Women have made huge gains, but haven't attained equality in Canada
Georgia Straight
March 6, 2009
Commentary By Caryn Duncan, executive director of the Vancouver Women’s Health Collective

Each year, women around the world commemorate International Women’s Day (March 8) by celebrating, protesting, and advocating for women’s rights. Women celebrate the day in many varied ways: by sharing a meal, spending an evening together, or planning a special event. Some women join in protest through marches, rallies, or at workshops. Whatever the activity, women continue to celebrate each other and their accomplishments, in spite of the recent setbacks to women’s equality….

There are many independent indicators that chronicle the inequalities, including Statistics Canada reporting on women’s average annual incomes, and the rate at which single mothers, aboriginal women, and senior women live in poverty. And there are other measures, like the unbalanced composition of the House of Commons and provincial legislatures, the low number of women CEOs at major corporations, and the few women who sit on the boards of Canadian banks. So, what do we need to do to address these participation rates and the overall status of women in Canadian society?

The ideas are not new—but they do require political will and action. Affordable, quality child care; livable welfare rates; a higher minimum wage; increased unionization; adequate housing; women working with other women to end violence against women; women’s participation in the electoral process; and women setting provincial and federal budgets with women in mind—all would make a big difference to the status of women in society.

And women forging alliances with men who support these goals is essential.

In recent months, with the severe downturn in the global economy, politicians are telling us that this is not the time to increase the minimum wage or introduce affordable, quality child care. But when the economy was growing, and year after year federal and provincial governments were running huge surpluses, it was also not the time. I wonder when the time will come….