Pursuant to Standing Order 68, Mr. Kevin Pollard, MHA for Baie Verte-Springdale, replaces Mr. Jim Baker, MHA for Labrador West.

The Committee met at 6:00 p.m. in the Assembly Chamber.

CHAIR (Harding): We welcome you back as we reconvene the Estimates debate for the Women's Policy Office.

We have one replacement; Mr. Pollard is replacing Mr. Baker. Apart from that – okay there is one change.

MS MACLELLAN: Melissa MacLeod, our Communications Specialist, is here for the Women's Policy Office instead of Linda Vaughan, our Finance Director.

CHAIR: Okay, thank you.

Ms Jones, do you want to begin now?

MS JONES: Yes, I can begin.

I am just not sure today, under section 2.7.02. there was $50,000 more spent on the Provincial Advisory Council last year than was budgeted. Can you tell me what that money was used for because it is not budgeted this year, or at least the numbers are down?

MS DUNDERDALE: It was a severance requirement. We had an employee leave and that covered off severance.

MS JONES: Okay, for the Provincial Advisory Council?

MS DUNDERDALE: Council on the Status of Women.

MS JONES: Okay.

Did you fill the position after they left?

MS DUNDERDALE: The position is filled.

MS JONES: Okay.

Where did you say the money for the Violence Prevention Initiative comes from, or does that come out of the Department of Health, or is it in here?

MS DUNDERDALE: It comes under 2.7.01.; all of the headings the whole way down through all include initiatives for VPI. It is all embedded in those headings.

MS JONES: Okay.

Today you were talking about the numbers or the percentage of violence against women has not gone down.

MS DUNDERDALE: It has not gone down, no.

MS JONES: How many years has the campaign been ongoing now?

MS DUNDERDALE: Which campaign?

MS JONES: The Violence Prevention Initiative campaign.

MS DUNDERDALE: We are coming into our sixth year now – fifth year.

MS JONES: Okay, five years.

Has there been any review of the program or –

MS DUNDERDALE: There will be.

MS JONES: - the initiatives to see if it is working or not working, or maybe has no impact on the fact that the stats have not gone down. I am not saying it is not effective, I am just wondering if there has been any evaluation of it.

MS DUNDERDALE: There will be now. This is a six-year initiative, and so the whole evaluation will begin next year.

MS JONES: Can you provide us with the numbers for the last five years – the statistics?

MS DUNDERDALE: On violence?

MS JONES: Yes.

MS DUNDERDALE: Absolutely.

MS JONES: Okay.

One of the questions that come up often from the women's centres - that, of course, you guys would fund and do all kinds of work - is with regard to affordable housing. Is this something that the Women's Policy Office has looked at in terms of what is an acceptable strategy to try to approach affordable housing for women in the Province, especially women who live in poverty and violent situations that they need housing on an emergency basis and so on?

MS DUNDERDALE: Absolutely. The Women's Policy Office is engaged with the women's centres, first of all. In terms of relaying that information back, not only to me, as minister, we work then particularly with the Department of Transportation and Works who is responsible for Newfoundland and Labrador Housing.

In this year's Budget, there is over $94 million that is going to the Newfoundland and Labrador Housing Corporation to, first of all, improve our own stock. I think, certainly as the Minister Responsible for the Status of Women, it was extremely important to me that, as a government, we make investment in our own housing stock. It was a real debate as to whether we went into providing more housing or we deal with some of the deficits we have in our current housing. There had been many, many years when there had not been any investment at all. We built the houses, and we ignored them. That is something that we have been trying to correct, and $94 million is gone into that stock this year.

We also support non-profits like Stella Burry, for example, who do non-profit housing, Marguerite's Place, those kinds of things. So, there are all kinds of initiatives that are going on and significant amounts of money going into social housing. It is a matter of degree in terms of what you are able to put in compared to the need. There is always pressure on that piece to do more.

MS JONES: Have you done any evaluation – I know it is one thing for women's centres to bring up the issue or any group to bring up the issue. I am not undervaluing the fact that it is a serious problem, but I am just wondering if there are any statistics that you guys have compiled around it. How significant is this housing shortage that they talk about? Are there any facts or information to support it?

