Yo! Ladies!

Feel a laser targetting beam on your back?

Stephen Harper embarks on his fourth national election campaign in seven years with a mission: to finally secure a majority government. And he plans to achieve that majority by convincing more women to vote Conservative.

Above anything else, this election is about Mr. Harper, a determined if extremely partisan leader whose personality earns the respect of some and the distrust of others.

Messrs Ibbitson and Friesen have provided a pretty short continuum of responses there.

Let's extend it a little, shall we? To include fear and disgust.

Unfortunately for Stevie Peevie, but fortunately for the country, a good many women regard the Cons with some combination of distrust, disgust, and fear.
The Proud Fringers, for example, whose number is over 5400, formed when an amateur video of Stevie crowing to what he thought was a private gathering about his accomplishments in silencing 'feminists and other left-wing fringe groups' surfaced.

An offshoot, Women Against Stephen Harper, numbering over 600, formed to WASH that man right out of our collective hair.

More than 1200 women joined a group called Women Who Are Creeped out by Stephen Harper. 'Nuff said there.

And when Senator Nancy Ruth counselled a bunch of women angry over the Cons' refusal to include family planning -- let alone safe abortion -- in his cynical G8 'Maternal Health Initiative' to 'shut the fuck up', another Facebook group sprang up. I don't need to tell you what it's called. (That audio clip is NSFW or children, by the way.) This group has more than 2800 members.

Granted, there is a lot of overlap in those numbers. (I think I belong to all of them. I have some strong -armed -minded Facebook friends.) But still, there are lots of Canadian women who wouldn't vote Conservative even if that target on their back were actually bleeding.

But what of the other thousands and thousands of women the Cons need for a *shudder* majority? What can we say to women who might be swayed?

Let's look south to the Excited States, where a wave of Tea Party victories in various states has unleashed an unprecedented orgy of misogyny. All manner of programs intended to benefit women and children have been slashed to ribbons: family planning, child care, violence against women, and, most importantly in this time of fiscal trouble and job losses -- abortion of course.

Ah, but Canada is a kinder, gentler place than the US, you say.

Oh yeah? Let's take a look at what Stevie Peevie has already 'defunded'.

1. Aboriginal Healing Foundation
(cuts affected several healing centres that focused on providing support to abused women, such as the Native Women’s Shelter of Montreal)
2. Action travail des femmes
3. Alberta Network of Immigrant Women
4. Association féminine d’éducation et d’action sociale (AFEAS)
5. Canadian Child Care Federation
6. Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women (CRIAW)
7. Centre de documentation sur l’éducation des adultes et la condition féminine
8. Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada
9. Child Care Resource and Research Unit, SpeciaLink
10. Conseil d’intervention pour l’accès des femmes au travail (CIAFT)
11. Elspeth Heyworth Centre for Women Toronto
(funding cut by CIC in December 2010)
12. Feminists for Just and Equitable Public Policy (FemJEPP) in Nova Scotia
13. First Nations Child and Family Caring Society
14. International Planned Parenthood Federation
15. Marie Stopes International,
a maternal health agency, has received only a promise of "conditional” funding IF it avoids any & all connection with abortion
16. MATCH International
17. National Association of Women and the Law (NAWL)
18. Native Women’s Association of Canada
19. New Brunswick Coalition for Pay Equity
20. Ontario Association of Interval and Transition Houses (OAITH)
21. Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care
22. Réseau des Tables régionales de groupes de femmes du Québec
23. Riverdale Immigrant Women’s Centre, Toronto
24. Sisters in Spirit
25. South Asian Women’s Centre
26. Status of Women Canada
(mandate also changed to exclude "gender equality and political justice" and to ban all advocacy, policy research and lobbying)
27. Tri-Country Women’s Centre Society
28. Womanspace Resource Centre (Lethbridge, Alberta)
29. Women for Community Economic Development in Southwest Nova Scotia (WCEDSN)
30. Women’s Innovative Justice Initiative – Nova Scotia
31. Workplace Equity/Employment Equity Program

(Note that immigrant and Aboriginal women are ˆNOT spared.)

That's what Stevie and his gang have done to Canadian women and children -- with a MINORITY government.

Imagine what he'd do with a majority.


