All posts in category sexism

Notes from #CNFC2013 Part 2

Further to the regina mom‘s Notes from #CNFC2013 Part 1 here is part 2, detailing the session, “Ownership: Stories and Lies,” with Kate Braid and Tyler Trafford, moderated by Myrna Kostash at the 2013 Creative NonFiction Collective’s annual conference in Banff.

 

trm knew of Kate Braid’s work as a poet, having been introduced to her Georgia O’Keefe poems at the Sage Hill Writing Experience more than a decade ago.  She did not know that Kate Braid was also a nonfiction writer and so listened intently during the presentation about her latest nonfiction work, Journeywoman: Swinging a Hammer in a Man’s World.  trm knows women who work in trades and technologies.  In fact, when she first became active in the women’s movement, she met many women involved in Saskatchewan Women In Trades and Technologies (SaskWITT), women who, like her, were part of the women’s coalition that came about during the end of the Devine years.

 

But back to Braid, who said that memoir writing is not the same as autobiography.  Rather, it tells part of a life.  She said she struggled with finding the stories that mattered and added to it as she went along.  Wisely, she had kept a detailed journal and was able to reference her notes.  Her first draft took more than 25 years to write and was over 1,200 pages!  Eventually, it was carved to a book, thanks to her editor who was able to see the narrative.

 

She said her intent was to be emotionally honest about her experience in the construction trade, about that time in her life, and found that the tense she chose to use, present tense, afforded her the best means of doing so.  The past tense tended to pull her away from the story.  She also said that a memoir’s success depends on the author showing what s/he has learned and referenced Myrna’s opening remarks about memory being like a computer.  “Memory is a backseat driver who wants control,” she said.  Truthtellers, of both emotional and literal truth, she added, are essential to credibility.

 

Her advice, which comes from Beat poet, Allen Ginsberg, is what the regina mom tries to do, that is to “write as though no one is ever going to read this.”  Easier said than done, but doable.  Still, Braid knew people would read her book and so she changed some people’s names to protect them.  She asked herself if names were essential to the story and, in instances where they were, she sent out chapters to those named and sought their feedback.  trm is thinking she may well have to do that with her Sask women’s movement essay, presuming it ever gets written, that is.

 

Braid spoke about her fear and how it stopped her from writing over and over again.  At one point she was paralyzed for years and it got even worse after she submitted the manuscript to her publisher!  But once she was able to figure out who she was writing the book for, the tradeswomen who went through what she went through, it was easier.  She decided she was providing a baseline of what it was like to be a woman working in the trades.  She knew the book wanted to be written, knew it had to be written.  She wrote various versions of it — scholarly, lighthearted, for example — and finally got it written.

 

trm can’t help but wonder about the women who, when she worked at the YWCA, were apprenticing in the trades and remodeling various locations in the building.  How many of them faced ridicule and insult once they completed their training?  How many even completed the training?  Certainly, working as part of an all-women crew would be very different from working as the only woman on a construction crew!  And trm bets they’d love to hear Braid read from her book, so she’s going to do what she can to get Kate Braid to Saskatchewan for a reading in the near future.

 

3 Comments
by thereginamom on May 2, 2013  •  Permalink
Posted in activism, Canada, feminism, Kate Braid, Labour, poets, sexism, women, Writing
Tagged , , , ,

Posted by thereginamom on May 2, 2013

http://thereginamom.com/2013/05/02/notes-from-cnfc2013-part-2/

Save the date! #SWF13

the regina mom is so very excited! As you regulars are aware, she attended the Women’s Forum des Femmes in Ottawa in October and had a fantastic time.  So, she brought the idea home and is happy to invite you to save the date!

—–

Saskatchewan Women’s Forum 2013

 

If you are interested in women’s rights, in connecting with individuals and organizations who have been working on women’s issues recently and through the decades, and in spending a weekend learning, having fun, and moving a women’s agenda forward in our province, then:

 

Please set aside Friday, January 18 (evening) and Saturday, January 19, 2013!

 

We are a coalition of women and organizations who have come together to plan a Saskatchewan Women’s Forum taking place at the Bessborough Hotel in Saskatoon. For too long, we have been having conversations in isolation from each other about the current context that women and women’s organizations find themselves in. So we are creating this opportunity to collectively develop how we can move forward on the issues that we care about.

 

We are currently finalizing our program, which will be centered on women’s stories and respectful of intergenerational, intercultural and diverse experiences. If you are interested in attending, please respond back to us (at michelle.beveridge@oxfam.ca, 306.242.4097)) and we will ensure you receive the program and registration package by mid-December.

 

In the meantime, please save the date! And get in touch with us if you would like to be part of the planning, to volunteer at the forum in any number of capacities, or have other ideas for us.

 

Registration is $50/person. (Please let us know if you are in a situation where you would only be able to attend with a reduced rate, or conversely, if you are able and willing to donate  money to assist in covering a portion of registration for others.)

