| IN THE NEWS
January 27, 2004
Right Honourable Paul Martin
Prime Minister of Canada,
Office of the Prime Minister,
80 Wellington Street,
Ottawa, Ont.,
K1A 0A2
January 26, 2004
Dear Mr. Martin:
We are writing to you on behalf of many Canadians who deplore women's
under-representation in the political life of this country. In particular,
we want to see more qualified women elected to the next Parliament
of Canada.
We have been heartened by your pledges to increase the number of
women who will run for the Liberal Party of Canada in this year's
federal election. You made a firm commitment at the Liberal leadership
debate of June 14 last year when you said:
"I am officially undertaking not only to increase the number
of women candidates, but to do so in winnable ridings through a
very, very active recruitment system for nominations, and if that
doesn't work, then I will not hesitate to proceed by appointment.'
Since then, you have repeated your determination to make Liberal
MPs more representative of the population at large, in which women
make up 52 per cent.
Still, we are concerned that without your active intervention at
this time, your stated goal of the largest slate ever of Liberal
women candidates, will not be met. The previous high, in the 1997
election, was a Liberal team of nominated candidates that was 28
per cent female. But since then, the numbers of women nominated
for your party have dropped, and we fear a further drop this spring.
With nominations now officially open, the struggles over who will
run under the Paul Martin banner are already under way. We agree
with your principle that all seats should be fairly and openly contested.
But we are concerned about the possibility of a perverse result:
that incumbent Liberal women MPs will lose their nominations, and
not enough new women candidates will be chosen at the riding level
to replace their numbers.
That is why we are asking you to take action to ensure that Liberal
riding associations actually seek out many more women candidates
to run. We are not interested in mere tokenism, but like you, want
to see qualified women seeking election in as many as possible of
the winning ridings coming open at this time.
We'd like to see a high-profile Liberal woman heading up a search
for strong women candidates. We ask that you require each Liberal
riding association to demonstrate a genuine search was made for
a qualified woman to be at least one of the contestants for nomination
before you will sign nomination papers.
We believe this is an issue of extreme importance. Countries elsewhere
in the world are making exciting progress towards political equality,
while Canada, embarrassingly, perpetuates a political status quo
that relegates women to minority status.
The difference: most modern democracies now have electoral systems
based on proportional representation. As well, their major political
parties take pro-active measures to make sure women get an equal
chance at elected office. Canada still uses the old first-past-the-post
system of electing its representatives and ranks a shameful 36th
in the world according to the percentage of women in its national
Parliament.
For decades, Canadian women interested in political careers have
been blocked by what amounts to systemic discrimination in politics,
no doubt unintentional but nonetheless damaging. You and the Liberal
party are in an historic position to make a real breakthrough by
electing a "critical mass" of women MPs, and we urge you
not to let this opportunity pass by.
We believe more women in your elected ranks would be good for the
Liberal Party of Canada, for Parliament and for the country. We
are asking for a meeting to discuss this opportunity with you further.
Sincerely,
Rosemary Speirs, Chair Equal Voice
Nazreen Ali, Business Development Consultant
Doris Anderson, President, Fair Vote Canada
Professor Sylvia Bashevkin, Director, Canadian Studies Program,
University College, University of Toronto
Martine Blanc, Le Collectif feminisme et democratie
Charles Coffey, Executive Vice President, Government and Community
Affairs, Royal Bank of Canada
Bonnie Diamond, Executive Director, National Association of Women
and the Law
Jennifer Dickson, Executive Director, Pauktuutit Inuit Women’s
Association
Alia Hogben, Executive Director, Canadian Council of Muslim Women
Jeannie Lea, Chair, Every Vote Counts
Kirstin Lund, Chairperson, Prince Edward Island Advisory Council
on the Status of Women.
Doreen Paris, Chair, Nova Scotia Advisory Council on the Status
of Women
Mercedez Roberge, Presidente, Mouvement democratie nouvelle
Kelly Sloan, Executive Director, One Woman One Vote (YWCA of Edmonton)
Jackie Steele, Doctoral Candidate, Political Science, University
of Ottawa
Mary Lou Stirling, Chair, New Brunswick Advisory Council on the
Status of Women
Lisa Young, Associate Professor of Political Science, University
of Calgary
Elaine Teofilovici, CEO of YWCA of /du Canada
Wendy Robbins, Chair, Policy, Action, Research List (PAR-L)
Manon Tremblay, Director, Research Centre on Women and Politics,
University of Ottawa
Gloria Wilkinson, Chair, Winning Women, Calgary
Please reply by letter to: Women’s Political ConneXion/ ConneXions
politiques des femmes, c/o Rosemary Speirs, 1815 Altona Road, Pickering,
Ontario, L1V 1M6, for forwarding to the 21 groups and individuals
signing the letter.
Phone 905-509-2777.
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