2016 CEDAW Report Card

For the 8th year in a row, West Coast LEAF has issued our CEDAW Report Card which grades BC’s progress in nine key areas in women’s rights, including access to justice, economic security, affordable housing and child care, and women’s health and safety. BC’s actions and inactions are assessed against the obligations set out in the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the international bill of rights for women.

This year’s Report Card is primarily a story of inaction. While BC has made small improvements in some areas this year, progress remains piecemeal and the Province’s overall action to remedy discrimination against women remains inadequate. As in past years, many women do not have adequate access to secure housing, they continue to be more economically insecure than men, they remain unable to enforce their legal rights because of insufficient legal aid, and BC’s child care crisis continues to result in human rights violations. BC’s worst grade this year was related to women and girls in provincial prisons. This year’s Report Card gives BC an F grade for overlooking the human rights of incarcerated women and girls, especially when it comes to the alarming over-representation of Indigenous women and girls in our provincial corrections system.

Read our 2016 CEDAW Report Card.