of women in minority groups, which includes women, at all levels of the broadcasting industry. If we want to be role models then we have to see ourselves somewhere. The present legislation breaks down in this regard and does not improve the inequities. Without an enforcement mechanism and a mandatory monitoring system we have a voluntary employment equity Act. I hope that the new Minister will look at this situation to find ways to make the legislation more effective.
I have said that Mediawatch and l'lnstitut Canadien de l'education aux adultes, ACTRA and many other groups that came before the committee asked us to address directly the need for the system to serve the needs of women, as well as men, and to reflect equitably their presence in the population.
In its presentation to our committee Mediawatch stated that men outnumber women two to one in prime time programming on public and private channels, and in children's programming four to one, although women account for over 50 per cent of the population. In addition to being under-represented they are performing a relatively limited number of stereotype roles. It is for these reasons that we want the broadcasting system to serve the interests and needs of both sexes. I certainly hope that the Minister will take this into consideration.
In conclusion, as we shape the forward agenda of the women's movement, and as we look at forward-looking strategies that we all worked on so hard and in which Canada was a true leader at Nairobi, it is important to note that there is no shortage of challenges left or of injustices to be resolved. We have come a long way, but we have not travelled the whole road yet. We need a special emphasis on those policy initiatives that allow and enhance the compatibility of family life and independence for women, that reaffirm the role of the family without abandoning the goals of feminism.
I will now give Hon. Members, from my point of view, a partial political action agenda for the rest of the decade. I think that we must change the attitudes of men and women so that true equality is established and allowed to grow. Attitudes in the media, in advertising stereotypes, in the soaps, in our workplaces and in our schools must also be changed.
Second, there must be changes to ensure employment equity through affirmative action and equal pay for work of equal value. I do not share the current Government's faith in its new employment equity legislation which fails to provide for

May 8, 1987
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specific sanctions against employers who refuse to implement a program of employment equity in hiring practises.
Third, there needs to be media attention given to the plight of the poor, single women in our society, both single women as heads of families as well as the single elderly. Seven out of 10 spouseless women aged 70 and over are living in poverty in Canada. That is shameful. We must address, as well, the pension issue. Women work in the community and they work in their homes. They contribute thereby to the economy. We must find a way to acknowledge this so that they do not end up in a poor state in their later years. The value of the work performed, the home work that is performed, including house care, was calculated at 36 per cent of the Gross National Product in 1981 by Statistics Canada on a model that was developed in 1978.
Four, we need redoubled efforts to curb the violence against women and children that pervades our society. Women cannot be fully equal until incest, violent pornography, wife battering and other violence are dealt with, and dealt with sensibly and not radically.
Five, I think it is vital that the funding of women's groups continues, and continues at a level that will allow them to continue their role of advocacy in order to keep the barriers that we need to break down in front of the public eye, and certainly in front of the eyes of legislators. They need to be enabled to assure this equality among people.
Finally, I would like to use a term that is often feared around here, that is, choice in reproductive rights. Let us not be frightened off by this term. Reproductive rights include such issues as pregnancy leave, unemployment insurance benefits and the availability of child care. Child care is especially vital if women, particularly single mothers, are to gain economic independence. It should be apparent that women have an equal right to choose to work, which cannot be exercised in the best interests of their family or their children without providing accessible, affordable and adequate quality child care. No one here need be told how important good child care is to the attainment of women's and family rights.
I think I have presented a list of concerns. I hope that together all of us in this Flouse can meet the challenge for change. It is an ongoing process. We would be happy with the achievement of any one of them, but I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, that women and women's groups will not rest until we have achieved every one of them.


Gabrielle Bertrand: Mr. Speaker, I wish to congratulate my hon. friend for her very well documented speech and for her involvement in the promotion of women. I suggest that her personal life demonstrates that she is perfectly dedicated and that she assumes her duties beautifully. But I would like her to push her intellectual honesty a little further and recognize
what our Government has done to promote employment equity for women.
I am aware that my colleague who is responsible for the Status of Women will rise in a few minutes and make a very well documented speech, but I would like to ask the Hon. Member for Mount Royal (Mrs. Finestone) to recognize what our Government has accomplished.
Quite recently, the Minister of Supply and Services (Mrs. Vezina) refused to award a contract to a company which did not meet the criteria as far as employment equity for women is concerned. Her decision was almost a first! It had never happened before and it is something for which the Hon. Minister of Supply and Services should be commended.
In my riding, last week, on the first page of our daily newspaper, there was a picture showing the Hon. Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Bouchard) presenting a diploma or an award to a company, an Alcan subsidiary in my area, for recognizing the right to work and the participation of women in non-traditional trades, in this case, welding. And the company president said that his best welder was a woman.
All this to indicate that we are making progress indeed. We know that before we came into office only 10 per cent of women belonged to the Public Service. We are now up to 27 per cent. We know that we had two women ambassadors, we now have 21. I will let my colleague responsible for the status of women give more statistics in this field, but I should like to ask the Hon. Member for Ville Mount Royal whether she would agree that our Government has done a tremendous effort in this respect?


Sheila Finestone: May I correct my colleague? I am not the Member for Ville Mount Royal, I am the Member for Mount Royal, which includes three cities. O.K. That is for openers.
Certainly I agree, and I think I was very clear about this issue for the benefit of my colleague. Still I would suggest that all Parties have promoted the cause of women. It is neither you nor us. I think that together, especially women MPs, we have made society aware of this and changed the mentality of our male colleagues here in the House. The Minister was able to recognize women's non-traditional work thanks to the women's movements who made this society aware of women's needs. During one of our World Wars, women proved they could be effective at non-traditional jobs, which means they have the capability and should have that choice throughout their years in the labour market. So the credit doesn't go to you as a Government or to us as a government. You have been able to promote the status of women thanks to women like Therese Casgrain and others, like the five women who helped define our position as persons in society, with equal rights and privileges. The movement started with them and has gone on to this day, and it will be thanks to historic developments and our own capabilities that we will finally get complete equality in our society. There are competent men and stupid men, and the same applies to women. But we should be treated equally in society. I am not here to praise the achievements of one
May 8, 1987

party over another. I am here to point out where you went wrong. I am here to suggest improvements. As far as the status of women is concerned, there are no partisan considerations. I think we should understand that together we will win this battle, and we will not win by going off in separate groups and deciding who is going to get money and who is not. It should go to the women who stood up for our cause and who were able to get us where we are today.


Mary Collins: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to hear the remarks of my colleague. I think all Hon. Members would agree that there are certainly no stupid women on any side of this House.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mary Collins: I am glad you agree. 1 know my colleague's commitment towards equality of women having worked with her on the Equality Rights Subcommittee and the report it brought forward. I think all Parties agree that this is not a particularly partisan issue in terms of the objectives we are trying to achieve. There are some differences, obviously, in the timing and some of the methods we use to achieve our goals, and I think in the debate today we will learn more about that from each other.
There is one thing which has really bothered me. In 1986 a study was done by the Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women with regard to the aspirations of adolescent women. That study indicated, and do other reports as well, that today's teenage girls still see their lives in very traditional and romanticized terms, and are less likely than boys to make explicit plans for their future paid careers.
I am a mother of a 14 year old and in talking to her and her friends I think it is true that, no matter what we do in terms of moving forward on legislation and with different programs, if we somehow do not reach those young women they will not seek the kind of training and education they need and will end up in that sort of vicious cycle of poverty.
I wonder if my colleague has thought about this issue and if she could share with us any of her ideas as to how the federal Government and provincial Government agencies might deal with that very fundamental root problem in terms of working with women in the future?


Sheila Finestone: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I had the pleasure of sharing many months and many hours of work with my hon. colleague who just raised the question. I would like to suggest that I think my friend and I looked at that question together. With another colleague I have also been looking at the impact on women through media. I think we will have the problem until such time as women start to feel a sense of their own worth and development and until they stop seeing themselves portrayed on probably the most powerful medium in our society today, television, in those kinds of sex stereotyping stories we see on the television screen, whether through advertising or the programs which are shown. That medium must start to change and give value and importance to
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education, post-secondary education, and show women as full partners having intelligent, equal conversations with their partners.
I think as well that schools should start to develop a curriculum which does not say, "Jane goes out to buy the oranges while John goes to buy the tools in the hardware store". If it could have Jane and John doing the opposite occasionally, the stereotypes could be broken.
It is a long hard row. We have been ingrained but, I hope not restrained, from some creative action. I would like to tell my colleague that I have an 11-year old granddaughter and she is not interested in the stereotype world. I suppose it has something to do with family upbringing and role models. I would prefer to have debates of this kind and not have the kind of partisan elements I have occasionally listened to in this House.
I could give my hon. friend a long list of the accomplishments of those on this side of the House, starting way back with Judy LaMarsh and forward, and my hon. friend could start with Ellen Fairclough and others, but that would not change the situation and the daily living for women in today's society and prepare them for tomorrow. Let us try to keep this on the level which I think will be helpful to the forward movement of women in today's society.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend and colleague stated that reproductive rights were basic to equality and defined reproductive rights in very broad terms. I agree with her on that, but she did not mention the whole question of choice in relation to access to abortion.
Last month a pregnant 14-year old girl was refused an abortion in a Kamloops hospital. As a result she had to go through a very prolonged forced premature delivery, which I am sure will create tremendous trauma for her for the rest of her life.
Does the Hon. Member have any suggestions about what she feels should be done on the whole question of access under our existing law? Also, what should be done about more effective preventive measures including better contraception so that women really have reproductive rights?


Sheila Finestone: Mr. Speaker, in a sense I am glad the Hon. Member has asked the question, although I could have done without it. I am pleased to share my point of view.
Those of us who travelled with the Equality for All task force were faced with the question of the right to choice versus the right to life. We heard the hard core views on both sides, and there does not seem to be, in society today, the kind of atmosphere which would enable us to make the choice on one side or the other by opening up the legislation.
It has been my view that a woman has the right to make the choice for herself after having received the best counselling and the best advice possible, after all the options have been

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made available to her and there is an understanding of all the options, including adoption and the kind of support the state can give a woman who chooses to keep the child herself. If all those support systems are in place-and I will come to the Hon. Member's case in a moment-and if we had the proper kind of education and training to teach respect for one's self and taking responsibility for one's actions, I would say to the Hon. Member that it would not be the kind of problem it is today.
1 do not think we can open up the abortion question in today's society. I think we will have to work with what exists in our law presently and apply it in an intelligent way. It will take government will at the provincial level, because that is where health services are determined, to find the answer to how to allow a woman to make her own choice in reproductive rights.
In respect of the case of the 14-year old child, as a director of youth protection I faced much younger children than that, such as a 7-year old and a 13-year old who were pregnant by incest and by rape. Anyone who tells me that we should have the kind of society which does not allow for the humane determination of termination in that instance is out of his or her mind, in my view. First, the child's body has not developed healthfully enough for her to sustain and give a healthy body to the foetus. Second, I do not believe that any family would want to impose that on a child.
In respect of the Hon. Member's question, I hope I have elucidated clearly enough that I would not reopen the issue in the Criminal Code at this point.


