(no subject)

[merrily]

Hey Canadian flisters,

Please take a minute to read this article in the Toronto Star. The Conservative government has added to the budget a piece of legislation that removes the legal right of any woman in the federal civil service to fight pay discrimination via the normal, effective channels. From the article:

It removes any chance women in the federal civil service have of fighting for pay equity by denying them the right to complain to the Human Rights Commission, or to go to court, when they believe there is discrimination. Instead, pay equity issues are to be solved as part of the regular bargaining process but - get this! - if anyone agitates on the basis of pay equity, they face a $50,000 fine. So the Conservative regime is forbidding a woman from fighting for herself and, simultaneously, penalizing her union from fighting for her.

Obviously, this is Not Okay.

After reading, it would be great if you'd take a minute to voice your opinion to TPTB. Here's how you do that:

You can email Prime Minister Stephen Harper at pm@pm.gc.ca. You can also fax his office at 613-941-6900, or write to him (no stamp required!) at the following address:

Office of the Prime Minister
80 Wellington Street
Ottawa
K1A 0A2

If you want to send snail mail to the House of Commons for any of the following people, use their name and this address (no stamp required):
House of Commons
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0A6

Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff's email address is Ignatieff.M@parl.gc.ca. His constituency office fax # is (416) 251-2845 his House of Commons fax # is (613) 992-5880;

You can reach him via snail mail at either his constituency office:
656 The Queensway
Etobicoke, Ontario
M8Y 1K7

NDP leader Jack Layton (who, based on my previous experience contacting politicians, is the most likely to respond) can be reached at LaytoJ@parl.gc.ca. His constituency office fax # is (416) 405-8918; his House of Commons fax # is (613) 995-4565.

His constituency office address:
221 Broadview Avenue , Suite 100 (Main Office)
Toronto, Ontario
M4M 2G3

The Bloc Quebecois leader is Gilles Duceppe. His email address is Duceppe.G@parl.gc.ca. His constituency office fax # is (514) 522-9899; his House of Commons office fax # is (613) 954-2121. His constituency office snail mail address is:

1200 Papineau Avenue, Suite 350
Montreal, Québec
H2K 4R5

Apart from these people, it's also a good idea to contact your own MP. If you don't know who that is, you can find out here.

(ETA: I had posted my letter to TPTB in this post, too, but I'm a little wary about making this journal google-able. I'll repost it in a locked post.)

This government is also responsible for shutting 12 of the 16 Status of Women offices in Canada, as well as removing the word "equality" from their mandate.

Time for us to make a fuss, people. This shit can't continue.

Comments

[weissman.livejournal.com]

That sounds like outright discrimination

[merrilily.livejournal.com]

Exactly. It is. And we need to protest that and point that out, loudly, because the government is hiding behind "but what we have isn't working!" as an excuse, even though they're not offering a workable alternative or doing anything that suggests they're taking the problems with the Pay Equity Act seriously.

[weissman.livejournal.com]

If that was in the States people would be blowing their stacks

[merrilily.livejournal.com]

In the US, they've got NOW (http://www.now.org/). Canada's seriously lacking a motivated, empowered equivalent.

[weissman.livejournal.com]

That sounds about right, and its too bad.

[cjlxx.livejournal.com]

wtf?
this is completely ridicilous and down right discrimination against 'us' women! what the hell is canada coming to?

[merrilily.livejournal.com]

Canada's come to a Conservative government, and has come to a mix of MPs of whom less than 30% are women. (That's the target number the UN has identified as being necessary for a domestic policy that adequately represents the interests of women. 22.1% of the Canadian House of Commons are women.) As a result, shit like this happens. And we need to be vocal that it is Not Okay.

[scrollgirl.livejournal.com]

Thanks for this. Will write letters this weekend.

[merrilily.livejournal.com]

GOOD. The internets -- they're useful, huh? :-)

[ancarett]

Here via a friend. I just wrote letters to the PM and the party leaders, faxed them to their Ottawa offices and will send hard copies as well. I find that emails are almost always ignored or undercounted, so, despite the extra effort, this is worth the time.

I'm phoning my local MP. He's a new NDP member and very passionate about such issues. I'll hope to hear him raise this in Question Period!

Thanks for the alert. It's good to know so we can try and fight back!

[merrilily.livejournal.com]

I find that emails are almost always ignored or undercounted, so, despite the extra effort, this is worth the time.

Good advice! I'll do that, too.

[ancarett]

You're welcome! My mother-in-law used to work in a MP's constituency office and she said that phone calls, faxes and letters seemed to have the most notable impact after face-to-face visits. Emails, hardly at all. Online petitions? None.

Many of the MPs rely on staffers to check their official email accounts so that blunts the impact of email even more as they're not anywhere the MP will actually lay eyes. That might change as more web-savvy MPs are elected, but there aren't a lot of those, yet!

[capra-maritimus.livejournal.com]

Thank you for this!!

(here via TGS)

[merrilily.livejournal.com]

You're welcome!

(Who/what is TGS?)

[capra-maritimus.livejournal.com]

topgearslash :D

here from your comment in Ces' lj

[copracat]

But surely whatever human rights legislation Canada has would override that kind of thing? Or maybe I'm being naive. Sucks mightily, that's for sure. It sounds like bad law.

Re: here from your comment in Ces' lj

[capra-maritimus.livejournal.com]

They're trying to circumvent it, the way Bush did with so many of his 'laws'.