MS DUNDERDALE: Our department is not charged with that responsibility. That falls more under Transportation and Works who is responsible in terms of housing. It is a concern to us because we need second stage housing and so on around our transition houses. When we have women in transition houses and they decide not to return home, then they have to find another place to live.

In many places in the Province that first choice for them is often Newfoundland and Labrador Housing. That is why that is certainly our priority at this point to make sure that housing is of an acceptable standard for residents in the Province.

MS JONES: The government is doing a new act, the Child, Youth and Family Services Act. Has the Women's Policy Office been asked for any advice or on that? Did you participate in the consultations or submit any kind of brief or input into that?

MS DUNDERDALE: Women's Policy Office has been fully engaged in that piece of legislation, as well as all of the Status of Women Councils in the Province, the Provincial Advisory Council on the Status of Women, and the RCAs of the Violence Prevention Initiative.

There has been a very, very broad consultation across the Province, as well as bringing representatives of all of those groups into St. John's for a daylong session on the act itself. There have been very broad and thorough consultations on the act.

MS JONES: Okay.

One of the issues that came up in the last year for us was women who were contacting us because they had adults in their care with disabilities, either sons or daughters in most cases. They found it very difficult to be able to work outside of the home without having proper care or supports for them. They could not afford the home care because they were on minimum wage jobs and things like this.

Is this an issue that has come to the attention of the Women's Policy Office, either through your advisory groups, or women's centres, or anything of that nature?

MS DUNDERDALE: Yes. We have not had direct representation on that issue, but we have supported the Provincial Advisory Council on the Status of Women who has raised that issue in terms of the Poverty Reduction Strategy. We support that within that strategy.

MS JONES: Okay.

Another issue that – and I have to confess, I am not very familiar with this issue at all, but it was a couple of calls that we received in terms of women who were on Income Support, they had disabilities, and they were pursuing post-secondary education. Of course, they had to take a student loan because they were pursuing it. As a result of it, they lost some of their Income Support and benefits. I do not know if that is an issue that you have been made aware of.

MS DUNDERDALE: No.

MS JONES: Who would we direct that to because we think it warrants looking at -

MS DUNDERDALE: Poverty Reduction Strategy.

MS JONES: So, who is that?

MS DUNDERDALE: HRLE, Minister Sullivan.

MS JONES: Are you guys still asked – I know one of the roles of the Women's Policy Office was to be a women's equality lens into government policy and so on. Do you still perform that role? Is that part of what you do?

MS DUNDERDALE: Absolutely. There is no paper that goes before Cabinet that does not have the WPO gender lens go on it. Certainly, myself and the former minister and other women in Cabinet bring that to the Cabinet table as well in the formation of policy. The WPO is working on a new training program for delivery to the public service.

I know that when I worked for the Provincial Advisory Council on the Status of Women, I came to government about ten years ago for gender analysis training. As a lifelong feminist and somebody who has worked in the community for years and years, I did not understand one thing that was put forward to me. I guarantee you if I did not understand it, some of the people who were working for government, even though they were there with the best of intentions, were in way over their head.

So, we need to revamp that, and we have done a significant piece of that work so that we are delivering a program that is understandable and meeting its objectives, which we certainly did not have up until the time that I had done that course.

MS JONES: If, for example, you apply the women's equality lens to legislation, or policies, or decisions of government and, as a woman, I feel or someone feels out there that this was not applied appropriately or whatever is there some kind of an appeal process? How do you get that relooked at through your department? Is there any process to do that?

MS DUNDERDALE: For example, when the Cabinet Paper comes through, it is part of the analysis that is provided. Along with the Cabinet Paper, is a view from the Rural Secretariat, for example, from maybe Treasury Board, or an economic or social policy committee from the Women's Policy Office, or the accessibility office and so on. There are a number of different lens put on it and those issues are squarely there and identified and debated and discussed and decisions made. We take responsibility, obviously, for the decisions we make in terms policy and programming that we deliver.