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to rise in my place today to discuss the issue because it is a very important one to all of us in Canada. Perhaps what has been missing so far in the debate is that it is important to men as well as to women. Within society we have come a long way over many years, as the Hon. Member for Mount Royal (Mrs. Finestone) pointed out.
I guess in the beginning women were fighting alone for things which they felt were important for themselves and things they felt were important for society. It gives me great pleasure-and it gives the women in this Party great pleasure-that we now have so many men as our allies. Let us make no mistake about the fact that women, not men, have put the issues of child care, the elderly poor, and so on, on the agenda. Women should take credit for it. Let them also remember that there are many people on their side. As we move forward from here, as we must continue to do and are doing, that is an important building block for how we approach women's issues in the future.
While I am very happy to debate the issue, I am very surprised by the wording of the motion. The fact is that the Government has put in place a number of programs for action on women's issues. The Government's whole strategy contains a comprehensive and pragmatic series of initiatives, I may say among the best ever introduced in Canada.
Let us look at what our achievements have been in 2.5 years. There has been reform of Canada's divorce laws and family enforcement orders, a very important element which women have needed for many years. There has been a repeal of the Indian Act provisions which discriminated against native women for decades. We introduced the first employment equity legislation ever introduced in Canada, opening up a full range of labour market opportunities for women.

The implementation of a National Training and Employment Program which, for the first time, defines participation goals for women, proposes steps to increase the number of pension beneficiaries and makes them more equitable, and the passage of legislation to put an end to the sexual exploitation and the sexual abuse of children.
As suggested by the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney), Mr. Speaker, our Government has given top priority to women's concerns. A document entitled Dimensions of Equality: A Federal Government Work Plan for Women clearly demonstrates our commitment to women's concerns. Tabled in November of last year by the Prime Minister at the yearly Conference of the First Ministers in Vancouver, this document describes our Government's biannual action plan to promote women.

Let me say that the document contains a number of measures. Earlier I pointed out the legislation surrounding divorce and family enforcement orders. Let me point out, in terms of progress for women, that not one of these issues is a new one. These issues have been around, and women have been asking about them for years. We have made an incredibly good start in the first half of our mandate, and we are not finished yet. That is what this book outlines.
Less than six months after its tabling, a number of the initiatives have already been accomplished or are well under way. The Minister of National Defence (Mr. Beatty) announced that the Canadian Forces would conduct trials with women in combat. A review of sex stereotyping in internal government communications is nearing completion, further to the review of external communications which was completed last year.
Let me just say about the problem of stereotypes that in the earlier Bill introduced on communications there was forward momentum to deal with the problem of sex stereotyping. We all know how important it is to develop, not just role models for children but their own attitudes toward themselves. This will be very important to the women of the future.
Labour Canada conducted an educational seminar for labour representatives on equal pay for work of equal value. The Secretary of State (Mr. Crombie) funded a national conference which was held in Toronto as a follow-up to the 1985 Nairobi forum and the United Nations World Conference on Women, as well as a successful national conference on immigrant women and visible minority women.
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Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Barbara Jean McDougall: Let me say as well that we have met with representatives of groups to discuss very specific issues and we will be meeting again with the NAC executive and many of its members on Monday. Many of our members will be there. Complementing this process, a dialogue, of course, has been our determination to bring more women into positions of power and influence.
The Hon. Member for Vancouver East (Ms. Mitchell) talked about this participation of women in roles of leadership and in politics.

During the 1984 election campaign, we had promised, if elected, to increase from 15 per cent to 30 per cent the rate of representation of women in federal agencies, boards and commissions. Only halfway through our mandate, the rate is now 27 per cent. It is only a beginning, but it is quite significant. Deputy Ministers and Assistant Deputy Ministers occupy also key positions in the Public Service. When we came to power, there were only three women appointed at that high level. There are now nine, including the Chairman of the Public Service Commission, as well as the Deputy Minister of Labour, the Deputy Minister of National Health and Welfare, the Deputy Minister of Supply and Services, and the Deputy Minister of Privatization. The incumbents of these positions of trust can make key contributions and may even further the economic and social advancement of all women.

I mentioned earlier that the Canadian Forces will be undertaking trials with women in combat. Let me mention as

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well that my colleague, the Minister of National Defence, has appointed Canada's first woman general, Brigadier-General Sheila Hellstrom. The number of positions in the Armed Forces open to women has risen from 19 per cent in 1971 to 75 per cent today.
Two eminent women now head the Economic Council of Canada and the National Capital Commission. Recently two women were appointed to the Board of Directors of the Bank of Canada. Other government agencies now have numerous women. There are now 10 women occupying senior diplomatic posts as ambassadors and consuls general. Of the 12 people the Prime Minister appointed to the other place, four are women.
In addition to a 22 per cent increase in the number of federally appointed women judges, let me point out and publicly congratulate, Madam Justice Claire L'Heureux-Dube on her appointment to the Supreme Court of Canada. What this tells us is not that women are getting appointed, but that they are being appointed to the highest and most influential positions in the land.
This is one indication of what we are doing. It is important, and I have pointed this out in this House before, first, because it is a legitimate recognition of the contribution that women have made-finally a recognition of their contribution and their talents. Also, it is important because when men and women sit down at the same table to work toward a common objective then the old stereotypes start to change and fall away along with the old attitudes.
As the Prime Minister said, our aim is to improve and perfect our democratic way of life. If we wish to correct the imbalance which still exists, we must increase further the presence of women in the national decision-making process.
Let us go back to women and their political role. There were only two women Cabinet Ministers in the last Government. There are now five, and I say with all due modesty that I think we do our share. I know this has been of great concern to the other Parties. I think particularly of a Member of the Liberal Party, a former president, who talked about the invisible ceiling for women, a glass ceiling where women can only reach so far and cannot go beyond it. Let me describe where 1 think women are in our Party.
Women for a long time did face a lot of barriers. They continue to face some. There was a big brick wall; then women started punching out some of those bricks. Enough holes are now in that wall so that it is going to start to fall down. That is the difference in how this Party views the role of women and how the former Government viewed the role of women. We are not only hopeful but we are going to help women get to where they should be.
Let me say, on employment equity, how important this Bill is. The Hon. Member for Mount Royal pointed out that it was not working, and I think the Hon. Member for Vancouver East said the same thing, that employment equity should be mandatory, that there should be quotas on things to regulate every move that business makes.
I have been monitoring this very closely and talking to people in human resources in the private sector who are inundated with requests from businesses and financial institutions anxious to meet the requirements of this Bill. The old stereotypes are changing. Business now knows that it is in its interest that women have an equal opportunity. The future of business will have to embrace the resources represented by women in society.
The number of people who are of an age to leave school is declining very rapidly. In order for business, commerce and universities to be competitive and productive in the future, they will have to draw on a wider range of talent and that includes women. They are starting to recognize that. If we can embrace them in a partnership without simply having the Government making rules, then women will be much better off.
There is a traditional women-as-victims attitude. Yes, women have problems that men to do not have, there is no question about that. However, one cannot transfer what was once a hope and faith in Prince Charming to a hope and faith in the Government. Women are better than that. Women contribute; women have talent; women make their own decisions; women can hold their heads up high along with all the men in Canada, and women working together with men can also help those women who are not in a position to do so.
Our objective is to have men and women start equally. Sometimes men start higher than women so in order for women to start equally we have to help. That does not mean that once women get there they are not every bit as able to contribute as are men. We recognize that.
Let me deal with the poverty statistics for a moment. Between 1982 and 1984, the number of women over age 16 living in households below the National Council of Welfare's poverty line rose by 118,000. This is a matter of real concern to everyone and every political Party. The proportion of women over 16 living in poverty rose from 17.3 per cent to 18.5 per cent, and that occurred during part of the economic recovery. That is serious.
Between 1984 and 1985, the number of women over 16 living in poverty dropped by 69,000. We were able to bring that figure back down to where it started. That is not anywhere like good enough, but we are glad to see that happening. We have given it a nudge in the right direction because of some of the things we have introduced.
Obviously jobs relate directly to poverty. During the first 30 months of this Government's term of office, the number of women with jobs rose by 406,000. During the last 30 months of the previous Government's term, the number of women with jobs throughout the entire period of recovery rose by only 250,000. The difference of 156,000 is greater than the total number of people employed in the whole of Metropolitan London, Ontario, a fine metropolis.
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The contrast in the increase in full-time jobs for women between the two periods is even more striking. During the last 30 months of the former Liberal Government's term, the number of women with full-time jobs rose by 128,000 and during the first 30 months of this Government's term, the increase was 327,000, a difference of 199,000 or over two and a half times as many.
It is important that women now have benefits in part-time jobs, that they have benefits in full-time jobs and that they get more full-time jobs. That is why the training programs we introduced have been so important. That is why the child tax credit and the sales tax credit were so important. They helped to move women out of poverty and into more comfortable and prosperous lives. We must all focus on that, particularly for elderly women, and that is why we have introduced so much pension legislation. We know how important that is.
That is the record of the Government in two and a half years. That is why I believe this motion is frivolous and should be defeated.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: Mr. Speaker, I do not know how the Minister responsible for the status of women could call this a frivolous motion. It is a very serious motion, and I hope she knows me and my Party well enough to realize that it was put in all seriousness.
I would like to ask the Minister a question about the Secretary of State women's program which, as she knows, has been in some turmoil of late. I would like to know her view of the purpose of this program and why we have had to spend so much time, money and hours on the road with the SOS Committee defending this program when it is very obvious that the program is essential to carrying out the equality goals of the Government. Does she support the views of some Conservative Members on the committee who have been very difficult, members who have suggested that advocacy groups should not receive government funding, that groups like NAC should not be funded if REAL Women is not eligible for funding?
Second, the Minister mentioned the child care program. What is her position on the recommendation of the special committee on child care regarding the refundable child tax credit which would cost about $300 million and put $200 in the hands of each woman with young children? Would this money not be better spent by increasing child care spaces and improving the quality and flexibility-and I agree with her on that point-of child care across Canada?