 

Sincerely,

Michelle Beveridge and Katelyn Jones, Oxfam Canada, Saskatoon

Sue Delanoy, Elizabeth Fry Society, Saskatoon

Diane Fletcher, Vadis Group, Saskatoon

Lori Hanson, U of S, Community Health and Epidemiology, Saskatoon

Laura Hopkins, Saskatoon Women’s Community Coalition

Lori Johb, Saskatchewan Federation of Labour, Regina

Audra Krueger, U of S, Centre for the Study of Co-ops, Saskatoon

Darla Leard, Canadian Labour Congress, Saskatoon

Barb Macpherson, YWCA Saskatoon

Adriane Paavo, Prairie Lily Feminist Society, Regina

Priscilla Settee, U of S, Native Studies, Saskatoon

Lenore Swystun and Samantha Mark, Prairie Wild Consulting, Saskatoon

Laura Westman, Saskatoon

Bernadette Wagner, Regina

 

1 Comment
by thereginamom on December 3, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in activism, ecofeminism, economics, environment, feminism, First Nations, Niki Ashton, reproductive freedom, Ryan Meili, Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, sexism, women, writers, youth
Tagged ,

Posted by thereginamom on December 3, 2012

http://thereginamom.com/2012/12/03/save-the-date-swf13/

Women have always been workers

The following piece appeared in the May/June 2007 issue of Canadian Dimension magazine. Sadly, the situation for women and unpaid work has become worse, not better. Right wing governments in Saskatchewan and Canada continue to dump unpaid work on communities and families and women in an attempt to rationalize cuts on social spending.

—–

“Women’s” Work: Unnoticed, Unrecognized, Unpaid

A discussion about labour is incomplete without some acknowledgment of the unpaid work performed by women. The traditional work women do, the three Cs – cooking, cleaning, caring – continue to be largely ignored thanks to long-standing sexist definitions of work. It’s almost as though the work women do to keep families healthy and functional, to move the economy through its cycles, and to make the world a somewhat caring and nurturing place really doesn’t matter. Capital, after more than three centuries of greed continues to pressure governments to create conditions for increased profitmaking, conditions which do not benefit women and which increase women’s unpaid work. Even the small gains of recent years are under constant attack by both capital and governments. Women’s groups know that if women are to reach a point of equality with men in this country, or anywhere in the world for that matter, then women’s unpaid work must be honoured in very real ways. Women carry on.

Defining Work

Societal definitions of paid work are based on sexist definitions established centuries ago. When our monetary system developed women were chattel; the work women performed preparing meals, cleaning homes, and raising children was not remunerated. As a result, it was excluded from economic records and, as the economic system developed, their work continued — and continues — to be excluded.

The economic value of the unpaid work women do is huge and must be acknowledged. According to Manitoba’s United Nations Platform for Action Committee (UNPAC) Canadian women’s unpaid work is an amount equivalent to as much as 41% of Canada’s Gross Domestic Product. The time women spend doing voluntary/community labour and household labour in Canada, according to a pilot study in Nova Scotia, is the equivalent of 571,000 full-year, full-time jobs. Even Statistics Canada (StatsCan) suggests a number anywhere from $234 to $374 billion worth of unpaid work is performed by women each year. Globally, the amount skyrockets to 11 trillion dollars, just a fraction more than what we know the US has spent on its illegal invasion of Iraq.

Decades of research and lobbying by women’s equality-seeking groups and others has had minimal impact. Governments are loathe to address the issue. Only recently did StatsCan begin gathering information about women’s unpaid work and that gathering is not thorough. The research documents only three areas of unpaid work: housework, childcare, and senior care. The time women spend building their communities — serving meals at a fowl supper, serving as a board member at the childcare centre, or volunteering at the women’s shelter — is not included in the numbers. Still, all is not lost. Researchers have developed ways to use the data that is gathered to make points about what is not. The gaps and absenses have proven useful in critiquing policy and for envisioning new policies.

Global Capital at Work

It is global capital that benefits from women’s unpaid work. As capital seeks increased profits, governments increasingly bend to the corporate lobby, adhering to neo-liberal and neo-conservative economic policies, downsizing or privatizing programs that seek to re-dress imbalances. Women bear the brunt of this greed.

Gordon Campbell’s Liberal government, when it took power in BC, almost immediately dismantled one of the most progressive elements of the its provincial government, the Women’s Department. What little remained of it was rolled into the Community Services Department. In effect, all funding to all of B.C.’s women’s shelters ceased and the amount unpaid work by women as well as the incidents of poverty among women increased.

In Saskatchewan, Calvert’s NDP government almost annihilated the Women’s Secretariat in its purge of policy analysts a few years ago. An immediate public outcry from Saskatchewan women forced the creation of a Status of Women Office (SWO). It was placed within the Department of Labour which, according to the Assistant Deputy Minister at the time, was “completely unable to absorb” it. The strategy moved many feminist researchers and analysts out of policy areas and, in some cases, out of government completely which could be part of a ploy to remove the last of Keynesian analysis from the bureaucracy. Indeed, in January 2007 the Saskatchewan government received great praise and front page headlines courtesy the Fraser Institute for completely reversing 50 years of economic policy. Apparently, it doesn’t matter that programs to enhance the lives of women in Saskatchewan ended or that the province’s child poverty rate is among the highest in the country.

Similarly, Status of Women Canada (SWC), recently attacked by the New Conservative Government of Canada impacts women’s unpaid work. The job cuts, funding restrictions, and removal of the word equality from funding guidelines will mean that research work formerly conducted by paid staff within SWC and within SWC-funded organizations will either not be conducted or will be done by volunteers. Without the research and lobbying the door is open for global capital to gain more ground.

It’s as though governments of the day believe that cutting funding and support makes the need for the service nonexistent. But smaller communities of people – women – fill the gaps..

A Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) report about the privatization of public services urges that women “not be made to bear the greatest costs of declining labour market conditions — less unionization, lower wages, fewer benefits, weaker workplace rights, more precarious employment, uncertain work hours.” Women should not be forced to take on more unpaid work when public services erode and men must “take more responsibility in the home.” This would have the effect of allowing women to “become more engaged in community organizing and political action in order to lobby for more and better public services.” Trade unions could play an important role alongside women’s and social justice groups in “building broad community-based coalitions” in opposition to privatization and in actively promoting “the improvement of public services in order to promote greater social and economic equality.”

The obvious economic impact on women – the continued cycle of poverty – is compounded by psycho-social implications on women and their children which result in chronic illness, early death, poor children, poor school performance. That means higher societal costs for healthcare. The National Crime Prevention Council of Canada suggests that poor school performance is the “best and most stable predictor of adult involvement in criminal activity.” And that means higher educational and criminal justice costs.

Women’s Response

All the attacks on women’s lives and the double-duty days haven’t stopped women from organizing for change. Over the past decade or more, women’s response has been building locally and globally. Organizations such as UNPAC, the Feminist Alliance For International Action (FAFIA) and the Global Women’s Strike (GWS) have come into being to demand accountability from the governments on the commitments made to women under international human rights treaties and agreements, including the Beijing Platform for Action (PFA) and the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). The World Women’s March in 2000 brought forth The Feminist Dozen, 13 items that the federal government must address to reduce women’s poverty in this country.

The World Women’s March Feminist Dozen

Women in Canada Call on the Federal Government to:

  1. Restore federal funding to health care and enforce the rules against the privatization of our health care system, beginning with Alberta.
  2. Spend an additional 1% of the budget on social housing.
  3. Set up the promised national child-care fund, starting with an immediate contribution of $2 billion.
  4. Increase Old Age Security payments to provide older women with a decent standard of living.
  5. Use the surplus from the Employment Insurance Fund to increase benefits, provide longer payment periods and improve access, as well as improve maternity and family benefits.
  6. Support women’s organizing for equality and democracy by:
    • allocating $50 million to front-line, independent, feminist, women-controlled groups committed to ending violence against women, such as women’s centres, rape crisis centres and women’s shelters;
    • recognizing and funding the three autonomous national Aboriginal women’s organisations to ensure full participation in all significant public policy decisions as well as providing adequate funding to Aboriginal women’s services, including shelters, in all rural, remote and urban Aboriginal communities;
    • funding a national meeting of lesbians to discuss and prioritise areas for legislative and public policy reform;
    • providing $30 million in core funding for equality-seeking women’s organizations, which represents only $2.00 for every woman and girl child in Canada – our Fair Share
  7. Fund consultations with a wide range of women’s equality-seeking organizations prior to all legislative reform of relevance to women’s security and equality rights, beginning with the Criminal Code and ensure access for women from marginalized communities.
  8. Implement a progressive immigration reform to provide domestic workers with full immigration status on arrival, abolish the “head tax” on all immigrants and include persecution on the basis of gender and sexual orientation as grounds for claiming refugee status.
  9. Contribute to the elimination of poverty around the world by supporting the cancellation of the debts of the 53 poorest countries and increasing Canada’s international development aid to 0.7% of the Gross National Product
  10. Adopt national standards which guarantee the right to welfare for everyone in need and ban workfare.
  11. Recognize the ongoing exclusion of women with disabilities from economic, political and social life and take the essential first step of ensuring and funding full access for women with disabilities to all consultations on issues of relevance to women.
  12. Establish a national system of grants based on need, not merit, to enable access to post-secondary education and reduce student debt.
  13. Adopt proactive pay equity legislation.

 

To date, not one of the recommendations has been fully implemented.

GWS is an organization of women from more than 60 countries, working to improve conditions for women, worldwide. Their first stated demand is “Payment for all caring work – in wages, pensions, land & other resources. What is more valuable than raising children & caring for others? Invest in life & welfare, not military budgets or prisons.”

Nearly 1.2 billion hours of women’s time each year is spent on fundamental work that goes unnoticed, unrecognized, and undervalued, thanks to archaic definitions of paid work. Public programs and services that seek to redress imbalances are under constant attack by global capital. Programs that support necessary public services for women and children are dismantled, never to appear again, or reappear as watered-down versions of what they once were. Women work harder and suffer greater hardships as a result. Still, women carry on with their work and with resisting oppression. Only constant and continued pressure from all sectors of society will ensure equity is reached.

1 Comment
by thereginamom on September 2, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in Canada, economics, feminism, Labour, Saskatchewan, sexism, Stephen Harper, women
Tagged

Posted by thereginamom on September 2, 2012

http://thereginamom.com/2012/09/02/women-have-always-been-workers/

Legitimate what?

Over the past couple of days, the regina mom has read a number of pieces, some humourous, in response to a statement by US Representative Todd Akin, the Republican Senate nominee from Missouri,  regarding the medieval concept of legitimate rape.

How long has this no-pregnancy-in-rape theory been around?
“The idea that rape victims cannot get pregnant has long roots,” says Vanessa Heggie at Britain’s The Guardian. Think 13th century. One of the earliest British legal texts — Fleta, from about 1290 — has this familiar-sounding clause: “If, however, the woman should have conceived at the time alleged in the appeal, it abates, for without a woman’s consent she could not conceive.” Samuel Farr’s Elements of Medical Jurisprudence, a treatise from 1785 (second edition 1814), elaborates: “For without an excitation of lust, or the enjoyment of pleasure in the venereal act, no conception can probably take place. So that if an absolute rape were to be perpetrated, it is not likely she would become pregnant.”

