NDP statement on International Equal Pay Day

NDP critic for Pay Equity, Peggy Sattler (London West) made the following statement on International Equal Pay Day, 2020:

LONDON — "As we mark International Equal Pay Day in Ontario, we recognize the thousands of women who have lost jobs or wages during the pandemic, facing unprecedented financial uncertainty and struggle.

We acknowledge the disproportionate burdens COVID-19 has placed on women; especially Black, Indigenous and racialized women, those in the 2SLGBTQIA+ community, those raising children on their own, living with disabilities or who are low-income.

We recognize that it is primarily women-identified folks who have been doing double duty working and parenting without child care or school during the pandemic, or who have been forced to give up their jobs to stay home with children. Four out of five health care workers in Canada identify as women, and women predominantly make up the workforce in the retail and service sectors, which have been on the front lines of the pandemic.

Ontario’s significant wage gap far precedes the pandemic. In Canada, women earn about 71 cents for every dollar men earn. When it comes to hourly wage rates, the gender pay gap is about 11.3 per cent. The wage gap has always been greater for racialized and Indigenous women.

Successive Conservative and Liberal governments have failed to take action to close this gap. The Ford government stalled the implementation of legislation aimed to increase pay transparency in Ontario. His government has made a slew of cuts that disproportionately impact women, including cancelling an increase to the minimum wage, slashing paid sick days and refusing to make investments in affordable child care, long-term care, education and health care.

Doug Ford continues to refuse to pay a fair, liveable wage personal support workers (PSWs) - who are predominantly women, and racialized women in particular - despite their risking their lives amid chronic staffing shortages to keep our most vulnerable seniors in long-term care safe, and despite pleas from health care experts, advocates and families.

Ontario’s New Democrats will continue to fight for the pay gap to be closed, for Ford to give the child care sector the funding it desperately needs, and for the province to invest in the feminist COVID-19 recovery needed to ease the financial, psychological and physical impacts the pandemic has had on women."