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, I believe the Hon. Member was not quite listening. I did not in any way suggest that she was frivolous or that the issue was frivolous. I said that the motion was frivolous.
If we are to engage in a discussion about women, we have to recognize and celebrate together some of the positive things that have happened. It is a case of whether the glass is half full or half empty. Until the glass is completely full, I would like to
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talk about it in a positive way. Compared to what has gone before, the progress that has been made is something with which I can certainly face the country very happily.
I believe the women's program has made an important contribution to the ability of women to articulate the things about which they care. Like any program, it is worth reviewing from time to time. We should hear what Canadians think of the program, if the program is working and if needs have changed in the last five or 10 years. The inquiry that is being conducted both by the Secretary of State and by the House of Commons is a perfectly legitimate one. Having said that, I would certainly think it is quite worth while to continue funding some kinds of advocacy programs and I do not in any way disagree with that.
I do believe that there must be some criteria and perhaps it is time the criteria for our objectives changed. I have made no prejudgement on that. I would like to see what comes out of the House of Commons committee's study and the review of the Secretary of State. I would like to see more services for women and not just a continuation of some women's programs.
Once again, we need flexibility in child care. The report of the special committee was a very thoughtful one and attempted to deal with flexibility and the many different ways women need help in looking after children. I agree with the Hon. Member that the definition of family has changed. That means that we should do something for women who want to care for their children at home and something for women who need a structured system. We are taking that into account as we develop government policy because we all know what the options are. They are to fund the supply side, which is additional space, or fund the demand side, which is to give parents money directly. We all have a different view of where to draw the line between the one and the other.
I think the Special Committee on Child Care is to be commended for the work it did and the report it presented. I know this is an issue that the Hon. Member cares about as well. The fact that there is ongoing discussion with the provinces, and the report will be a part of that discussion, means that by the time we come forward with a policy it will be positive and will help the women of Canada.


Jean-Robert Gauthier: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister a question.
Yesterday, the Public Service Commission tabled its annual report for 1986. We are pleased to note significant improvements in the area of promotion and hiring of women in the Public Service.
A problem which seems to recur year after year is the ratio of women in senior-level positions, the so-called Management Category. We find on page 27 of the report that Government objectives have been lowered or reduced due to budgetary

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constraints. For the benefit of the Minister 1 might quote what is said on page 27 of the report:
In 1986, 42 women at the senior management level minus one took the senior management orientation course, compared to 52 in 1985 and 32 in 1984. This decrease is probably the result of-
According to the Commission-
-fewer people being sent on management orientation courses due to general government restraints.
There is also, Mr. Speaker, at page 25, a question relating to the appointment of women to senior-level positions. It reads, in part:
The number of appointments of women to the Management Category will have to be increased in 1987 to meet the government's target of 476 by the end of the first quarter of 1988.
Could the Minister tell us whether she will try and exercise pressure on the Public Service Commission to ensure that the objective of the Government, which is to raise the number of women in senior management in the Public Service of Canada to 476, is indeed met.


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, that is an easy question to answer because the answer is obviously yes. What is not clear to me from the Hon. Member's comments is what is the proportion of SMs that took the course and so on. It is not just the number that is significant but the proportion at each level. It is inevitable that what we are going to see is a kind of ebb and flow. There will be more one year than another year. It depends how many people are coming up from one level to the next level. There has to be a progression.
Like the Hon. Member, I take a personal interest in this. I want to see more done around that and I have often spoken about it with my Treasury Board colleagues and the Public Service people. I think this year we will have to see an improvement, but I want to point out as well that part of the evaluation of Deputy Ministers is how well women are doing in their Departments. It is an important part and not something this Government ignores in any way. It is a significant factor in the measurement of how Deputy Ministers perform their duties.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: A very short question from the Hon. Member for Burnaby (Mr. Robinson).


Mr. Robinson:: Mr. Speaker, one of the priorities identified by the National Action Committee on the Status of Women at their annual meeting this week is the position taken with respect to a motion before this House on the question of recognition of the foetus in the Constitution. The Minister responsible for the Status of Women has to date remained silent with respect to this motion. I ask her to show some leadership on this matter now by indicating her position on this motion which I believe could constitute a grave threat to freedom of choice of women.
As well, could she please indicate to the House and the people of Canada when the Government intends to move with
respect to its commitment to amending the Canadian Human Rights Act to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation? Those two subjects have been identified by NAC as important subjects to be addressed this week and I would like the Minister to show some leadership on them.


Barbara Jean McDougall: Mr. Speaker, on the second point, as the Hon. Member knows, that is something that the Minister of Justice (Mr. Hnatyshyn) has been reviewing. I would not want to comment beyond supporting the conclusions he comes to.
On the first issue, I believe, and I have made it clear, that I agree with the Hon. Member for Mount Royal (Mrs. Fine-stone) that I would like to see the law remain as it stands. I recognize that this is a very important issue for women across Canada.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Resuming debate with the Hon. Member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom).


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, I want to commend the Hon. Member for Vancouver East (Ms. Mitchell) for suggesting this topic to the House today. It is very useful from time to time to have a review of important issues like women's issues.
Over the years women have faced tremendous discrimination in Canada. When I was first elected in 1968 we had but one woman in the House of Commons, Grace Maclnnis from the riding of Vancouver-Kingsway. She was one of the champions of the cause of women's issues for many, many years in this House. She was a Member of Parliament, if I am not mistaken, from 1965 until about 1974. She did a very commendable job.

Mr. Speaker, there has long been a lot of discrimination against women in this country as elsewhere-income discrimination, occupation discrimination, discrimination at the political level, and sometimes, before that, statutory discrimination in Canada. But now, in 1987, there is still too much discrimination left, a lot of inequality between men and women. By comparison, according to Statistics Canada, last year, in 1986, women's income in Canada was only 64.9 per cent of men's income. Three years ago, in 1984, women's income was 65.5 per cent of men's revenue. This is a setback rather than progress, Mr. Speaker, as far as the average income of Canadian women is concerned. This is why we need this debate, this is why there are still many women below the poverty line in Canada, and that problem is specific to women in single-parent families.

I want to spend most of my time this afternoon on the Canadian Jobs Strategy and some of the problems which have been identified in serious studies and comments about that strategy. In 1985, the Government announced a new Canadian Jobs Strategy with several different components. That strategy is now in operation across the country. Since that time we have
May 8, 1987

had a number of problems with that strategy. I want to draw to the attention of the Elouse and the Cabinet in a very serious way, as well as to any officials who may be watching, a very important discussion paper prepared by the Ontario Ministry of Skills Development a short time ago. This paper was prepared on behalf of all provincial Governments for a meeting in Ottawa on January 29 and January 30, 1987. The paper analyses in detail the Canadian Jobs Strategy and makes a number of important points concerning women and the program. The paper was undertaken by the Ontario Government but at the request of the other provinces. It was endorsed by those provinces at the meeting in January.
The observations in this paper are relevant to the motion before us today. I hope members of all three Parties will take these observations to heart and seriously consider them.
One of the most serious comments made in here is with regard to the criteria for eligibility to the Canadian Jobs Strategy. They say that the eligibility criteria to the programs remain too restrictive in many ways. The Ontario Ministry of Skills Development study says:
Key target groups-for instance the severely employment disadvantaged, women, and individuals in threatened communities-face barriers due to gaps in the design of the CJS.
They go into detail about the job development budget and program and entry and re-entry components of the women's program within the CJS.
In speaking of women specifically the report says:
The Canadian Jobs Strategy identifies women as a special client group to receive a greater share of training and employment opportunities.
They identify women for this, but the study goes on to say:
However, the CJF is criticized by women's groups across Canada for its failure to benefit women, and immigrant women in particular.
Statistics Canada's Labour Force Survey reveals that women make up 43 per cent of the labour force in Canada.
Yet, despite the fact that women are a target group under the CJF, federal statistics show that the participation rate of women in the CJS, excluding the Challenge 85 program which provided summer employment for secondary and post-secondary students, was only 34 per cent in 1985-86.
That is very serious, Mr. Speaker. Women make up 43 per cent of the labour force yet only 34 per cent of the people participating in the Canadian Jobs Strategy are women. That is a gap of 9 per cent.

This is something that is so important that 43 per cent of the Canadian labour force were women. But women participation in the Canadian Job's strategy of women program is only 34 per cent.

That is not good enough. The Minister should take note of that and try to do something about it. The study continues:
Furthermore, the number of women being served by E1C since the introduction of the Canadian Jobs Strategy is declining.
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In addition, the preponderance of projects funded under the CJS have offered
women training in traditional, low-paying occupations.
That is a very important point of which we must all take note. So many of the women in the Canadian Jobs Strategy are being trained in traditional low-paying occupations. Of the 767 female participants who received occupational training, fully two-thirds, 512, received training in such traditional areas as clerical, sales and service occupations. That is not good enough, Mr. Speaker. All Parties should insist that that be changed.
Even more telling is that no training was provided for women in such non-traditional occupations for women as construction, mining, machining, and forestry and transport equipment operating. The table contained in this study of the Ministry of Skills Development shows that in such occupations as mining, oil and gas there is not a single woman of the 3,250 involved being trained in those areas. The same applies to forestry and logging occupations, machining and related occupations, construction trades occupations, transport equipment operating occupations, and material handling and related occupations. Very few women are being trained in other occupations which are non-traditional for women in this country.
The Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) is very proud to say that he has six women in his Cabinet. I congratulate him for that. That is pretty good compared to previous Prime Ministers. However, anything is pretty good when it is compared with something which is really bad.


Mr. Fennell:: What about your Cabinet?