What’s the medical underpinning of this theory?
From medieval times until the 19th century, doctors and laypeople alike widely believed that women only conceived if they had an orgasm, since the presumed female “seed” — needed to complement the male sperm to achieve pregnancy — was thought be secreted only during sexual climax. “By logical extension, then,” says Heggie, “if a woman became pregnant, she must have experienced orgasm, and therefore could not have been the victim of an ‘absolute rape’.”

Interestingly, and in stark contrast to what the right wing nut jobs (RWNJ) in the US have been saying, researchers at the University of Saskatchewan’s Western College of Veterinary Medicine in Saskatoon recently shared their findings into a hormone that’s present in semen. They now believe it “nudges a woman’s body to ovulate.”

In a new study published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the Saskatoon-based researchers and their colleagues in Chile went sleuthing in llamas and cows for the identity of a seminal fluid protein they’d previously found sends a signal to a female’s brain. That signal prompts the female brain to release hormones that stimulate ovulation.

Veterinary biomedical sciences Prof. Gregg Adams, who is with the university’s Western College of Veterinary Medicine, says he expected to find a brand new protein in the seminal fluid. Much to their surprise, they found this poorly-understood protein (called ovulation-inducing factor or OIF) is the same molecule as an old friend in the nervous system that’s critical for normal neuron function.

the regina mom cannot wait to see how the RWNJs respond to this piece of legitimate science!

Leave a Comment
by thereginamom on August 22, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in abortion, activism, feminism, fundamentalists, religious right, reproductive freedom, Saskatoon, Science, sexism, sexual assault, USA, Western Canada, women
Tagged ,

Posted by thereginamom on August 22, 2012

http://thereginamom.com/2012/08/22/legitimate-what/

Sex Stereotyping @ Industry Canada

the regina mom is blogging this from an email message she received this afternoon.  She should never be surprised by the HarperCons, but yet again, she is.

—–

This past weekend the Corporations Canada website was down for upgrading/maintenance.  The new website has a spiffy new video introduction.  The text is innocuous:

Screen 1:  Start a business.  Be your own boss.  We can show you how.

Screen 2:  Find Permits & Licenses.  Get what you need to run your business.

[Naturally, they use the American spelling of "licence".  In Canada, we
issue licences to entities we have licensed.]

Screen 3:  Business Finance.  Ready to grow?  We can help.

Not to get too wound up in semiotics, take a look at what the images linked
to these screens portray:

Screen 1 – young white male, very happy.

Screen 2:  young black male, very focussed on the horizon.

Screen 3A:  “Business Finance” – young white male, standing doing nothing.

Screen 3B:  young white male, being asked if he is ready to grow?

Screen 3C:  Young white male now joined by young non-white female, who
declares “we can help”.  (Could this really be an innuendo-laden joke?)

Then at the bottom of this page, there is another picture.  What do we see
here?  Seven people, of which four appear to be women, and the one who
appears to speaking from a position of authority is – again – young and
white and male.  It looks good to see that there are so many women, until
you realize that only two of the six people who are presumably taking
instructions from the young white male are also male – so more woman than
men need guidance?

So how far have women in Canada come ..

- 41 years after the report by the Royal Commission on the Status of Women
(whose current federal website declares, “As we look back on these decades
of change in the status of women, and mark the 40th anniversary of the Royal
Commission report, it’s important to consider how far women have come.”

http://www.swc-cfc.gc.ca/dates/roycom/index-eng.html
), and

- 26 years after the CRTC’s policy on gender portrayal in broadcasting (and
recall that the internet is a form of broadcasting, that the CRTC has
exempted from regualtion).

The answer is that we have come to the point where young men are still seen
as being in charge of launching and financing businesses in this country,
while women are still viewed as existing only to serve or service them.

Considering how much the Conservatives need the female vote, it is
interesting to see how the Industry Minister’s staff thought this was the
best way to reach that vote.

1 Comment
by thereginamom on August 20, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in Canada, sexism, Stephen Harper, women

Posted by thereginamom on August 20, 2012

http://thereginamom.com/2012/08/20/sex-stereotyping-industry-canada/

Good Grief, Regina Public Library!

the regina mom is short on time to write background for this at the moment.

Dear Reader,

This is to advise you that, as a citizen of Regina, I call for the resignation of each member of the Regina Public Library’s Board of Directors. The power granted to them through our municipal system of governance and the grace of the citizens of Regina must be ended. The Board’s treatment of our library workers is abhorrent!

The people who use our library system, most especially our children, love their library workers. Our communities and community organizations love our library workers. Here, in Cathedral, the library staff were an important part of the success of the Cathedral Village Arts Festival. Throughout Regina, the library staff help us, our children and our communities continue to learn and grow. In a time of prosperity, we should be showering them with raises, not killing them with cuts and clawbacks!

The RPL Board must step down or get back to the bargaining table!

Sincerely,

Bernadette L. Wagner
thereginamom.com
thereginamom@sasktel.net
@thereginamom
306.550.7023

1 Comment
by thereginamom on May 27, 2012  •  Permalink
Posted in activism, governance, regina, Regina Public Library, sexism
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Posted by thereginamom on May 27, 2012

http://thereginamom.com/2012/05/27/good-grief-regina-public-library/

Happy International Women’s Day!

Oh, the regina mom‘s been a busy woman this past year! Marketing a book takes time and energy in the planning and carrying out. Needless to say, this blog has fallen by the wayside.

However, I could not miss the opportunity to wish my readers a happy International Women’s Day and to share a piece I was asked to write for the Equity Issue the Prairie Dog published last week. The editor contacted me, requesting a rant and, of course, I could not say no. But, later that day, when I attended my meditation class and we talked about “wise speech” and were invited to practice it over the upcoming week I realized that I could not write this rant in my usual way.

