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CANADA

Ont. Liberals restrict
equal pay to dampen
corporate protests

By KERRY McCUAIG

The Ontario Liberals are expected to
introduce new legislation in the coming
month which will add an extra $70-mil-
lion to the government payroll to help
close the male-female wage gap.

The bill, to be introduced by labor
minister Bill Wrye, covers the 68,000
members of the Ontario Civil Service
and is intended to be a first step to im-
plementing full equal pay for work of
equal value for the province’s almost two
million working women.

According to the Liberal-New Demo-
cratic Party Accord which permitted
Premier David Peterson to form the
government, equal pay legislation for

. both the public and private sector was to

have been tabled in the first session of the
legislature.
Peterson’s throne speech last July

Skirted the Accord and called for a

**staged approach’’, initiating pay equity
first in the public then in the private sec-
tor. A Green (discussion) Paper was an-
nounced along with hearings which are

’ scheduled to commence next month.

Premier Back-tracks

The resulting criticism was swift, the
Equal Pay Coalition embarrassed the
premier by releasing a series of his
statements made while in opposition and

__during the election campaign when he

argued equal pay had been studied suf-
ficiently and the time had come for
action.

The coalition charged the Liberals
with buckling under to the business
community which has fiercely fought the
concept. The Canadian Federation of
Independent Business and the Canadian
Manufacturers Association alleged that
pay equity would hurt the province’s
“investment climate’’ and ‘‘competitive
edge’’. The wage gap, they said, is not
due to discrimination but because
women choose to work in low-paying

The coalition counters that the only
reason “‘women’s jobs’ are so badly
paid is because women do them.

While welcoming the extra $70-million
for its members, the Ontario Public Ser-

Women’s groups reject ‘stay home’ calls

vice Employees Union says the gov-
ernment is about $30-million short of
seriously closing up the wage gap.

It also queried why the legislation was
taking such a narrow definition of the
public sector, restricting it only to the
civil service. When the Public Sector Re-
straint Act was passed in 1983, all pro-
vincial and municipal workers had their
wages restricted.,

The Canadian Union of Public
Employees, also called for a broader
interpretation of ‘“‘public sector’’. Now
in negotiations with 62 hospitals, it has
asked for an extra $18-million to assist
the hospitals in raising the wages of its
large female workforce. The health
ministry refused.

Both the coalition and the Ontario:
Federation of Labor have called for one
bill to cover both the private and public
sector immediately. Private sector work-
ers, they demonstrate are most in need of
protection. Public sector workers are
more highly unionized and whereas the
average wage gap in the province is 38 per
cent, it is 22 per cent in the public sector
and 50 per cent in private industry.

Coalition sources are also concerned
that the two-tiered approach could be an
attempt to split private and public sector
workers on the issue. There is a chance
the public sector could be “‘neutralized”’
by being offered better legislation.

Handbook for Subversion

Although not publicly condemning the
Green Paper, coalition members have
privately called it ‘‘an employers’
handbook for subversion’.

‘It is obvious the government is out
for window dressing on this issue’’, one
long standing member commented. “‘It is
going to take a fight to make sure we
don’t get stuck with a paper tiger’.

A paper tiger may well be what the
Liberals have in mind for pay equity. It
hired the Nesbitt Consulting Firm and in
an effort to woo the corporate sector,
invited chief executives to sit on an ad-
visory body to work out an implementa-
tion system.

The Peterson strategy appears to be to
get business to back away from its vocal

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condemnation of equal pay in return for
enough loopholes to make the legislation
virtually ineffective.

Crucial here is the number of
employees ina firm to have it covered by
the legislation. Key ministers, including
the premier, have stated it should apply
to only large companies. The Green
Paper suggests 500 employees. However
even if only 20 workers was the cut off,
one-third of the female workforce in the
private sector would be excluded.

Other areas of concern include what
the legislation will consider a ‘‘job ghet-
to’’. The paper suggests a sliding scale

- corresponding to the size of the firm. One

figure advanced is that there would have
to be at least 70 per cent women in a job
in order for a comparison to be made.