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: The Conservative Member across the way talks about our Cabinet. I have seen NDP Cabinets in western provinces which have very few or no women. I am not proud of that. I am happy that in the last provincial election in Saskatchewan, after not having female New Democratic MLAs for a long time, three were elected. That is good, not only for the NDP and not only for Saskatchewan, but for all women in this country.
All Parties should do whatever they can to ensure that there are more women in politics so that when there is another important Conference of First Ministers there will be some women sitting around the table rather than only 11 middle-aged or older men making important decisions about the future of Canada for all Canadians. That is very important.
This study points out the discrimination in the Canadian Jobs Strategy. There are 311 women being trained in clerical and related occupations, 131 being trained in sales occupations, and 69 being trained in service occupations. However, there are very few women being trained in occupations which are important in terms of making money and decisions. I will give you three examples.
In the managerial, administrative and related occupations class there are only 42 women being trained in all of Canada, while for low-paying clerical jobs they are training 311 women

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and in sales they are training 131 women. In occupations in natural sciences, engineering and mathematics, which are areas of great contribution to the country and which offer tremendous salaries and job security, they are training only five women. In occupations in social sciences and related fields they are training only 29 women.
Even in teaching and related occupations in which there are a lot of women working, only 63 women are being trained. In occupations in medicine and health 79 women are being trained. I am sure that the great preponderance of them are being trained for the traditional women's jobs in the medical field.
I recommend that Members of the House take a very serious look at this discussion paper on the Canadian Jobs Strategy, which was prepared on behalf of all the provincial Governments in Canada by the Ontario Ministry of Skills Development and was endorsed by all 10 provinces which represent four political Parties. The study condemns the Canadian Jobs Strategy for training women for low-paying jobs and for their low level of participation.
I would now like to refer to a study which was released in February of this year by the Canadian Advisory Council which assessed the impact of the Canadian Jobs Strategy on Women. It draws some conclusions similar to those of the Ontario Government on behalf of the provinces. The key observation was that evidence suggests that the majority of women are receiving training in traditionally female and lower paying occupations.
In addition to this, the Council adds its voice to those who also believe that the criteria for the Canadian Jobs Strategy are too restrictive, particularly as they pertain to women in Canada.
In particular, it points out:
Many individuals and groups concerned with training for women consider the
orientation of women's training toward traditional occupations to be a major
problem. A large portion of women currently unemployed (55 per cent) work
in sales, service and clerical occupations.


Mr. James:: What is the matter with sales?


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: They are referring to sales as such jobs as a sales clerk at a Bay store. The problem pointed out in the Ontario study, which is endorsed by all provincial Governments, is that these are traditionally very low paying jobs. An increasing number of these people are being trained for those kinds of jobs rather than jobs that pay better in some of the non-traditional areas. Perhaps the Hon. Member missed some of my earlier comments, so I refer him to the discussion paper by the Ontario Skills Development Ministry from January of this year. It is entitled The Canadian Jobs Strategy: Policy and Implementation.
I want to go to another topic which I believe is important. It was mentioned briefly this morning by the Member for Vancouver East and concerns the whole area of women in
part-time work. She said that some women and some men want to work part-time but she knows of many who want a full-time job but cannot find one.
Recently, I found a study conducted by Statistics Canada in December, 1986, which contains figures on involuntary parttime work. These include women who are working part-time because they cannot find a full-time job. I believe we should be raising this issue in the House more often because the statistics are very startling and revealing.
The study noted that over 500,000 people worked in parttime jobs in 1985 because they could not find full-time jobs. In 1986, there were 516,000 who worked in part-time jobs because they could not find full-time jobs. In 1975, the figure was 109,000, which means there has been an increase of 500 per cent in some 12 years.
I know of dozens of people in my riding who are in such a position. There are people in Canora, Kamsack, Yorkton, Melville, Preeceville and Sturgis in my riding who would like to work on a full-time basis but cannot find a full-time job. Therefore, they work on Saturday afternoons in a store or a few evenings a week in a business or as part-time consultants.
Involuntary part-time work is concentrated among women between the ages of 25 and 54 and among young people between the ages of 15 and 24. These two groups make up 81 per cent of the total involuntary part-time workers in Canada.
The data for 1986, according to Statistics Canada, shows very little change in this situation. A woman or young person working in the community, business or the personal service sector, as opposed to manufacturing, is seven times more likely to be an involuntary part-time worker. One can see how the problem has escalated when one considers that in 1975 there were some 74,000 involuntary part-time workers while in 1985 there were 351,000 involuntary part-time workers.
A recent Labour Canada study made the following observation:
Part-time employees are at a disadvantage on all benefits but the gap is largest for pensions which, not surprisingly, are the most costly for an employer to provide.
In the minute that I have remaining, I want to refer to a number of papers that were written by the Community Coalition on the Canadian Jobs Strategy. They state the following with respect to the eligibility criteria:
The first aspect 1 would like to address is the eligibility criteria. Under Job Development the eligibility criteria requires that candidates have been unemployed for 24 of the 30 weeks preceding his/her application for training in order to be considered eligible. Anyone who has been employed during that period is not eligible for training and more important, is not deemed to be severely employment disadvantaged. Such specificity in calculating the term of unemployment completely overlooks the economic and employment reality for many of the unemployed.
They are saying that the criteria are too rigid, which discriminates against women in particular but also discriminates against many men, particularly in regions of the country where unemployment has been a very serious problem. I urge
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the Government to examine seriously some of the shortfalls in the Canadian Jobs Strategy.
I hope the Hon. Member for Capilano (Mrs. Collins), who is an expert in this area and who I assume will be following me in the debate, will seriously review these studies. When she speaks about the accomplishments of the Canadian Jobs Strategy I hope she will also take into consideration some of its shortfalls, particularly for women. If she can do that and perhaps persuade the Minister, this country will be a better place for us all, particularly the women of Canada.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: Mr. Speaker, I want to compliment my colleague for putting on the record that informative but rather disturbing analysis of the Canadian Jobs Strategy and training programs. In particular, the Statistics Canada study on parttime work was extremely useful.
I would like him to comment on another subject that I know is very close to his heart. It concerns the agricultural situation in Canada and the impact that the extreme stress and economic hardship of farming is having on women. Does he have any suggestions about what should be done, because I believe that farm women carry far more than the average burden of responsibility since many of them work on the farm as well as perform their usual family and homemaking responsibilities? Indeed, I understand that some women work in town in order to help buy the groceries. Would the Hon. Member comment on that situation?


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, I thank the Hon. Member for that question. I grew up on a small farm near the town of Wynyard, Saskatchewan. I spent my first 18 years there, until I went to university. I, and many Members of the House, such as the Member from the Camrose area, witnessed the tremendous discrimination farm wives experience in the economic and social system of the farm community.
First, many farm women not only look after the house and the children, but also do a lot of work on the farm itself. When I was growing up, these jobs ranged from milking the cows, to hauling the bales, to kicking the rocks. They very often received very little in return and did all this work without income. These women carry out this work without a pension or the ability to qualify for unemployment insurance.
These women represent a group of people in our society who do a tremendous amount of work and make a valuable contribution to this country through their farming skills, parenting skills, and managerial skills, but do not have many of the benefits provided by our society. I have seen case after case in which the land is in the man's name, in which the cheques come in the man's name, in which the man makes contributions to the Canada Pension Plan and to his RRSPs. I have seen cases in which the man has this and the man has that and in which there is very little for the woman.
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In addition to that I see tremendous discrimination against farm women when it comes to matters such as child care. Obviously, many farms are a long way from towns, cities and larger villages and women are stuck on the farm with the children and do not have the options that their urban sisters do. I think that is a tremendous discrimination. What makes it worse is that we are now facing an economic crisis such as we have not seen in rural Canada, particularly in the west, since the 1930s. We have all seen the figures with respect to the price of wheat and the price of other farm commodities, which are exceedingly low. Much of the burden this creates must be borne by the farm woman in terms of the additional stress it places on the family.
I was in my riding not last weekend but the weekend before last when I had a chance to meet with three people who run the Yorkton Crisis Centre. This is a crisis centre which has been open for a short time, I believe just two or three years. They came to me with a request for lobbying for more funding. At the moment they receive a very small grant from the federal Government and nothing from the province. They receive small contributions from people in the community and from the city council. They came to me and told me that in the last year in the small community of Yorkton there were over 1,300 people who contacted the crisis centre, either in person by walking through the door or by calling on the telephone.
They told me that many of these people who called were farmers, men and women, who were going through stress because of financial problems. Many of them were farm women who are battered wives or who are having problems in that they feel isolated on the farm and have nowhere to turn. Those statistics alone have shown me what kind of problems farmers face in general but, in particular, the problems that women face because of the role they are playing in our society.
What we should be doing is bringing in adequate pension plans for farm women, as well as adequate pension plans for women who work with their husbands in small businesses. We should bring about recognition of the work that is done, not just in the home, and we have talked about the work done in the homes of urban Canada, but the work done in the homes of rural Canada as well as the work done on the farms by the women who make such a great and tremendous contribution to Canada.
I could name many women who live in the community where I grew up who not only looked after the house and the kids but who actually did more work on the farm than did their husbands. I remember in particular one family, and I will not give their name, where the woman, after having to do all the work in the house and looking after the kids, also had to go out and milk the cows. The man would stand by and watch her because milking cows is women's work.
So these women have made a tremendous contribution, particularly the pioneers who settled the West. I think the time

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has come for us to recognize that in terms of more progressive legislation in Canada.