It was a challenge, indeed, to say what needed to be said in a wise way. And so, I’m curious what you, dear reader, think.

And here’s the rant, as published in The Dog:

Beyond Despair

Women survive, against all odds.

Even though we women make up 52 per cent of the global population and we own only one per cent of the land, we survive.

Even though climate change impacts women around the world more harshly (try gathering wood, food, water in a drought zone or flood zone every day), we survive.

Even though we earn 73 per cent the wages of men and are over-represented in part-time, low-pay jobs, and even though the world economies once counted us as chattel and told us our work was not work, we survive.

Even though cooking, cleaning and caregiving, the three Cs of women’s work, are worth between $234 and $374 billion in labour that remains unpaid, and even though we never received the national childcare program we were promised and yet we still find time to fill the gaps when governments offload services onto communities and families, we survive.

Even though, right here in Saskatchewan, one child in five – a full 20 per cent – live without adequate food, shelter and clothing, and even though more than 43,000 of our children live in poverty and 60 per cent of children living in households headed by a lone woman live in poverty, and children around the world continue to live in deep poverty, we survive.

Even though governments dismally fail to acknowledge our inequality, respect our issues – or even hear our voices – and instead, privatize economic decision-making, grant corporations more rights and less taxes, doctor documents, cut funding to programs, close doors to our organizations, oppose same sex marriages, peel back our reproductive rights, ignore our human rights, spurn and deride us, tell us to “go slowly,” that we’re “too radical” and dismiss us as “dumb bitches” or “Feminazis,” we survive.

Even though violence against us is epidemic the world over – we are assaulted emotionally, psychologically, physically, sexually – even though 50 per cent of us will experience violence to our person in our lifetime and we have sisters, daughters, grand-daughters who are treated as illegal goods to be trafficked and sold into sexual slavery, and even though we are stoned to death, gunned down, disappeared or murdered, we survive.

Even though we live our lives in the global war waged against us right here and right now, as it has for centuries – even though we die daily, we survive.

We survive because we are strong.

We are strong because we are one community. We are one community with a diverse population: women of colour, Indigenous, Métis women, who have immigrated, emigrated, who are refugees, who are urban, rural, peasant, homeless women, are mothers, grandmothers, child-free, who are sex workers, waged workers, volunteer workers, who are lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, queer, are religious, atheist, agnostic, spiritual, women with disabilities, healing powers, visions, who are older, younger, middle-aged…

We survive because we are coming to know the power of diversity, to know our power as women. And we know that our time to wield power is at hand.

c. 2011 Bernadette L. Wagner

Happy IWD!

5 Comments
by thereginamom on March 8, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in activism, economics, feminism, International Women's Day, sexism, women, youth

Posted by thereginamom on March 8, 2011

http://thereginamom.com/2011/03/08/happy-international-womens-day-2/

Sisters In Spirit Under Attack

The HarperCons have gone much too far now!  Apparently, the Sisters In Spirit Campaign, organized by the Native Women’s Association of Canada (NWAC) has been too successful in raising the awareness about murdered and missing Aboriginal women in Canada.  Or something.  They’ve done a lot, that’s for sure, including heightening awareness throughout the country, establishing a database of missing and murdered Aboriginal women, and co-ordinating vigils in more than 80 communities across the country.  APTN reports that

Status of Women officials had asked the organization [NWAC]  not to use any government money for projects under the name Sisters in Spirit or for work on their vaunted missing and murdered Aboriginal women database.

Alison@Creekside has a thorough post addressing the many issues involved in that, as well as the Cons posturing around it.  Please go read her post!  And the links!  Then come back here and take action:

NDP MP and Critic on the Status of Women, Irene Mathyssen, says that

[D]espite the Conservative government’s praise of Sisters in Spirit (SIS), the recent $10 million announcement to address the issue of violence against Aboriginal women left SIS out. The main voice calling for action on how missing women cases are reported and investigated has been excluded. Many fear this means the end of Sisters in Spirit since the government made it very clear that SIS will not receive any more funding for this project.

Sisters in Spirit, a project under the umbrella of the Native Women’s Association of Canada since 2005, led the way in research regarding missing and murdered aboriginal women. Their April 2010 report, “What Their Stories Tell Us”, identified knowledge gaps that hindered the creation of effective policies and programming to address the high number of missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls in Canada. Problems such as different jurisdictions not communicating as happened with the victims of Robert Pickton, delays in starting missing persons investigations if the woman was Aboriginal or in the sex trade, lack of resources for family members to deal with the aftermath of murder, and not enough investments in anti-violence programs and front-line community workers, were all identified by SIS.

Since SIS didn’t receive any of the $10 million, the research they did may be lost as they cannot get funding from any other government department. The minister needs to make it known how this data will be protected and maintained. Sisters in Spirit is the voice for the most vulnerable in Canadian society. Shutting them down after they demonstrated how we are failing Aboriginal women is another example of Conservative bully tactics, and the common conservative practice of trying to cover up embarrassing truths.

She has prepared a petition she will present to the House of Commons. All we have to do is to get the signatories.  Here’s the text.