(cross-posted at Unseat Harper blog)

Working mother wins human rights decision

In the 1970s feminists applied their intellectual acumen, emotional clout and political savvy to ensuring that women's work, in all its forms, was valued. The expression: 'Every mother is a working mother' became a rallying cry and women's right to work was supported. To a certain extent, this was also of benefit to men who became more engaged in childcare and educating their offspring.

In spite of the ditzy perorations of Sara "Choice for me, me, me" Landriault, there have been major advancements for working mothers - at home and in the labour force.

The sight of men pushing strollers in public places - on their own! - no longer shocks.

Yet there are still work environments who have resisted the needs of their employees' rights to fair accommodation, with regard to balancing their family responsibilities.

A Canada Border Services Agency officer who had to give up her full-time position after the birth of her first child has won a six-year battle with her employer over its failure to accommodate her. [...]

Johnstone had been working a variety of shifts as a full-time officer at Pearson Airport in Toronto and had a good record with her employers when she had her first child in 2003.

Both before going on maternity leave and before returning to work in 2004, Johnstone had asked her employer if she could come back on an altered schedule, one in which she worked three static 13-hour shifts a week, with no preferred start time. The unusual schedule was suggested so that she could care for her child on the four days she could not find available child care, while at the same time working the weekly hours needed to maintain her status as a full-time employee and retain her maximum pension.

Johnstone said because of the unpredictable shifts of the job, public or private child-care options were not available, but that she had found three days in which family members could care for her child. [...]

Her employer denied the requests, saying the Canadian Border Services Agency had an unwritten policy not to provide full-time hours to those requesting accommodation on the basis of child-rearing responsibilities. [...]

"When I asked for clarification on the policy and when I asked to come back full time they told me I couldn't and there was no reason given that was good enough," said Johnstone [...] The tribunal agreed, saying that the agency didn't establish a strong enough case that altering the schedule to accommodate Johnstone would have constituted an undue hardship for the employer and other workers.

This is a very important decision for working mothers and fathers, as well as other workers who may request an accommodation of their employer to handle family responsibilities, such as caring for a spouse ill with cancer or an elderly parent with Alzheimer's.

After all, mothers - and fathers - are working, productive members of our society.

Real choice for childcare

Every mother is a working mother. Remember that feminist affirmation from the 70s? In Québec, a popular play about stay-at-home mothers was entitled "Maman travaille pas; elle a trop d'ouvrage." - translation: Mom doesn't have a job; she's got too much work at home.

We had hoped that in spite of small gains, the world had moved beyond prejudices about working mothers, that things had evolved and some obstacles had been removed.

It would appear that Britain has taken a big step backwards. Two female detective constables were threatened with prosecution if they didn't drop the reciprocal child care support they've arranged with each other over 2 years.

The Children's Minister has ordered a review of the case of two police officers told they had broken the law by caring for each other's children.

Ofsted said the arrangement contravened the Childcare Act because it lasted for longer than two hours a day, and constituted receiving "a reward". It said the women would have to be registered as childminders.

Minister Vernon Coaker said his department was talking to Ofsted about this particular case. According to the Mail on Sunday, Ofsted told two detective constables, Leanne Shepherd, from Milton Keynes, and Lucy Jarrett, from Buckingham, to end their arrangement.

'Stunned' Ms Shepherd told the newspaper: "When the Ofsted inspector turned up, the first thing she said was: 'I have had a report that you're running an illegal childminding business'. "I straightaway thought she must be mistaken, so invited her into my home to explain we were police officers and best friends helping each other out. "But she told me I was breaking the law and must end the arrangement with Lucy immediately. "I was stunned, completely devastated... I couldn't see how I could continue working."

Reward is not just a case of money changing hands. The supply of services or goods and, in some circumstances, reciprocal arrangements can also constitute reward Ofsted spokesman. ...

Thames Valley Police Federation, which represents rank-and-file officers, said the pair had its "full support". Secretary Andy Viney said: "Both of them are experienced professional officers. "They just want to return to work after having children and have found that the system is working totally against them.

Ofsted is the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills which inspects and regulates care for children and young people in Britain. Someone used the whistleblower's hotline to rat out Leanne and Lucy. Did this busy-body think their children were at risk, being cared for by their own mothers and a close family friend? Was it an envious neighbour or perhaps a sexist colleague?

The BBC News has an interview with officers Shepherd and Jarrett, here. And more at the Daily Mail and the Guardian.

As much as I hate to agree with Margaret Thatcher, this seems to me like the worst of a "nanny state" type of interference. Mind-boggling.