Step up the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women by Fighting for a Society Which Recognizes the Rights of All! Defeat the Right! Elect an Anti-War Government!

Take Back the Night
• Step up the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women by Fighting for a Society Which Recognizes the Rights of All! Defeat the Right! Elect an Anti-War Government!

For Your Information
• Some Facts on Working and Living Conditions of Women in Canada

Take Back the Night

Step up the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women by Fighting for a Society Which Recognizes the Rights of All! Defeat the Right! Elect an Anti-War Government!

The Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada salutes women and supporters gathered across the country to Take Back the Night (TBTN). Despite one hundred plus years of an organized women's movement in North America, women remain second-class citizens and are still "fair game." They face not only individualized violence but systemic economic and social marginalization. TBTN has come to represent the demands of women to live in security, free from violence and harassment. This year, TBTN falls during the 2008 federal elections. What role do women have in these elections given their rights and those of the people they hold dear? How will we turn the tide of the Harper government's ramped up attack on women's rights?

First, we must grapple with a political system that gives rise to governments that eliminated "equality" from the mandate of Status of Women Canada, slashed its operational budget, resulting in the loss of 61 out of 131 positions, the closure of 12 out of 16 regional offices and the elimination of the Independent Policy Research Fund, the Court Challenges Program and many other programs. Harper's government has also rolled back important commitments to build a national child care program, resulting in cuts of $1.2 billion annually to provinces and territories for child care services. Further, the Harper government has refused to address the issue of 3000 missing First Nations women, whose supporters spent the summer crossing the country in the Walk4Justice. These are but a few of many drastic actions and inactions. We need to ask: why are women excluded from the decision making processes when their consequences so deeply affect women's day to day living?

The biggest problem facing women in Canada is their lack of political power. Indeed this is the problem facing all of society. Without political power and participating in governance, women are unable to ensure that their rights and those of all members of society are provided with a guarantee, both as individuals and collectives. Current arrangements at both federal and provincial levels show the dangerous extent to which the political representatives of the rich are using their power to put all the assets of society into the hands of the monopolies. This can only be accomplished if working people are excluded from the political process and their resistance to annexation, imperialist war and cuts to social programs is suppressed. Women know that to put an end to the anti-social offensive and build a new society, it is necessary to be effective politically and resolve the current political crisis is in favour of the working class, women and youth.

The MLPC calls on women activists and organizations of women fighting for collective rights to take up the task of political renewal to empower the working class and people! By taking up the necessity of our times to wrest power from the forces of reaction and to renew democracy women play a leading role in building a bright future for all and to guarantee their own emancipation. Let us pledge to defeat Canada's pro-war government and elect an anti-war government which represents the popular will. End the anti-social offensive by changing the direction of the economy to stop paying the rich and increase investments in social programs! End the agenda to annex Canada to the United States of North American Monopolies! Dismantle NATO and make Canada a bulwark which upholds international rule of law based on the principles that all nations big or small are equal, non-interference in their internal affairs and no use of force to settle conflicts!

This struggle can only be successful when women themselves take the lead to solve the problems confronting their societies. Women around the world are proudly taking up the problems facing humanity, saying loud and clear: Another World Is Possible! It Can Be Done! It Must Be Done! By taking up the banner of the democratic renewal of the political process, women will not only put themselves at centre-stage of history in the making, but in the leadership of society. Only in this way can we guarantee that the new modern society we need to create eliminates all vestiges which condone and enforce the exploitation of persons by persons and the oppression of women.

To contact the Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada: info@mlpc.ca
For information on the MLPC candidates and program: www.mlpc.ca

For Your Information

Some Facts on Working and Living Conditions
of Women in Canada

Women make up slightly over 50 percent of the population -- 16,332,300 out of 32,976,000 based on the 2007 census figures. In Canada, a newborn female is more likely than a male to grow up to be poor. Some 18 percent of Canadian women (just under 2.8 million) are living in poverty compared to 15 percent of the male population. Based on the 2001 census 23 percent of all women not born in Canada lived in poverty, and 37 percent of those who had arrived in the previous five years were impoverished. Among aboriginal women 43 percent lived below the poverty line. All indications are that the situation of national minority and aboriginal women has deteriorated since these figures were gathered.

Single mothers and other "unattached" women are most vulnerable to poverty with 46 percent of single mothers and 43 percent of "unattached" women over 65 living in poverty. By comparison 31 percent of single senior men live in poverty. Two-thirds of those earning the minimum wage are women and it is simply not possible to work enough hours at this rate to get above the poverty line.