Petition to the House of Commons –“Sisters in Spirit”
We, the undersigned, residents of Canada, draw the attention of the Government of Canada to the
following:
THAT for the past five years, the Native Women’s Association of Canada’s (NWAC) Sisters In Spirit initiative has worked to identify root causes, trends and circumstances of violence that have led to disappearance and death of Aboriginal women and girls;
THAT in March 2010, NWAC released the report “What Their Stories Tell Us” which provided evidence that 582 Aboriginal women and girls have gone missing or been murdered in Canada; and
THAT the fact that so many mothers, daughters, sisters, aunties and grandmothers have been lost to violence in this country makes this the most pervasive human rights crisis facing Canada today.
THEREFORE, your petitioners call upon the Government of Canada to renew funding for the Sisters In Spirit initiative Phase II “Evidence to Action” and to invest in an “Action Plan for Aboriginal women”, which NWAC has developed, to stop the devastating number of missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls in Canada.

 

It’s a paper petition, so it’s a bit more work that we digital activists are used to.  But, it’s a must.  It’s a must for more than partisan reasons.  It’s a must for the betterment of our country and, most importantly, it’s a must for demonstrating our support of and to Aboriginal women and girls in Canada.  Download it now!

Take it to work, take it everywhere you go and get folks to sign it.  Then send it to Irene, free of charge.

2 Comments
by thereginamom on November 14, 2010  •  Permalink
Posted in activism, racism, sexism, sisters in spirit, violence against women
Tagged , ,

Posted by thereginamom on November 14, 2010

http://thereginamom.com/2010/11/14/sisters-in-spirit-under-attack/

Budget 2010: Still Leaving Women Behind

This came my way via the PAR-L email list.  Huge thanks to Kathleen Lahey for this work.  It puts a light on the inherently sexist economic system in which women exist, a system Stephen Harper is determined to prop up, regardless how much it hurts women and their children.

Kathleen Lahey
Mar. 5, 2010

The big picture: Women are half the population in Canada and nearly half the official labour force – but still do 62% of all unpaid work, and receive only 40% of after-tax incomes.

This Budget: The government claims that it is providing one last $19 billion ‘stimulus’ package this year, shorn of new tax cuts or spending items. This is highly misleading. New corporate tax cuts and continued huge PIT and GST cuts bring the total to $41.9 billion for 2010/11.

Gender gaps This $41.9 billion is being delivered in forms that will benefit far more in Budget 2010: men than women, widen gender gaps even further, and continue to drive up poverty rates among women and single parents:

2010-2011: Amount: Women’s share:
Infrastructure spending $ 9.6 bill. 7% to 22%
Corporate tax cuts $10.1 bill. 10% to 37%
GST tax cuts $10.0 bill. 38%
Personal income tax cuts $ 7.4 bill. 40%
EI enhancements $ 4.8 bill. 36%
Single-parent UCCB tax cut $ 0.005 bill. 81% (max $168/C)

Infrastructure spending $9.6 billion, 2010-2011
($8 billion, 2009-2010)

• For 2010-2011, the ‘base’ infrastructure fund is $7.7 billion, which will continue to be allocated to road, municipal improvement, and building infrastructure:

– only 7% of construction, trade, transportation workers are women
– only 21-22% in engineering, manufacturing, and primary industries/women1

• For 2010-2011, an additional $1.9 billion is being added for post-secondary infrastructure, consisting of both construction and enhancement of selected areas of research and technology innovation:

– these construction funds will impact women in the same 7% to 22% range
– there are relatively few women in the research and technology areas targeted for the remainder of this funding: only 21% to 23% are women2

• No gender equity requirements have been included in any of these spending programs

• Tying provincial and municipal construction project criteria to federal funding forces provinces/local governments to match funds on the same terms (provincial shares: 61%) and continues to block child care projects desperately needed across the country

• Will women get another 2 shelters this year? (Cf 3 animal shelter projects in 2009)
Corporate income tax cuts $10.1 billion, 2010-2011
($6.3 billion, 2000-2010)
($44.8 billion, 2010-2014)

• These tax cuts were announced beginning in 2006, were accelerated in 2008, and will be fully implemented in 2012 – they reduce the general rate from 22.12% to 15% by 2014

• By 2014, total federal revenues produced by corporate income taxes will have been permanently cut by a third of former corporate tax revenue

• The $10.1 billion cut in 2010-2011 reflects the 1% cut that came into effect in 2009 plus the new 1.5% cut coming into effect in 2010 (but buried in fine print in Budget 2010)

• These cuts permanently depress Canada’s annual revenue, and form one basis for the argument that Canada cannot fund programs like child care or women’s services

• The federal government has been pressuring provinces to make similar large rate cuts

• Once the combined federal-provincial corporate income tax rate falls below 35%, the US government will begin collecting a share of Canada’s foregone CIT revenues

• The government itself has admitted that corporate income tax cuts only weakly promote economic growth (Budget 2010, table A1.1)

• Men will be the largest beneficiaries of these cuts, because almost all CEOs, directors, and controlling shareholders are men, and 63% of corporate shares are owned by men

• One of the tax benefits of receiving corporate dividends is that the first $50,000 is tax exempt ($34,000 if issued by small business corporations) – compare this with those who live on subsistence incomes of $10,320 or less – such low incomes are PIT-free, but will still bear total taxes of 17.175% from the GST/HST-PST, EI, and CPP GST tax rate reductions (2%) $10 billion (annual) ($34.8 billion 2007-2011)

• The GST and PST/HST are highly regressive, giving the biggest benefits to those with the highest incomes regardless of whether they save or spend

• The GST tax credits refunds only a small part of the GST that is paid by those with low incomes (the credit covers the tax on approx. $4,750 of spending)