Mary Collins: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take part in this debate today. As several members have already mentioned, it is appropriate that this debate is taking place on the Friday before Mother's Day, a day when all of us give recognition to our mothers and the contributions they have made to our lives in terms of what we are doing today as Members of Parliament. I am sure that many of us are here because of the encouragement we received from our mothers.
I am also pleased to be speaking in this debate because many of us here are mothers. We think about the future of our daughters. We want to create a better future and better opportunities for them. I hope that my male colleagues who have daughters share my hopes and aspirations.
We hear a great deal from women about their problems. They often have differing opinions with respect to how they feel the Government should respond to these problems. In fact, there are a great many women today who say that they do not want anything special, they just want to be treated the same as their male colleagues. As the Minister responsible for the status of women mentioned earlier, this is a philosophy, and one with which I agree. The problem for so many years has been that women have started behind. What we have to do is to close the gap so that men and women start together at the starting gate. From there they can obviously move ahead based on their own ability and their own possibilities. However, because of traditions and because of many years of attitudes, women have not been equal at the starting gate.
Earlier, in questions I posed to the Hon. Member for Mount Royal (Mrs. Finestone), I talked about there being among many younger women something which I find disturbing in that they have limited aspirations. They do not see all the choices that are out there for them. They think of their lives in fairly romanticized terms. They think that they will grow up, get married and be looked after for the rest of their lives. We know that is not the reality of life in Canada today, certainly not for all women.
The other difference that exists between men and women is the biological reality of women as the bearers of children and their primary care givers. Fortunately, that, too, is changing in our society and men are playing a greater role. They are accepting responsibility for their children. However, women are the ones who still tend to look after the children, who take them to child care and look after the home to a great extent. In fact, some of my women friends have often said that the best thing they could get on Mother's Day would be to have their spouses look after the arrangements for child care, dentist appointments and lessons for a whole year for them. That would be a great present that some men could give to their wives.
The reality associated with being child care givers is that it limits women's opportunities for participation in the workforce
and thus limits their economic equality. I will come back to some of these issues later on in my remarks.
Although I know that there are many women in the country who are tremendously successful and who are reaching high levels of achievement I would like to say to them that I hope they will share with me the responsibility for bringing along our sisters, because not all women are as fortunate as we are and they need role models. They need other women to help them along to achieve the same heights.
I wish to say a few words about women in the political process and in the decision-making process as this forms part of my colleague's motion today. As we have already heard, we have made great progress here at the federal level. As has been mentioned, there have only been 38 female Members of Parliament since 1921. There are now 27 of us in this Parliament, which is obviously a tremendous improvement. However, it is not improvement enough, but it is substantial progress. We hope that this figure will double, and then triple and that ultimately 50 per cent of Members in this House will be women. That will ensure that the views and experiences of women are felt in all our decisions.
It would be interesting, and I have not done this, to look at the debates of both the committees and the House and to consider the participation by female members therein. Although only 10 per cent of the members here are women, I am sure that their contributions in debate are much greater than 10 per cent in terms of all our discussions and deliberations in this House and in committee.
Canada is now being looked to as a very progressive country with respect to the advancement of women in the political process. Only this week the Minister for International Trade (Miss Carney) told me that she had just come back from meetings in the Far East. While she was in Hong Kong meeting with business people and talking about trade and investment opportunities in Canada, the people with whom she was meeting said to her: "It is very interesting, Madam, that you are the Minister for International Trade for your country. You have a High Commissioner in Hong Kong who is an outstanding woman and who is doing an excellent job. Over the past few months we have also had visits from members of your Government such as your Minister of Communications (Miss MacDonald), your Minister for External Relations (Mrs. Landry) and your Governor General". As we all know, these people are women. The comment to the Minister for International Trade was: "Don't you have any men in your Government?" Well, we do.
Fortunately, women are achieving so much on the international scene that we are really seeing progress. I know that at some of the international meetings I have attended Canada is the only country that will have women along as senior delegates. I would like to compliment the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) and the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Clark) for their constant vigilance and support in ensuring that women are always part of every delegation and
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play leading roles. In the appointments to boards and commissions we have made substantial progress.
I say to women who might be watching the proceedings that we want more of you here. We know that there are barriers, financial barriers, barriers that are created by family and political life. There have sometimes been barriers within our Parties. But I know that all three Parties are working hard to increase the number of women candidates and, hopefully, the number of women members at the federal, provincial and municipal levels so that women can play their full part in the political decision-making of this country.
I would like to turn now to the issue of economics because certainly in my mind, and from what we have heard today, the barriers which still stand in the way of women achieving full equality are economic barriers. It is interesting to know what has happened over the past 25 years. I graduated from university in 1961. I was looking at some of the figures today which show some of the changes which have taken place. In 1961, the workforce was comprised of only 27 per cent of women. Today it is 43 per cent. In 1961, the participation rate of women in the workforce from ages 20 years to 64 years was only 31 per cent. Today it is 64 per cent, more than double. In 1961, only 2 per cent of women had university degrees. Fourteen per cent of women now have university degrees as compared to 17 per cent of men. Therefore, there has been a tremendous change in this area over the past 25 years.
Interestingly enough, the average number of births per woman has decreased from 3.9 in 1961 to 1.7 currently. If we take all that information together, I believe it signifies not an evolution but a revolution. There has been a change not only in the role women are playing in the workforce, but a change in their lives, and this has had an impact on families, on consumer patterns and on all aspects of our lives.
One of the unfortunate realities is that there has not been much change in the kinds of jobs women hold. In fact, in 1961, 62 per cent of women working were concentrated in only three occupational groups, clerical, sales and service. Today that has changed to 60 per cent. So there has not been the same kind of progress where women would be entering into a wider variety of occupations and professions that we would like to see. As has been already mentioned in the House, more work must be done to encourage women to enter into some of these nontraditional occupations or into some of the new occupations.
The Minister of Communications (Miss MacDonald) addressed a conference I attended recently and talked about the tremendous opportunity there is for women to get involved in the communications revolution. There are all kinds of skills and professions based on the communications revolution. These are jobs which do not need physical prowess as do many of the jobs related to traditional resource industries, and which therefore apply to men. These are jobs based on new kinds of knowledge-based skills. The Minister urged this group of women to get on board now, not to miss out. We may have
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missed out on the industrial revolution but we should not miss out on the communications revolution.
Communications holds the opportunity for women to play a leadership role, but in order for women to do so, and I come back to one of my earlier comments, women at the young ages of 14, 15 and 16 years, are going to have to make choices about their studies and careers. They should be studying computer science, science, mathematics, and all the skills they can do effectively. They should make those choices so they can take on those challenges ahead of them.
One of the other realities we have also heard about is the root problem that we have not yet achieved economic equality. We have heard over-all that women who work earn only 66 per cent of what men earn. If we take that statistic and break it down by age groups, it becomes even more interesting. It reveals one of the problems about which I would like to speak. Working women under the age of 20 years are earning approximately 76 per cent of the salaries of their male counterparts. Between the ages of 20 years and 24 years, it goes down to 71 per cent. From 24 years to 29 years, there is a dramatic drop down to 56 per cent; from 30 years to 34 years, it is down to 46 per cent; and from 35 years to 39 years, it is down to 42 per cent and stays around 42 per cent to 44 per cent during what are supposedly the high earning years, the years between the ages of 30 and 55 when people can accumulate wealth, pay into pensions and plan for their retirement. It is in that age group that women are really earning less than 50 per cent of what men earn. I think that is a statistic we have to keep in mind as we look at the problems we need to address.
The key to economic self-sufficiency for women, in my mind, is labour force equality. The Government has done an outstanding job in taking some strong measures to work towards the achievement of labour force equality. We know it is not going to happen overnight. We know we have to send the right signals and start to put in place the right programs which can lead us towards that equality. First, we must go right back to the beginning and deal with the issue of education. We must ensure that women have access to the education which will enable them to enter into the workforce in well-paying occupations. This is, I think, the responsibility of all of us, along with our provincial colleagues and our school systems. We must ensure that this is happening at the junior high and high school levels.
Second, as my colleague said earlier, we must give women opportunities for training. Under the Canadian Jobs Strategy there have been some excellent measures undertaken for women. I have been involved with some of the job entry/re-entry programs. The job re-entry program has totally focused on women, and the job entry programs in which I have been involved in the north shore in British Columbia have been primarily for women. In fact, the over-all statistics show that under the Challenge '86 program, 51.5 per cent were women, and under the other job entry programs, 68.2 per cent were women. So progress is being made.

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When I talk to the women who are in these programs-in fact, I am going to a graduation ceremony again next week, I believe-the question is, once they have done this training and are entering into the workforce, what is going to happen now? One of the problems I still see is that many of the women will still not have a high enough skill level to get jobs which are going to pay enough to really make that much of a difference, to enable them to look after child-care costs and really get ahead. I have made a recommendation to the Minister that in our job training programs we have to look at ensuring that the programs are long enough and the skill level is high enough for the mature woman re-entering the workforce so that she can look forward to getting a job which is going to pay enough to give her that start and provide some opportunities for economic equality.
The next area, of course, is access to employment, because unless women have full access to employment, they are never going to have economic equality. That, of course, is where the employment equity legislation, the first legislation ever introduced by a federal Government in this country, comes into play. I know that many companies are working on plans now. They recognize they are going to have to make changes. The Minister of Supply and Services (Mrs. Vezina), under her program, has already refused to sign contracts with companies which do not put in place employment equity programs. Employment equity programs will help to give women that start, that access into the job market, and provide them with fair treatment.
Of course along with that there must be equal pay for equal work. I had thought that it was no longer an issue in the country, but I was surprised to read recently the mid-1984 survey by the Geneva-based Economic Monde Forum, which rated Canada as being twenty-third out of 28 nations on the extent to which equal pay is paid for equal work. I think this means that a lot of work still needs to be done.
Of course the provinces are involved in that area, but we need not think that the challenge is over. We still need initiatives to deal with it.
Turning to child care, it is one of the top issues on the agenda of the Government and on the agenda of women. Until we are able to deal effectively with the issue of child care, women will not have the real freedom to make choices on whether to go into the workforce or will not be able to look forward to a well paying job. They will always have to compromise their potential if they do not have access to appropriate child care.
I was pleased by the efforts not only of the parliamentary task force but of the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Epp) and his provincial colleagues to address the problem seriously. It will not happen overnight, but it is important to start to put in place the elements which will provide for a fair child care system.
I should now like to turn to pensions. Certainly the older women in the country are facing a problem in this regard. We know that to be poor in the country is to be old and to be a woman. However, we have done a lot on the issue of pensions. We have made amendments to the Canada Pension Plan. We brought in spousal allowance for widows between the ages of 60 years and 64 years. We have amended the Pension Benefits Standards Act.
When we look at women in the workforce now, we recognize that there must be more flexibility and more portability in pensions. I have been working in the workforce for 26 years, and I do not have a pension. Each time 1 moved from job to job, the pensions were not portable. I think this is true for a lot of women. Because of changes in our family circumstances, we go in and out of the job market at different times in our lives. We need pension systems which accommodate that, in addition to the excellent RRSP legislation that enables women to contribute toward a pension plan.
I realize that my time is limited, but there are many things about which I want to talk, including the elements of further action on which I would like to see all of us working together. I think the Government has done a tremendous job, but the challenge is ahead of us.
That plan of action, first of all, would be to influence the attitude of youth toward economic and social realities and the permanent presence of women in the workforce. Second, the Government should act as a model leader and employer regarding employment equity and increasing appointments to boards ultimately to 52 per cent. It must take action on training needs and on child care. I think it should also take action to develop a better data base relating to the impact of broad fiscal measures on women.
In fact, there has been a suggestion that there should be a gender equality index which will provide Governments with a yardstick to measure the relative progress regarding the attainment of economic equality by women.
We should also reassess our income tax provisions in respect of child care, recognizing the contribution which women make in the home, and of a potential credit for women who work in the home through the income tax system. Some suggestions have been made that if we look at the value of a homemaker as being about $26,000 per year, we might look at a tax credit rather than a spousal deduction paid to women who actually gave rise to the tax benefits.
1 think those are some of the issues on the agenda before us. With the commitment which the Government has shown over the past 2.5 years and will show as we proceed through our first, second, third, and fourth terms, I know we will see progress that will ensure that women not only have legal equality, which we basically have now, but that we will achieve the kind of economic equality that we all desire.