The plight of single mothers is so marked that they are included by Statistics Canada as a distinct category of those most likely to be among the working poor. In 2005, the income of single-parent families headed by women averaged $25,356 a year compared to $31,797 for those headed by men. Moreover, as of 2001 a full 37 percent of single mothers were raising their families and paying costs of childcare on less than $10 per hour. The depth of the impoverishment of single mothers is reflected in the fact that 40.9 percent of children living in female lone-parent families were classified as persons with low income while only 7.7 percent of children living in two-parent families were classified as persons with low income.

In Canada working women make on average 70.5 percent of the wages men make. This is the case in a situation in which just over 86 percent of women between the ages of 25 and 54 participate in the workforce and in which all wages are being pushed down.

Women continue to be concentrated in traditional female-dominated jobs. According to Statscan, as of 2006, 67 percent of all employed women were working in one of teaching, nursing and related healthcare occupations, clerical and other administrative positions or in sales and service. This compares to only 30 percent of men in such occupations.

These are all relatively low-paid sectors of the workforce and the effects of neo-liberal globalization -- such as the privatization of public services -- have further reduced wages in sectors like healthcare. For example, as a result of the privatization of the jobs of 8,500 health support workers in B.C. in 2005 their pay was cut by more than 40 percent and they also lost their benefits. The majority of these workers were women and recent immigrants.

The drive of the monopolies to compete within the global market has also seen a steady increase over the past decade in what are referred to as non-standard or precarious jobs. Most estimates put the number of workers employed in "non-standard" jobs or "precarious" work -- which comes with low wages, unstable income, shift work, lack of benefits, limited access to labour rights and low rate of unionization -- at 33 to 37 percent of the workforce. Women are over represented in this category with over 41 percent of women, compared to 29 percent of men, falling within this category. This category includes workers forced to become "self-employed contractors" with recent figures indicating that the average annual income for self-employed women is around $15,500.

Precariously employed women face unstable and unpredictable hours, and may work only part time, intermittently or alternately may work very long hours. There was also an increase during the 1990s in the number of both men and women working nights and weekends. In 2002, one in seven women were working more than 41 hours per week, 7.6 percent were working 41 to 49 hours at their main job and 6.8 percent were working more than 50 hours a week at their main job.

One of the ways in which this type of work shows up in Statscan figures is in the number of women who work part-time -- that is they work less than 30 hours per week at their main job. The figures do not give a figure of the total number of hours they work at several jobs, or the toll that takes. Of those employed part-time, 23 percent were looking for full-time work. Among women aged 25 to 44, 19 percent worked part-time, while 20 percent of women aged 45 to 54 did so. This compares to only 5 percent of men in each of these age categories.

Another form of precarious employment is so-called "self-employment." According to the 2007 census figures 900,000 women were "self-employed." According to a federal government task force report in late 2003, there was a 208 percent increase from 1981 to 2001 in the number of women who were "self- employed"compared to a 38 percent increase among men. The growth of this "self-employment" in the 1990s was an increasing number of "own-account" workers who were unincorporated and employed unpaid help. Many of the women in this category are really temporary workers with a series of short-term contracts with an employer or ran micro-businesses out of their homes. In 2002, 61.1 percent of all self-employed women fell into this category as compared to only 44.5 percent of self-employed men. The average annual income of women "own-account" self-employed workers in 1999 was $13,032 per year.

In 2002, the average woman worker earned $15.82 per hour, 81.6 percent of the $19.38 per hour earned by the average man. When the average annual earning of women full-time/full-year workers is considered, the gap is still more marked. In 1995, earnings of women in this category rose to 73 percent of men's earnings, an all-time high and by 2000 had declined to 71.7 percent of men's average yearly earnings. Particularly striking is the fact that women with university degrees, traditionally the group with the smallest wage gap, were earning only 69.8 percent of what their male counterparts earned by 2002, down from an all-time high also in 1995 of 75.9 percent.

According to 2002 figures, almost one in three women (31.5 percent) were low paid compared to one in five men (19.5 percent). Low paid is defined as earning less than two-thirds of the national median wage.

The recent period has seen a marked increase in the employment rate for older women. From 1995-2002 the employment rate of women aged 55 to 59 rose from 44.0 percent to 50.9 percent and for women from 60 to 64 rose from 22.0 percent to 28.8 percent. This is partially explained by the fact that more of today's older women have worked all or most of their lives than was the case with previous generations but may also be explained by the need of many older women to continue to work because of inadequate pensions, particularly for those among the working poor. As of 2003, the percentage of women in the labour force covered by a registered pension plan was 33.2 percent.

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