• GST tax savings per year on spending, for taxpayers in –

Bottom income quintile: $280
Top income quintile: $1,244

• The 2% rate cut has contributed substantially to the sharp reduction in federal revenues, thus impairing federal capacity to go ahead with adequate affordable child care or expand EI to give benefits to more marginalized members of the labour force

• As the federal government has placed pressure on provinces to induce them to ‘harmonize’ their PSTs with the federal GST, provincial tax bases are being expanded to include previously non-taxed services, resulting in further increases that affect lowincome taxpayers the most negatively (usually without offsetting low-income credits)

• 62% of these federal GST tax cuts go to men, 38% go to women Personal income tax cuts $7.35 billion, 2010-2011
($18.4 billion, 2008-2010)

• Lowest income tax rate reduced from 16% to 15%: ($5.5 bill)

– At least 40.4% of women receive no benefit from any of these cuts because their incomes are so low they already pay no income taxes

– These cuts to to middle and high income taxpayers too – to all taxpayers
– Women’s average incomes are too low to use the whole benefit of this cut
– The average benefit to men of this cut is $196 – to women, $171
– Men receive 57% of this cut, women, 43%

• $220 increase in the personal exemption: ($0.55 bill.)

– At least 40% of women will receive nothing from this cut (no tax liability)
– This cut is also available to all taxpayers, no matter how high their income
– 54% of this cut goes to male taxpayers; maximum cut/year = $333

• $1,894 increase in the lowest income bracket (15%): ($1.0 bill.)

– Only 14% of all women taxpayers can get this tax cut (and 30% of all men)
– 67% will go to male taxpayers; maximum cut/year = $1324

• $3,788 increase in the second income bracket (22%): ($0.3 bill.)

– Only 6% of all women taxpayers will enjoy this tax cut (and 14% of all men)
– 70% of this cut goes to male taxpayers; maximum cut/year = $1515
Employment insurance $4.8 billion, 2010-2011
($2 billion in 2009-2010)

• For 2010-2011, $2.6 billion of this total is being allocated to further extensions of EI for those with ‘standard’ eligibility for regular benefits

• For 2010-2011, an additional $2.2 billion is being allocated to labour market adjustment projects in regions facing special challenges

• Regardless of program allocations, those working less than 35 hours per week during qualifying periods have marginal eligibility

• Because 70% of all part-time workers are women, and because the hourly wages of women in all employment categories are lower than men’s, only about 36% of those receiving regular EI benefits are women

• The EI extensions offered in 2009 and 2010 (announced in Budget 2009) are only available to workers already qualifying for EI; they do not bring other workers into EI

• The new women workers who might qualify under EI enhancements are those who stayed at home for long periods of time with their children – not women in nonqualifying paid work who have only taken time out for maternity leave, and who are disproportionately disadvantaged in obtaining those EI benefits due to the current eligibility criteria

• There is growing support for the 360 hour EI qualification test

• Postponement of increases in employee contribution rates and reduced employer contribution rates that have never occurred are not real tax benefits Home buyer tax credits $200 million in 2009-2010

• These credits will only be available to those who can afford to purchase a home

• Because these credits are not refundable, even low-income taxpayers who are able to purchase a home cannot use them, because they will have no tax liability against which to offset them

• On average, women will thus receive far fewer credits under this program, because their average incomes are much lower than men’s:
– women’s average incomes: $27,000
– men’s average incomes: $45,0006

• Most women’s incomes fall into the three lowest income quintiles, all of which are net dis-savers – they end every year with net debt7

• For the same reasons, low income taxpayers – predominantly women – will not have RRSP savings that they are allowed to roll into home purchases on a tax-free bases Working income tax benefit $580 million per year

• The current Working Income Tax Benefit (WITB) is $522/year for a single individual and $1044 for a single parent; Budget 2009 enhanced these benefits to the current levels:

– Single individuals: to $925 credit per year, phased out at income of $16,700
– Single parents: to $1,680 credit per year, phased out at income of $25,700

• Only one spouse/partner or the other can claim this credit

• Women who cannot enter paid work without affordable reliable child care will not be able to take advantage of this increased credit Canada child tax benefit $230 million/year

• The brackets measuring the phase-out of the Canada Child Tax Credit and the National Child Benefit Supplement are each being increased by the same $1,894 that is added to the 15% income bracket

• The result of this change is to increase at the top end of the brackets used to phase-out these two low-income benefits, adding a bit more to the after-tax income of the parents currently receiving the CCTB or NCB Supp at the highest end of that income scale

• No new money is going to parents at the low end of the income brackets used to measure qualification for these benefits, however UCCB/Single parent calculation $5 million/year

• The ‘Universal Child Care Benefit’ was introduced in 2006 to replace the $5 bill. national child care program established in 2005 (UCCB cost/year = $2.1 billion)

• The government claimed that it ‘will support child care choices by families’8

• The UCCB is taxable, and this change will reduce the single parents’ tax on it by $168/yr

• Even the full UCCB ($1200/yr) is far too little to enable single parents to ‘choose’ to stay at home to care for their children vs. pay for childcare so they can earn income Joint tax measures Ongoing; expanded in 2006

• All joint fiscal measures create disincentives to women’s paid work

• Joint low-income refundable tax credits impose tax penalties on low-income women:

• There are a few tax benefits that are designed to provide refundable credits to those whose incomes are too low to be able to claim ordinary tax benefits (40.4% of women) GST tax credit Canada Child Tax Benefit
Working Income Tax Benefit [$580 mill/yr; $522 single; $1044 couple]