Margaret Anne Mitchell: Mr. Speaker, I thank the Hon. Member for her remarks. I think I agreed with most of them, but I should like to make a couple of comments.
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I could not help but note that when she talked about credits through the tax system she in effect supported a Liberal proposal rather than the proposal of the special committee on child care, which was for a refundable child care tax credit that would give some $200 per child per year to all women with young children who are in the home, and would not just be targeted to those with lower incomes. Perhaps she could comment on whether she really intended to support the Liberal proposal rather than the Conservative one, which would be quite interesting.
Also, the Hon. Member talked about equal pay for equal work. She did not talk about equal pay for work of equal value, which is a very different concept, as I am sure she must know. I was wondering why she talked about equal pay for equal work. Was it just an error? Most people concerned about the whole question would say that we require a real procedure for pay equity, as it is called now.
I think that we require a real procedure which would provide not only a case by case appeal forum through the Canadian Rights Commission but would build systemic change into the entire federal employer jurisdiction to start with.
I know that Yukon, Manitoba, and Ontario have moved into the area of pay equity Bills themselves. It seems to me that this is something at which we should be looking federally. We should have our own pay equity Bill. It is not implicit in the employment equity Bill. It would be quite different and in turn would require equal pay for work of equal value.
I think a dramatic example would be, since the Hon. Member is so interested in child care, that child care workers, many of whom have two years of post-secondary training to become care givers of young children, a very important job, are paid much less than truck drivers and zoo keepers, as a matter of fact.


Mary Collins: Mr. Speaker, when I talked about equal pay, I meant equal pay. We have legislation throughout Canada which says that it is illegal not to have equal pay. However, I found the survey which indicated that Canada ranked twenty-third out of 28 nations on the extent to which equal pay is paid. I have not had a chance to look into it.
However, as the Hon. Member knows, the equal pay for work of equal value issue is very controversial. 1 get feedback from all sides on that issue. People fear the role of the state in determining pay levels for different jobs, and I have some difficulty with it, although I support the concept itself.
I am not satisfied that we have a mechanism by which to implement it appropriately and effectively without intruding unnecessarily into the market-place. I think we must do more work on that.
As the Hon. Member knows, federally we have pay equity legislation under the Canadian Human Rights Act. There is more staff and more effort made through the Canadian Human Rights Commission to ensure that it is being implemented in the federal jurisdiction.
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In respect of tax credits, I was not actually talking about the child tax credit. The child tax credit concept, as recommended by the parliamentary task force on child care, is an interesting approach. I know the Minister will be looking at it, along with other recommendations, to see whether it is the best way of giving people choices about child care while also ensuring that there are adequate child care spaces. I think we must balance those two things in the system.
I was really talking about another idea. We have been talking about homemakers' pensions or how we value the work of women in the home. Is it through contributing to the Canada Pension Plan? I see a lot of difficulties in that regard, some inequities and some problems, particularly for low income families and just how it would be done. Another idea which I heard discussed was that perhaps we could do it through a tax credit system to the spouse who is staying at home. Again, it is an idea which might be worth looking at, and I put it forward on that basis.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I offer my hon. friend a suggestion. When it comes to equal pay for work of equal value and the argument that it is difficult to assess the relative value of different jobs, let me say that we do that in the corporate sector all the time. It is called "job evaluation studies", where in fact we bring in a team to evaluate every job on the basis of a whole set of criteria and give every job a certain number of points. This job, for example, in a totally unrelated area gets a certain number of points. Then we agree that if you reach so many points in these two jobs you should be receiving equal pay. The concept has been working for years and years in the private sector. I have been part of the teams that have done this in a variety of places in western Canada. The mechanism is there. It is perhaps a matter of applying it on a wider scale.
However, my question is unrelated to that. Having heard the Hon. Member talk earlier about the situation in B.C., I am concerned about the number of young women who are looking for jobs in British Columbia. Recognizing that youth unemployment in her province increased 157 per cent in the 1980s, the situation can only be classed as tragic. This is a tragic crisis situation particularly for young women who have a more difficult time than ever obtaining summer jobs now that students are looking for summer work because so many jobs in the resource sector tend to go to young male students.
Last year we had Expo in B.C. which was presumably to create a lot of summer jobs, which it did. We do not have Expo this year in British Columbia and the situation is worse than it was last summer. Given the crisis situation in B.C., did the Hon. Member accept the notion that the amount of funding for Challenge '87 should be the same this year as it was last year?


Mary Collins: Mr. Speaker, I would like to bring to the attention of the Hon. Member, as I am sure he is aware, that since our Government took office-this is the beginning of

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April and I know that the figures have gone up substantially since 63,000 jobs have been created in British Columbia-well over two-thirds as many jobs have been created in the 30 months in B.C. since September, 1984 than were created between the 1980 and 1984 elections. The unemployment rate in British Columbia has fallen from 15.1 per cent to 13.6 per cent. Things are obviously moving in the right direction. Within that, however, there are disparities. The problem of youth is one concern.
I have found, just reflecting on my own riding, that unemployment has been up this year, partly as a consequence Expo. A number of people who were working at Expo are now on unemployment insurance until something else, hopefully, will come along. My Challenge '87 is up this year, and we are really looking forward to it. Maybe it is the way we have been able to carve out the jobs.
We have a lot of jobs in the private sector this year, which is participating and helping to pay for part of the program. I am very pleased by the tremendous response I have had from the federal Government, not only through Challenge '87. In the last few weeks I was able to announce $300,000 worth of jobs under Section 38, very important jobs for people on unemployment insurance who will now get back into the workforce, many in training and a lot of them in community organizations. Those programs, on top of the Canadian Jobs Strategy Program, a number of job development programs and the job entry and re-entry program, are making a significant impact in my part of the province. I would hope that my hon. colleague will have the same positive results in Kamloops.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Resuming debate with the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence (Mr. de Corneille).


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to ask a question of the Hon. Member. Is there time for a further question?


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Will the House agree to the Hon. Member for Eglinton-Lawrence asking a question and for the Hon. Member for Capilano (Mrs. Collins) replying?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, I wanted to call to the Hon. Member's attention that since 1930, in the United States the concept of equal pay for work of equal value has been in effect. Criteria has been developed and, as my colleague has pointed out, in the private sector the criteria are four in number: skill, responsibility, effort and working conditions, in order to make an assessment of dissimilar jobs. Is the Hon. Member in replying to those who approach her about this matter, expressing sympathy for this kind of equality where women have equal pay for work of equal value?


Mary Collins: Mr. Speaker, I guess the way I would see it is that it is not just for women; it is hoped that one is paid the value of the job. The criteria that my colleague mentions are appropriate. I worked in personnel at one time many years ago
and did job classification, and that was certainly the basis upon which we did it. If jobs are looked on in this way, the skills required, the education required, sometimes hours or other aspects that may be included, it will not make a difference whether it is men or women who are filling those jobs. I think in most cases that is what is happening.
There are obviously still some areas where that has not worked. We need to address those. I know many of the provinces are taking steps because most of these private companies come under provincial jurisdiction. The Province of Ontario, for example, is taking steps in that respect. It is something that has to be worked out with employers. It is not something you can impose, because it does not work if you do it that way. The public has to have a better understanding about the concept and the implications. That is my approach to dealing with the issue. If we do it in that way, we can be successful.


Roland de Corneille: Mr. Speaker, the subject before the House today is as follows:
That this House condemns the Government for failing to recognize the real value of womens' work in the workplace, the community and in the home with tangible policies that would ensure adequate incomes, removal of barriers and full opportunities for equal participation in decision making and in the political life of Canada.

That is a serious resolution. I suggest that it is not trivial and it is not in any way something that is put forward simply as an act of partisanship. It is a serious subject. It is not one either which has suddenly been put forward, Mr. Speaker. We are talking about real people, and lest perhaps we get lost with the statistics, certainly of Members of Parliament, and I am sure my colleagues even on the government side, receive letters of complaint and concern from constituents about the problems they face, not the least of which is the kind of letter that I have received from a person who works in the Bank of Montreal, let me read it. I am not selecting that particular bank as being any different from any other bank. This person writes:
The past year has been one of tremendous change at the Bank of Montreal. As employees, we have experienced the impact of radical organizational change. Some of the adverse consequences of these changes have been:
Bank-initiated terminations;
Reassignments from full-time to part-time jobs;
Reassignments to lower-graded positions;
Relocations to other branches.
In summing up concerns and those of other co-workers; the letter goes on to say:
-the unequal treatment of men and women in hiring and promotion shockingly insensitive lay-offs and transfers as a result of technological change and growing work loads-.
This is not an isolated letter, and it is not merely about one bank. It is the kind of letter that I receive from people in many different organizations and companies over the kinds of problems they are facing, not of improvements for them in
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their daily lives but a regression to problems that are increasingly hitting them, sometimes in middle life, which is a very critical time, when, as the last speaker so correctly said, they should be able to expect greater security, greater recompense because they are now in what is supposed to be their higher earning years.
We are talking about real people and about the kind of person who writes the kind of letter I have just read. We are talking about people we see often in schools or in hospitals when we go to institutions such as that and we see large numbers of women, the majority of whom are working in those institutions, working as ordinary workers but very few of them being given the opportunity to hold administrative positions. Even if they do hold administrative positions, they are not necessarily being promoted any further.
We are talking about real people in real institutions, banks, schools or hospitals where women still remain often the main workforce but are not being given the opportunity to move upward. Very often, women still say today that it feels like a man's world. We who are legislators must regard that inequality as a challenge.
I cannot accept the passive attitude that in the long run education will solve all these problems and that progress will eventually take place. I am concerned about the comment of the Hon. Member for Capilano (Mrs. Collins) who has said previously as well that she does not always see the value of forcing these issues through legislation. Rather, she feels we must educate people. Education is certainly important, but when it comes to human rights, there is no reason for people to waste their lives while we let time go by in the hope that education will change opinions and attitudes. It is not fair that people do not now have equal rights, and that should be our objective. We should not leave it for education in some future day. Human rights should be brought into effect now.
We may look at the situation statistically. I tried to cite examples of living people in real situations, people working in banks, schools, hospitals, corporations, factories and plants. However, the statistics must also speak to our thoughts. We must realize that statistics speak of real individuals. Women earn 65 cents for every $1 a man earns. That is a real statistic about real people with real names.
Of all Canadians who are working at the minimum wage, two-thirds are women. Women lose out economically when they leave work to have children because they lose seniority when they re-enter the workforce. We know that that happens to real Canadian citizens. From statistics, we know that 6.7 per cent of the women in the labour force earn more than $30,000, while for men that figure is 28.6 per cent. There are almost five times as many men as women who make more than $30,000. This means that women are not yet included in opportunities for promotion.
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Still another fact is that two and a half times as many women as men are forced to work part time because they cannot find full-time work. Seventy-one per cent of all parttime workers in Canada are women. These are the realities faced by real people. These are real statistics about our children, cousins, neighbours, families, friends and people across Canada whom we do not know but about whom we should care.
W'e know that there is an incredibly high rate of poverty among elderly women. They represent the largest number of people who live under the poverty line. The fact that this is so relates back to just these kinds of economic realities. They cannot earn the kind of incomes they should for the kind of jobs they do and they cannot get the kind of pensions they deserve. Often pensions relate to incomes. Ultimately, that is why the greatest number of people living under the poverty line are elderly women.
One must ask if Government can and should do anything about this. We in the Opposition do not agree with the attitude so often expressed by government Members that these are matters which should be taken care of by the increasingly affluent economy, that if the economy is sufficiently well off, eventually enough people will be hired and the poor will become richer-the trickle-down theory.
During the 1984 election campaign, the Prime Minister (Mr. Mulroney) promised to develop a definition of part-time employment and to require employers to "include a pro-rated basis in all employment benefits". When he was electioneering, the Prime Minister was prepared to promise government action rather than to let things happen through education and over time. Of course, this has not been the case.
Louise Dulude, President of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women, has said that the Prime Minister has failed to honour his promises to part-time workers, most of whom are women. She says that she rates the performance of the Government so far as poor.
Lisa Avedon of the Canadian Congress for Learning Opportunities for Women has said the following:
This government's philosophy is fine for those at the top of the system. But for
those at the bottom, without access to higher education, it's the pits!
In short, the Government has a responsibility. It has a task to perform. We in the Opposition call upon the Government to do more than it is doing to meet the needs and concerns of women.
There has been a failure on the part of the Government to set an example. It calls upon the private sector to do things it is not prepared to do itself. For example, we know of the Government's record in hiring young people. Huguette Labelle of the Public Service Commission, a very respected person and a Deputy Minister, indicated yesterday that the number of Public Service appointments going to people aged 24 and under dropped in the past year. She pointed out that barely 4 per cent of public servants are 24 or under. During the summer, the Government calls upon the private sector to hire

