31 Things British Columbia Can Do Right Now to End Violence Against Women
7. Address the feminization of poverty with a provincial anti-poverty plan
Poverty disproportionately impacts women–particularly indigenous women, women with disabilities, immigrant and refugee women and other marginalized groups. Single mothers are drastically over-represented among people living in poverty and 64% of minimum wage earners are women. Poverty rates for single mothers nearly tripled from 1980 to 2006, so that today more than 35% of single mothers live in poverty, compared to 9.3% of two parent families and 12.7% of men. Among seniors, women are twice as likely to live in poverty.
BC needs to:
- design and commit to a real anti-poverty plan to address our shocking levels of child and family poverty;
- legislate for pay equity in work sectors traditionally dominated by women, such as nursing and home care;
- provide adequate social assistance rates and living wages that adjust for inflation;
- provide quality, affordable family housing, and
- provide universal daycare.
Women in British Columbia have waited too long already. That is why we are offering 31 things that BC’s new Provincial Office of Domestic Violence (PODV) can push for right now to increase safety for women and to bring us closer than we have ever been to ending violence against women once and for all. We are calling for 31 social, economic and legal changes, none of which are unachievable in this province. Some would require very little financial investment, and each of them will save resources in the long term given the high costs of violence against women.
For more information:
1. Call violence against women what it is
2. Audit for compliance with BC’s Violence Against Women in Relationship policy
3. Address the immediate financial and housing needs of women fleeing violence
5. Make addressing women’s inequality a core learning objective for all BC students
6. Add sexual violence by police to the mandate of the Independent Investigations Office
7. Address the feminization of poverty with a provincial anti-poverty plan
8. Push to add gender and sex to the hate crime provisions of Canada’sCriminal Code
9. Bring back regional coordination committees for women’s safety
10. Join the call for a national inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women
11. Do not let immigration status stand in the way of women’s safety
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