• However, these refundable credits are all subject to couple-based LICOs that artificially bar many low-income women from receiving these refundable credits

Single taxpayer: $13,500 [2009: $16,700]
Coupled taxpayer: $21,500 [2009: $25,700]

• These couple LICOs raise the ‘welfare wall’ for low-income women in relationships

• They impose tax penalties on relationships without regard for the economic realities of those relationships

• Open-ended joint tax measures undermine women’s economic security:

• Unlike joint provisions for low-income refundable tax credits, many joint tax benefits discourage women with mid/high income spouses/partners from earning income

• Most joint tax benefits reward higher income spouses for supporting their spouse/partner

– without any upper limits on eligibility, no matter how high the income (e.g., dependent spouse credit and transferrable spousal credits; family limits on child care deductions; spousal RRSPs; caregiver credits; Universal Child Care Benefit; pension income splitting; TFSA investment income splitting)

• Pension income splitting (2006 onward; $0.6 bill/year): For couples only: The higher the income of the supporting spouse, the higher the tax benefit from pension splitting:

Supporting spouse/ $26,800 Tax benefit: —
partner income: $31,800 $500
$41,800 $700
$72,000 $2,975
$100,000 $8,125
$140,000 $11,216

• Creates fiscal disincentives for lower-income spouse to work after higher-income spouse/partner retires, to have own-source pension income, or a spousal RRSP Tax-free savings accounts: $0.5 billion (2009; expanding)

• $5,000 can be contributed to tax-exempt accumulation accounts each year for ultimate tax-exempt withdrawal; $10,000 per couple; $5,000 per adult child

• Only the top quintile of households have enough savings to fully fund TFSAs fully9

• Spousal TFSAs are not required to remain the property of the non-earning owner

1. Statistics Canada, ‘Work Chapter Updates,’ Women in Canada (Ottawa: 2005); online:

http://www.statcan.ca/english/freepub/89F0133XIE/89F0133XIE2006000.htm
.
2. Statistics Canada, ‘University Enrolment, 2007/2009,’ The Daily (July 13, 2009);
online:

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/090713/tdq-9-713-eng.htm
.
3. Based on data in CRA, Income Statistics 2007.
4. Based on data in CRA, Income Statistics 2007.
5. Based on data in CRA, Income Statistics 2007.
6. Canada Revenue Agency, Income Statistics 2007 [2005 tax year] (Ottawa: 2007) table
6,
at 15-16; online:
http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/gncy/stts/gb05/pst/fnl/pdf/table6-eng.pdf
.
7. Sauve, Vanier Insitute for the Family, 2005.
8. Hon. Flaherty, Minister of Finance, The Budget Speech 2006 (May 2, 2006); online:

http://www.fin.gc.ca/budget06/speech/speech-eng.asp
.
9. Sauve, Vanier Insitute for the Family, 2005

4 Comments
by thereginamom on March 15, 2010  •  Permalink
Posted in Budget 2010, Canada, economics, sexism, Stephen Harper
Tagged , ,

Posted by thereginamom on March 15, 2010

http://thereginamom.com/2010/03/15/budget-2010-still-leaving-women-behind/

What Harper’s Done to Canadian Social Programs

I wrote this for rabble.ca some time ago but never did blog it.  I’ve been trying to find it for some time because it’s in need of an update. Here it is.  Please feel free to use the comment box below to add the other places Harper’s axe has landed since this was written.

What Harper’s Done to Canadian Social Programs

by Bernadette Wagner

In September 2006 our boy, Steve Harper, pulled out his axe. Here’s a little review of where the axe fell.*

Aboriginal Programs

Indian and Northern Affairs Canada “operational efficiencies” = $3.5 million cut

“Unused funding” (re: Nunavut) = $50 million not re-allocated or otherwise made available

Elimination of funding for First Nations and Inuit Tobacco Control Strategy = $10.8 million cut

Status of Women Canada

“Administrative savings” = $5 million cut (40% of budget), job layoffs, offices closed, organizations unfunded, their offices also closed.

Skills and Literacy Programs

Literacy division of HRSD under one banner = $55.4 million cut

Youth employment subsidies for businesses and organizations = $17.6 million cut

Elimination of the Canada Labour Business Centre

Statistics Canada

“Organizational efficiencies” = $15 million cut & reduced ability to collect vital data

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)

Social economy research program (community outreach) = $2 million cut

Health Canada

Policy Research Program eliminated = $7.5 million

“Health portfolio efficiencies” = $28.1 million was cut through

Foreign Affairs

Youth International Internship Program eliminated = $10.2 million cut

Delays and cutbacks on international postings and outreach programs at Canadian embassies = unknown but substantial cuts

Law Commission of Canada

Eliminated = $3.2 million cut, including two large scale projects on indigenous law and vulnerable workers

Court Challenges Program

Eliminated = $5.6 million cut and no legal assistance for equity-seeking groups who do not have the resources to take forward a legal challenge.

Treasury Board of Canada

Training programs for civil servants = $82 million cut

“Unallocated funds across all departments” = $18 million cut

Elimination of advisory panels in Revenue Canada and Agriculture Canada = unknown amount cut

* This information was culled from a Canadian Association of University Teachers Commentary

7 Comments
by thereginamom on February 8, 2010  •  Permalink
Posted in activism, Canada, feminism, sexism, Stephen Harper, women
Tagged , , ,

Posted by thereginamom on February 8, 2010

http://thereginamom.com/2010/02/08/what-harpers-done-to-canadian-social-programs/

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