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young people, to take a chance on young people. Yet the Government itself is setting an example which fails young people and cuts down on the number of jobs for young people in the Public Service. It is saying: "Don't do as I do, do as I say".
I serve on the subcommittee of the House of Commons which deals with the disabled and the handicapped. Similarly, it has been brought to our attention that the private sector has provided 6 per cent of the jobs for the disabled and the handicapped, whereas statistics show that the Government has provided jobs for only 2 per cent of the disabled and the handicapped. The private sector hires three times as many handicapped and disabled people as the Government which, in its pious concern, expresses all this great emotion about the disabled and the handicapped with words. When it comes to delivering, it shows a very bad record.
The same applies to women. We also found out from Huguette Labelle that though the number of women in management jobs increased by 55, the number of appointments will have to be increased significantly in 1987 to meet the Government's target by the end of the first quarter of 1988. The Deputy Minister has expressed grave concern about the fact that the Government is falling short of its target for providing jobs to women in administrative and senior positions. At this rate, she feels it will fail to keep its promise, as it has failed in so many other ways to provide women with the kinds of jobs and the number of jobs they deserve to have. The Government is saying: Do not do as I do, do as I say.
We believe the Government can do certain things, and we call upon it to set an example with its own workforce. Let the Government deliver on the words we heard from government Members as they piously spoke about Mother's Day and their concern about equity for women. Let them provide the jobs in the Public Service that they should. That will be the best proof to the women of this country, in fact to all of us, that there is a determination by the Government to practise what it preaches.
We know there are other things that ought to do be done. We know they can be achieved by the Government. If the Government had the resolve, it could do what other countries have done concerning equal pay for work of equal value. For example, equal pay legislation was phased in from 1969 to 1975 in Australia. Over that time, average weekly earnings of women increased from 62 per cent to 80 per cent of men's earnings. That is a remarkable record. It demonstrates that if Government sets the example and brings in adequate legislation, progress takes place very rapidly. Women have the right to be treated as equals. They are entitled to equal access, equal opportunity and equal pay. If they can do it in Australia, it can be done here.
In Britain equal pay for work of equal value legislation has increased women's earnings by 10 per cent. Here in Canada the Ontario Government introduced a Bill to extend pay equity to over one million women over a three-year period. It is the
most powerful and sweeping Bill of its kind in North America, and a Liberal Government brought it in. It will require employers to pay men and women the same salary for work of equal value. This proves, whether it be Australia in the 1960s, Britain in the 1970s, or Ontario in the 1980s, that if a Government wants to do something about it, it can. The challenge is there if the political will is there. The promise was made by the Prime Minister during the election campaign that he would deliver. We are asking him to do just that.
The Government had the opportunity; it was tested, and found wanting. It brought in a Bill, which was a good thing to do in itself, but it was so weak that one organization after another said it was worse than nothing and they would be better off without it. I am of course speaking about Bill C-62, an Act respecting employment equity. It should have been called an Act respecting reporting. It was introduced on June 27, 1986. We opposed it, not because we did not want a Bill, because we did, but we wanted one that would be effective. The Bill introduced was gravely defective. That is why most of the organizations concerned about the issue of equality expressed their disappointment with it.
I would like to give just four reasons why we in the Opposition were disappointed with the Bill. First, its scope was and is too narrow. It does not apply to federal Departments and suppliers as regulated by Treasury Board. In other words, the Government exempted itself from this Bill. When you look at the record of the Government and its failure to deliver on its promises to youth, the handicapped and women, perhaps that explains why the Government decided to exempt itself. Yet at the same time it called upon other organizations to comply.
The second reason is that we felt the Bill did not have enough teeth so that if organizations did not comply there would be some way to make them do what they are supposed to do. The Bill failed on that level especially. Neither did it include contract compliance, except at very high levels. The Bill would apply only to contracts of $200,000 or more. That meant it covered only about 500 of the over 54,000 contracts the Government issues each year. It provided little or no leverage for the Government to use to get companies who buy from the Government to comply. Finally, there is one last tragic fact, that the Bill is in any case a reporting mechanism. It does not provide any immediate relief for or correction of the situation. We will probably have to wait for three years before we have any results which can be firmly measured.
I will close my remarks by saying that while this is a nice time for us to pay lip service to these matters because it will soon be Mother's Day, while it is nice to talk about the wonderful distance we have travelled, we cannot look back and simply pat ourselves on the back because we have finally recognized the fact that women, the disabled, and the minorities are all human beings. We should now resolve that this is not good enough and we have to take very strong steps forward to legislate ways whereby women will receive equal pay for work of equal value.
May 8, 1987


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Resuming debate. The Hon. Member for Louis-Hebert (Mrs. Duplessis).


Mrs. Suzanne Duplessis (Louis-Hebert):: Mr. Speaker, I welcome this opportunity to take part in the debate on the motion presented by the Hon. Member for Vancouver East (Ms. Mitchell), because the status of women is one of my major concerns, and also because I would like to tell Hon. Members a little more about what the Government has done to promote women's employment. I find it hard to understand why the Hon. Member for Vancouver East is presenting a motion of this kind. Since the Government was sworn in three years ago, it has seen the status of women in Canadian society as one of its major concerns. The Hon. Member wants tangible and compassionate policies for women. Mr. Speaker, the Government is doing everything it can to promote appropriate and effective measures.
The Hon. Member for Vancouver East also referred to equal participation in decision-making and in political life. These terms are so vague they can mean just about anything, but if it is a matter, as I believe it is, of offering women new opportunities, the best way is to have a paying job, and with the material benefits, the independence and self respect such a job provides.
Mr. Speaker, no previous administration has a record that can compare with what this Government has done to promote women's employment. Employment barriers as a result of systematic discrimination and prejudice have been revealed for what they are and torn down. Never before have Canadian women been present in such large numbers and on the same equal basis, in workshops, board rooms and the corridors of power.
Women would be the first to admit this is true.
Mr. Speaker, since we came to power in 1984, 337,000 women entered the labour market. During the same period, the unemployment rate dropped by 2.3 per cent. In fact, the number of jobs filled by women increased by 427,000, and 80 per cent are full-time jobs.
Let the Hon. Member for Vancouver East (Ms. Mitchell) try to denigrate the Government with her motion. Some 427,000 Canadian women who have paying jobs have proved they have confidence in the economy. Their improved employment situation is of course due to economic growth. And 1 think the Hon. Member will have to acknowledge that it was this Government's policies that contributed to that growth. By creating a climate conducive to investment, the Government made it possible for the private sector to create real, permanent jobs. Thanks to our efforts to reduce the deficit, we have restored the confidence of investors in our economy and lightened the tax burden on future generations.
Mr. Speaker, the workplace is undergoing a spectacular transformation, the increasingly important role of women is a striking example. Today, economic growth is highest in the
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small business sector, and women are responsible for a considerable share of that growth. Today, one third of Canada's small businesses are owned by women, and this share is increasing rapidly. At this rate, women may own 50 per cent in three years.
Now this is an outstanding change in relation with conditions which existed only a few years ago. Fifteen years ago, only 6 per cent of university graduates in business administration were women. In 1982, that proportion had risen to almost 34 per cent. During the same period, the percentage of women graduates from law schools in Canada had more than quadrupled from 9 per cent to 38 per cent. Women are beginning to carve out a place for themselves in the business world, in the courts, in medicine and in Parliament.
However, those statistics show more than the determination of women to play a full role in the social and economic life of the country. They also indicate the important part played by women in our economic welfare. Indeed, a number of them meet an economic need of our society. However, many other statistics give us a quite different view especially those indicating the problems of single parents who are women. A recent report of the National Council on Welfare shows that families headed by single women are usually five times poorer than families with two parents.
One of the main obstacles facing women on the labour market is due to the fact that they are concentrated in a few sectors and occupations which could be called occupational ghettos, that is in service industries or as salespersons or administrative support staff. As a result of conditions on the labour market today, most entry-level jobs in those areas will be increasingly sought.
This being so, to maintain and improve its position in our competitive world nowadays, Canada has to count on its most valuable assets, that is on our whole human resources.
Over the past two years, the Government has taken two major initiatives to help working women. If I may, Mr. Speaker, I would like to provide the House with a few details. First of all, there is the Employment Equity Act which was promulgated in June of last year. It applies to all employers under federal jurisdiction which have 100 employees or more, whether they are Crown corporations or private companies in the area of banking, transportation, and so on.
Under this legislation, all obstacles limiting or preventing the employment of women, Indians, members of visible minorities and the handicapped should be canceled and eliminated. Likewise, the employers are responsible for taking special steps to ensure that people belonging to these groups fully participate in the labour market.
The legislation does not impose any quota or stringent restriction or time schedule on employers to meet.
Our Government's objective is development and not dependency. It is making funds available to benefit Canadians and not bureaucracy.

