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The Problem More than 25 years the adoption of the Canadian Human Rights Act, women working full-time still earn 71% of men’s salaries, regardless of our age, occupation or education. For women of colour, Aboriginal women and women with a disability, the ...

In close collaboration with the Coalition for Women’s Equality (CWE), NAWL encourages women and women’s groups to get involved in federal elections and ask questions about women’s issues. During the Federal Elections in 2004 and 2006, NAWL helped the CWE develop a ...

Gosselin v. Québec… a disappointing Supreme Court decision on the right to social assistance. This case is about a Québec welfare regulation that provided drastically reduced benefits (170$ a month) for persons under thirty years of age who were considered able to ...

Québec has them, so why can’t the rest of Canada? Mothering a child is associated with a significant drop in income. It has lifelong consequences for a woman’s earning capacity and employment-related benefits like pensions. And that’s above and beyond feeding and ...

In December of 1999, NAWL presented a Brief to the Canadian Human Rights Act Review Panel. We recommended inclusion of social condition as a protected ground of discrimination under the Act. We also told the Review Panel that if the Human Rights ...

Canada adopted the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in 1976. Countries like Canada that have signed the International Covenant must submit progress reports to an International Committee. Groups like NAWL can also present alternative reports to the Committee. In ...

Today, 73% of women with children aged 0-6 years are in the paid workforce. If women are to have equal access to the work force, education and professional training, good, affordable child care is essential. Women shouldn’t have to assume responsibility for ...

In 1995 the government implemented the most significant spending reductions in contemporary Canadian history. Following these reductions, many women suffered significant economic hardship. A time of economic prosperity then ensued for the federal government. However, federal spending policy in the last ten ...

How should much-needed human rights protection be extended to transgendered people? Existing grounds that have been invoked include sex, sexual orientation and disability. Some advocates have suggested that the addition of ‘gender identity’ would better protect trans people. However, the idea of ...

In 2000, the Canadian Women’s March Committee’s published a document called “It’s Time for Change”. This document set out a list of demands for the Federal Government aimed at ending poverty and violence against women. However, few of these demands have been ...

Brief submitted by Susan Russell of the Canadian Federation of University Women and the National Association of Women and the Law to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. Our concern over the Public Sector Equitable Compensation Act begins with the ...

NAWL evaluates the federal government on its responsiveness to national issues: budgeting and fiscal management, jobs and well-being, participation of Canadians, Crime and Safety, Building Stronger Government Institutions, and Promoting Equality for Girls and Women. See the Report. Budgeting and Fiscal Management: ...

Public income security programmes for individuals can take three forms. Each kind targets different kinds of beneficiaries and requires a different type of financing. Here the different kinds of programme will be defined relative to the objective of providing maternity, paternity, adoption ...

According to NAWL’s vision, every mother should receive income replacement and material support during the first years of caring for a child. Bearing and raising children should not impoverish women, as is now the case. No single initiative is sufficient to drastically ...

According to NAWL’s vision, every mother should receive income replacement and material support during the first years of caring for a child. Bearing and raising children should not impoverish women, as is now the case. No single initiative is sufficient to drastically ...

For the last three years, NAWL has been exploring ways of improving maternity and parental benefits for women living outside Québec. The NAWL Working Group has had several in-depth discussions on this issue, did extensive research on existing literature in Québec, Canada ...

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On May 2 and 3, 2007, the National Association of Women and the Law, in cooperation with the Canadian Labour Congress and the other members of the Pay Equity Network, held a Canada-wide meeting on recent developments in pay equity. Activists from ...

For the last three years, NAWL has been exploring ways of improving maternity and parental benefits for women living outside Québec. The NAWL Working Group has had several in-depth discussions on this issue, did extensive research on existing literature in Québec, Canada ...

The federal government – Canada’s “New Government” – has decided to take a giant step backwards on the question of equal pay for work of equal value. There is nothing new in their pay equity plan. More than thirty years after the ...