It is worth noting that all of the federal
complaints that have succeeded have not
met the 70 per cent requirement. Even
the Green Paper remarks that this figure
would exclude most hospital and other
institutional workers.

The paper also hints that the legislation
may not apply to jobs which are done
almost exclusively by women, such as
primarily school teachers, day care

workers, nurses etc., because comp
able male occupations could not
found. vi
The paper then lists a number of ‘a,
lowable exemptions’, including mep
pay, regional pay differences, lab

shortages and technological change. Q;
the exemptions listed the coalition co
tends that only ‘‘seniority”’ is valid ‘*

long as it is not used in a discriminatoy
manner’.

Only a Step

Equal pay for work of equal value
been on the agenda since 1919 whe
was included as one of the founding p
ciples of the League of Nations. O
considered a cure-all for womer
economic woes, the 10 year fight by t
coalition has led it to the conclusion th
equal pay “‘is not a panacea and is onh
one, albeit a major step, in achievin
economic equality for women.”

In its response to the Green Pape
called on government to act quickl
address wage discrimination thro
mandatory affirmative action, better
care, and retraining opportunities
higher minimum wage and easier ac
to unionization.

By ANNE McGRATH

would invite Mr. Diachuk to ente

EDMONTON — The dis-
covery of Brenda McClenaghan’s
body on January 22 followed a
two-week search for the young
Edmonton woman who disap-
peared after leaving a southside
bar to drive to her parents’ home.
Brenda, who would have been 21
the day after her body was dis-
covered, was a hairdressing stu-
dent at the Northern Alberta In-
stitute of Technology (NAIT).

Her disappearance from the
parking lot of the Pink Panther
Lounge on January 12 sparked a
major search by Edmonton
police, the RCMP and citizens.

An atmosphere of hysteria was
cultivated by the appearance of
several media articles per day re-
minding women of the con-
sequences of assuming that they

8 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, FEBRUARY 12, 1986

Rape/murder raises media hysteria

are free to walk at night unpro-
tected. The local police and media
circulated dire warnings about the
dangers of women walking alone
at night and urged caution.

Brenda’s partially clad body,
tied to a tree by an orange ex-
tension cord was found on an
acreage in southeast Edmonton
The incident has shocked and
angered the women’s community
here. A candlelight vigil, or-
ganized by the Alberta Status of
Women Action Committee (AS-
WAC) and the Sexual Assault
Centre of Edmonton mourned the
loss of the woman and expressed
outrage against a society that
terrorizes women.

Lisa Walter, an ASWAC board

“movement felt,

the women’s
‘‘compelled to
speak out at the brutal ways of
one man who abducted, tortured
and took the life of one woman.
We also speak out now at these
same brutal ways that this man
has affected other women’s lives
— rape is never a single event.”’

A poem read by Sheryl Acker-
man, a local school teacher and
ASWAC member, included a
litany of women’s names who
have been abducted and mur-
dered in Edmonton over the last
few years.

member said

A report in the Edmonton .

Journal stated that Brenda had
everything going for her, ‘*But
she made one fatal mistake. She

decided to walk to her car alone
after a few drinks ... She never
made it home.”’

Women’s groups spoke out
against the archaic attitude typi-
fied by the article which. implies
the victim shares the blame with
her attacker or that women
should take the responsibility for
their own protection by staying
off the streets.

Tory politicians have also come
under fire for their comments on
the case. Alberta health minis-
ter Bill Diachuk suggested
women should learn from Brenda
McClenaghan’s murder not to go
out alone at night. ASWAC office

manager Amanda Le Rougetel
- was angered by his statements. *‘I

the 20th century, in which mos
people believe that all peo
have the right to walk on
streets.

“*Tf Diachuk thinks we are s
‘staying at home, I invite him t
any of the shelters in Edmontoi
and Alberta that help women wh
have been physically and sexu
abused by their husbands or
friends.”

According to the Sexual Ai
sault Centre in Edmonton S50 pe
cent of sexual assaults take p
during the day, many in wom
homes. Jane Karstaedt, dire
of the Sexual Assault Centre, sai
that the solution is to, ‘‘strive fot
society where women are not di
prived of the right to walk on 1 th
streets and to be safe in
EEXORR