MS JONES: Is there any new studies or new areas that the Women's Policy Office is looking at in the next year?

MS DUNDERDALE: Well, we have laid out our direction in our business plan, and that is a public document. We advance all the areas: the antiviolence piece, training within government, and work with our Aboriginal people.

One of the biggest pieces that we are working on is our women's employment plans with Natural Resources. In terms of the Hebron project, we saw a gender equity and diversity clause that was first in the country, and probably the first in the world where companies had to agree to very specific goals that had to be achieved around women's employment and training and so on. We do that in oil development. We are doing it now. We did it in Hebron. We have done it in Hibernia South and White Rose. We have done it in Long Harbour and we will do it with the Lower Churchill. So this has become - we are starting now to do it around some of our mining pieces and so on. This is very, very important to us. That is a major piece of work that we have undertaken. We have been very, very successful with it at this point in time.

We are also working with Aboriginal women, and that is extremely important. Especially for women on the Coast, Inuit women, because they tend to be very isolated and cut off from opportunities to network and to share information and so on. So, we are trying to do a very targeted piece of work to address that deficit with them. We are funding, this year, Newfoundland's Aboriginal women and providing funding to them for the very first time for their organization so that they can expand and do a specific piece of work.

Last year, we funded the multicultural women's organization for the very first time. I must say, the feedback from them has been so positive in what they have been able to do in the last year now that they have sufficient funds to organize themselves. So they are the major themes. The specifics of that are laid out in our business plan which is, as I said, a public document.

MS JONES: Just getting back to 2.7.01. again, you guys under spent in Salaries, you under spent in Transportation and also in Professional Services. I am just wondering, was there something that you were going to do that you did not do under that heading? Transportation and Communications had a very high budget but there is only like half of it spent. I am just wondering why that was?

MS MACLELLAN: That under expenditure had to do with the project we are doing with the Department of Health and Community Services where we are developing a training package on violence prevention for older adults in the Province. As the project evolved we realized we needed more modules, the curriculum developed. We mentioned that this morning. We will start delivery this year on it.

MS JONES: Yes, okay.

How much is the Violence Prevention Initiative budget, because your department put out four press releases last year, one in February, one in June, one in September and one in November. In February you stated you were putting in $9.2 million. In June you said it was $12 million. In September you said it was $10 million and in November you said it was $12 million again over the six years. So I am not sure which of those numbers are right, but that was just four releases in 2009.

MS DUNDERDALE: It will be $12 million for the whole six years.

MS JONES: It will be $12 million for the full six. Okay. You might want to put that in all of your statements.

MS DUNDERDALE: Well, the money keeps increasing as we find new projects and we find new money to fund them. So the amount has gone up.

MS JONES: Yes, it went down though in September compared to June, that is why I found it confusing.

I do not have any other questions.

CHAIR: Thank you, Ms Jones.

Ms Michael.

MS MICHAEL: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Fewer questions than I thought because Ms Jones has covered a couple that I was wanting to ask about, but I just want to push one a little bit further and that is the one with regard to input in policy. I understand what happens when it is something new that is coming and you have Cabinet documents, et cetera, but if there were a policy that were affecting women adversely, how would you deal with that if it is a policy that is already in place?

I am going to use an example because it is a real example, and I used it with the Minister of HRLE for another reason when I doing that one. A single parent, woman, employed, and while she is employed has child care subsidy, becomes unemployed so is on EI but is potentially going to have another job through – I forget which program it is. One of the programs anyway, where she could get a job where the employer would get a subsidy to hire low-income women, but her process became completely slowed down – nobody knows really why that happened – by months. The employer was three months waiting to get approval. Her child care was stopped and finally now the placement has happened. She started this past Monday but now has to wait a whole month before her child care can start up again. It seems to me that there needs to be – and I said this to the minister. There needs to be a coming together of two or three policies there looking at the individual. If you know that she is on that track - it is not that she just became unemployed and said okay, that is it. She immediately was trying to get employment but the child care had to stop because she was not employed. Would you deal with that as WPO in talking to HRLE about that?

