Federal Cuts Will Affect Advocacy on Equality and Women’s Rights

By Jo-Anne Pickel

In late September, the Conservative minority government announced deep cuts that will have an impact on advocacy for equality and women’s rights in Canada. The government announced that it was cutting all funding to the Court Challenges Program. It also announced significant cuts to Status of Women Canada’s budget as well as critical changes to the agency’s mandate and funding rules.

Cancellation of Court Challenges Program

Established in 1978, the Court Challenges Program provided funding support for test case litigation in equality and minority language rights cases as well as funding for publicly available research on systemic equality rights issues and for community consultations to address the implications of equality rights cases. As a result, the Program’s cancellation will have a significant impact on access to justice and the effective advancement of equality and minority language rights in the country.

The Court Challenges Program has provided funding in a number of key equality rights cases or cases with an equality rights dimension including, to name only a small fraction of the cases: Egan v. Canada (challenge to the denial of old age pensions to same-sex spouses); R. v. Butler (challenge to the Criminal Code’s obscenity provisions); Corbière v. The Queen (challenge to Indian Act provisions that prohibited off-reserve Indian Band members from participating in Band elections); Gosselin v. Quebec (challenge to reductions in social assistance payments for individuals who do not participate in workfare programs); Mack v. Canada (claim for restitution of the “head tax” levied on Chinese Canadians in the early 20th century); and Egale Canada v. Canada (challenge to denial of right to marry for same-sex couples.)

The Court Challenges Program was briefly cancelled in 1992 by Brian Mulroney’s Conservative government but reinstated, after widespread criticism, by Kim Campbell following her election in 1993.

Numerous legal and community groups have opposed the cuts to this program. For more information on these initiatives, see the websites for the following organizations: Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action (FAFIA); the Canadian Bar Association as well as www.savecourtchallenges.ca (website of a coalition of community and legal organizations).

Cuts and Changes to Status of Women Canada

At the same time, the Conservative minority government announced a $5 million (40%) cut to Status of Women Canada’s budget. Status of Women Canada is the federal government agency which conducts gender-based research into public policy and funds organizations working on women’s issues. The agency was established following the 1970 Royal Commission on the Status of Women in 1970 with a mandate to address issues of systemic inequality that women faced and continue to face. While the funding cut will not directly affect the Women’s Program, which funds women’s groups, it will drastically reduce SWC’s capacity to sponsor independent research, to ensure that other ministries take into account the impact of their policies on women and to report to the United Nations on Canada’s international commitments to women.

In addition to cutting Status of Women Canada’s funding, the government has also made fundamental changes to the goals and funding rules of the Women’s Program. The government removed “equality” as one of the objectives of the Program and introduced new funding rules which will prevent Status of Women Canada from funding groups that are engaged in advocacy or lobbying of governments.

Many community groups and other organizations have opposed the cuts and changes to Status of Women Canada. On October 31st, the all-party House of Commons Status of Women Committee passed a motion recommending that the government reverse the $5 million in cuts to Status of Women Canada and that it re-instate the original Terms and Conditions of the Women’s Program. The motion also recommended that the Chair of the Committee, Judy Sgro, report the adoption of the motion to the House of Commons without delay.

For more information on interventions to oppose the cuts and changes to Status of Women Canada see for example the National Association of Women and the Law's website.