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We have also implemented the federal contract program to ensure that all contractors doing business with the federal Government are doing their share to train and preserve a representative and equitably distributed labour force. Moreover, we are trying to persuade all contractors big and small doing business with the federal Government to apply employment equity principles. They know that we are very serious about this.
Those two measures, the Employment Equity Act and the Federal Contract Program will impact on the work life of over a million Canadians. Those two initiatives offer both women and other members of target groups an opportunity to play a more important role on the labour market.
It is not enough to create openings, we must also ensure that those people can benefit.
What about the young for instance who, having dropped out of school, do not have the required skills to get a job? What about people at home and mothers who want to return to the labour market after a number of years, but whose skills no longer meet current requirements? What about women who cannot afford child care in order to get training, or who only can get part-time training?
Previously, no adequate steps were taken to effectively meet the needs of those women. Now, thanks to employment planning, we are tackling that problem and many others still.
Through employment job planning, goals have been set for participation of women and members of other minority groups, and excellent results are reported in that respect. But more importantly, in each program, women have an opportunity to acquire the skills needed to enter the labour market. Under the Canadian job strategy, subsidized training and work experiences are available for young women who have a hard time making the transition from the schooling system to the labour force, women who return to the labour force after just being homemakers for some time, women who have been unemployed for a long time, women whose jobs are threatened by technological change, women in communities who have suffered from economic hardship or long-time unemployment.
The rate of participation of women in the training and work experience project is representative of their percentage of the work force. Flexibility is one of the major assets of the job strategy. Women are encouraged to take part on a part-time or a full-time basis in various activitities and all training and other allowances have been increased to encourage more women to participate.
Moreover, allowances are now granted on the basis of the number of hours spent on those activities, which means that they can be paid to part-time participants.
In the case of women with dependents, the dependents' allowance is a fairer recognition of child care costs. As far as women in rural or isolated communities are concerned, training is more readily available for them as travel, commuting and food allowances have been increased.
Under the Canadian Job Strategy, we have come to grips with all the obstacles faced by women. For instance, the initiatives taken with respect to welfare recipients will benefit women with an urge to become full-time members of the national workforce.
We have been taking a number of steps this year to enable women to choose from a wider range of activities, in other words to help a larger number of women get non-traditional, better paid jobs. We have also been urging employers with greater insistence to promote activities that will make it possible for women to work in positions which were traditionally open to men only. The federal Government is also committed to a number of changes which will help women as their needs and the situation of the labour market change.
We must take a closer look at any question concerning the change in women's career orientation with a view to increasing their numbers in jobs where they are now under-represented. This question and the other one related to professional ghettos, that is limited opportunities for women, are two major concerns. However the Government alone cannot change individual attitudes nor remove social obstacles preventing women from gaining access to training courses or employment in fields traditionally reserved to men.
As I have already pointed out, employment growth forecasts reveal that within a few short years jobs will be concentrated in the service sector where women have always been more numerous. Many of the 10 professions which are expected to expand considerably between now and 1992 are professions traditionally occupied by women. Most of the others do not pay very well. Women who are anxious to sever all connections with professional ghettos may find these forecasts very discouraging. Essential though it may be for women to be able to venture into predominantly male professions, that is not enough. It is therefore imperative that they become skilful enough to change jobs and professions, and that the federal Government promote co-operation between academic circles and the labour market. As my colleague the Minister of State for Youth (Mr. Charest) pointed out yesterday, it is holding extensive consultations with provincial representatives in an attempt to draft a national education policy which would make it easier to prepare young Canadians, men and women alike, to join the labour force.
In this respect, Mr. Speaker, we cannot act unilaterally. Even with the assistance we provide through our programs, the federal Government alone cannot change individual attitudes and eliminate obstacles which prevent women from being active in the labour force and play their proper role in society. This is a challenge to all of us.
So far, Mr. Speaker, the Government is quite satisfied with the results. Last year under employment planning programs the participation rate of women was 46 per cent, up from 37 per cent under previous programs. In excess of 197,000 women throughout Canada underwent training and participated in
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employment enhancement activities sponsored under Employment and Immigration Canada programs. However commendable these results may be, Mr. Speaker, the Government remains firmly committed to deal with the serious problems related to the status of women on the labour market. With that in mind, it is more than willing to examine any constructive suggestion likely to advance the cause of women, but it will not consider such vague and shallow opinions as this motion which does not lead anywhere.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Resuming debate.


Steven W. Langdon: Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by paying tribute to the people who have put the question of women on the agenda of this country. They are the people in all of our communities who are seeing to it that all the various needs and concerns of women are being considered, responded to and taken seriously by those who are in authority in those communities.
I begin by paying tribute to the National Action Committee on the Status of Women which is meeting here in Ottawa this weekend. As usual, it is bringing before Canadians a tremendous range of important subjects, some of which will disagree with what each of us in our political Parties represents. It will bring forward some policies which each of us presently holds but will attempt to present to us both the urgency and the specifics by which that urgency can be fulfilled in trying to create a measure of true equality between men and women in Canada.
It is important to stress that it is, in fact, not these national organizations that are primarily responsible for transforming the nature of political discourse at the local level, but the groups which are developing themselves, bringing women together and giving a force to their cry for change in our communities.
These groups include ones in my community such as the Immigrant Women's Centre, which works so effectively with new immigrants and refugees who enter the Windsor area. They make the case powerfully as a consequence of their detailed experience that there has to be fairness provided for those immigrant women to have equal access to training of immigrants in English or French as their male counterparts.
I also pay tribute to groups like the one in Windsor called Women Working, which has tried to bring the issue of equality in the workplace, both on the job and in training for jobs, and make it a powerful, effective force for thoughtful change throughout our community and Essex County and Windsor.
I also refer to the local day care association which has worked so hard in trying to take this issue before the people of Essex County in Windsor and demonstrate as clearly and powerfully as it can why it is necessary to make urgent changes in this area rather than continue on the path of study
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after study which has so marked the delay and lack of urgency with which the issue has been treated in the past.
I also refer to groups like the Women's Economic Forum in Windsor which has attempted to draw together professional women and give them a sense of solidarity as they face the very difficult day-to-day struggles which occur on the job to establish equality in promotions and social priorities throughout the community.
I wish to emphasize in tribute my strong regard for the Unemployed Help Centre which is headed by a very intelligent and articulate woman, Pamela Pons-Lauzon. She has been able to assist right across the country to see to it that women have at least equal access to the new job opportunities which we have been trying to create through government programs and which private businesses have also been trying to expand in the Windsor area.
To that group I would add the names of those involved in the various farm groups in our community, as well as the local of the National Farmers Union and the Essex County Federation of Agriculture, who are co-operating with me in conducting a full-scale survey across my constituency to try to identify and then to respond with urgency, concern, and sensitivity to the needs of rural women in southwestern Ontario.
I did not want to finish the debate by simply paying these strongly felt tributes to women's groups in my community. I should say that there are many others which I could add to the list. I want to deal with what I think will be an important economic challenge facing women, not just in my constituency or in the constituency of my colleague, the Hon. Member for Vancouver East (Ms. Mitchell), but in the constituencies of all Members of Parliament.
I think it is now clear that we are heading for an agreement of sorts on free trade. It is an agreement the contours of which it is very difficult to identify at this stage because of the secrecy which has surrounded the whole process. However, there are several things which can be said about the potential impact of that free trade agreement if it takes place, when it takes place, with respect to women.
In this respect I draw particularly on material which has been brought together by the National Action Committee, and especially by Marjorie Cohen who is an economist at York University. She has spent a great deal of time looking at this issue. I believe she has raised very important warning signs for the Government, and certainly for women, as they look at their reactions to this potential agreement.
Marjorie Cohen has said that the Canadian Government appears to have ignored the impact that free trade will have on the service sector and on jobs in that sector. That is of great concern to us because it is clear that if one talks about the sector of the economy within which women have often been caught, in which women have often been ghettoized, it has been the service sector in terms of communications, banking,

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data processing, insurance and transportation. As the National Action Committee has said, there has not been consideration for the impact of free trade on public policy with respect to this sector. Until Canadians have a clear idea of what free trade will mean for workers in such industries, it would be foolhardy to proceed with free trade in services, so says the National Action Committee.
For the two countries which are now talking about such an agreement, the United States and Canada, if this agreement does come to be an agreement that extends to services, then it will be the first agreement with respect to free trade between two countries which will have touched the service sector. That in itself raises many questions. It raises questions of specific and important concern when the service sector in one country, the United States, is very much larger, better developed and, frankly, more cost-effective in many sections of its operations, than is the case in Canada. Therefore it is likely-indeed it is more than likely, it is probable-when one takes the fact that 80 per cent of the jobs that exist in the service sector are held by women, that one will find that a great many of those jobs will be badly disrupted.
Disruption is an easy word. It is a word which sounds intellectually neutral. In fact, disruption means the loss of jobs, transfers to new employment, the necessity to face often difficult training opportunities and often training opportunities which are just not there. This job disruption will be very much the challenge which women within the service sector will have to face.
Of course, it is not just the service sector which will be involved. In the manufacturing sector, as has been indicated by the National Action Committee, women represent almost two-thirds of workers in the most vulnerable of industries, including textiles, clothing, small electrical products, sporting goods, toys and games and leather products. Women in the manufacturing sector are highly concentrated in these vulnerable industries. In fact, these industries represent about 42 per cent of all women manufacturing workers. That is why women have a great concern about what has been happening in the free trade negotiations and why they resent very greatly their lack of involvement in the decision-making processes which have been associated with free trade discussions.
For this reason I hope, even if it is at this last minute, that the Government will finally get its act together. I hope that it will draw further into the discussions which should be taking place with groups such as those that I started out talking about in my speech today.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: It being five o'clock, it is my duty to inform the House that pursuant to Section 12 of Standing Order 82, the proceedings on the motion have expired.
This House stands adjourned until Monday, at 11 a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 3(1).


[Stage Direction]
The House adjourned at 5 p.m.
[Stage Direction]

Monday, May 11, 1987
[Stage Direction]
Prayers