MS DUNDERDALE: Yes, I would deal with that as the Minister –

MS MICHAEL: You would?

MS DUNDERDALE: – Responsible for the Status of Women. When those kinds of situations are brought to my attention, then I go back to the relevant ministries and see if I cannot resolve what the issue is, and working with the other ministers, resolving: Do we have a policy piece here that we need to address?

MS MICHAEL: Right.

MS DUNDERDALE: In terms of these kinds of things being brought to our attention, how we deal with it, not only do we get them – not so much through the WPO, but through the minister.

MS MICHAEL: Right.

MS DUNDERDALE: People will contact me directly. I also have a long relationship with the Provincial Advisory Council on the Status of Women –

MS JONES: Right.

MS DUNDERDALE: - who do this work all the time, who people will go to. I have regular meetings with the president, who is – the primary task of the advisory council on the status of women is to advise the minister and government on these kinds of issues. So it gets brought to my attention. We also have - the advisory council and the WPO have regular teleconferences with all of the women's centres throughout the Province, and that happens almost on a monthly basis. So that is another channel to bring those kinds of concerns.

Plus, all of our staff, a number of them are en route and the rest of them will leave tomorrow morning to go out to Corner Brook for the AGM of all the women's councils, their thirty-fifth anniversary this year. I cannot go because the House is open, but we have really good working relationships and good lines of communication with all of these advocacy groups in the Province. So there are a lot of different ways that information gets to us.

MS MICHAEL: Well, I am going to be following this policy up. Actually, after the Estimates the minister did have Roxie contact me to say that she would be really happy – they would like, not only be happy to, they really want to sit down and talk about this case, just as a – not to solve the case, the case is taken care of. That was not why I brought it up, but to look at it from a policy perspective, what went wrong. I will let you know what happens after that, from that policy perspective.

MS DUNDERDALE: Absolutely.

MS MICHAEL: Thank you.

MS DUNDERDALE: Because sometimes it is the particular case that will demonstrate the gap where, unless you had it, you probably would not be able to identify it.

MS MICHAEL: Exactly, and that is why I brought it up to Minister Sullivan. I said I am not bringing this up to have a case solved, but I said I think it just really clearly shows how there are gaps in between the different policies that affect women, in particular.

With that, I think that is it. Thank you, Mr. Chair, because I asked most of mine this morning.

CHAIR: Thank you very much, Ms Michael.

Any further questions from the Committee?

Okay, I will ask the Clerk now to call the subheads.

CLERK: 2.7.01.

CHAIR: 2.7.01., shall that carry?

All those in favour, ‘aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

CHAIR: All those against, ‘nay'.

Carried.

On motion, subhead 2.7.01 carried.

CLERK: 2.7.02.

CHAIR: 2.7.02., shall that carry?

All those in favour, ‘aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

CHAIR: All those against, ‘nay'.

Carried.

On motion, subhead 2.7.02 carried.

CHAIR: Shall the total carry?

All those in favour, ‘aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

CHAIR: All those against, ‘nay'.

Carried.

On motion, Women's Policy Office, total heads, carried.

CHAIR: Shall I report the Estimates of the Women's Policy Office carried without amendment?

All those in favour, ‘aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

CHAIR: All those against, ‘nay'.

Carried.

On motion, Estimates of the Women's Policy Office carried without amendment.

CHAIR: You have the minutes of our meeting this morning, the Department of Natural Resources. I would like to have a motion now to adopt these minutes.

MR. VERGE: (Inaudible).

CHAIR: Moved by Mr. Verge, seconded by Mr. Hunter, that the minutes from this morning's meeting of the Department of Natural Resources be approved as circulated.

All those in favour, ‘aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

CHAIR: All those against, ‘nay'.

Carried.

On motion, minutes adopted as circulated.

CHAIR: At this time I would just like to thank the members of the Committee, the minister and her officials, as well as the staff with the House of Assembly.

That concludes our departmental Estimates debate for this year in Committee.

I would like to ask for a motion now to adjourn.

MR. VERGE: (Inaudible).

CHAIR: Moved by Mr. Verge.

This meeting now stands adjourned.