With the clock literally ticking until she needed to take her seat in the House to vote, Ms. Mourani (Ahuntsic, Que.) said she knew she didn’t have time to make it all the way to the closest women’s bathroom that was actually equipped with a change table—located on the ground floor of Centre Block, near the public visitors’ centre. The nearby small, two-stall women’s washroom off of the House foyer was without one.
As passing noses caught a whiff, MPs’ heads turned, and Ms. Mourani decided she couldn’t wait for her mother.
“So I changed him there,” Ms. Mourani told The Hill Times.
By using one of the antechamber’s benches as a cushy, makeshift change table, Ms. Mourani was able to change her baby’s diaper. But she attracted a good deal of attention in the process.
“I didn’t feel comfortable with that because all the people look at you when they pass, they look at you like, ‘What are you doing?’” said Ms. Mourani, 42, whose son is now four.
Ms. Mourani said her mother moved to Ottawa to support her full-time in caring for her new and prematurely born son. She said she was told she wasn’t allowed to bring her son into the House. So her mom would usually be there to take over Gabriel’s care before votes.
Ms. Mourani’s diaper changing incident happened in 2007, but babies and politics are not a new combination.
Former deputy prime minister Sheila Copps was the first woman to give birth while she was an MP in 1987. In the late 1990s NDP MP Michelle Dockrill and Bloc MP Caroline St. Hilaire both brought their babies into the House.
Ms. Mourani said the problems she’s encountered in balancing her job as an MP and as a mother aren’t a result of negative or “boys’ club” attitudes.
“The problem is not the MPs, the problem is the structure,” she said. “It’s an old institution and it’s a male institution, so maybe they don’t think to do things to help women who are pregnant and have babies.”
MPs don’t enjoy parental leave the way new parents do in the private sector. Though technically possible, Ms. Mourani said it isn’t a feasible choice for an MP.
“It’s not the same when we are an MP, we have to be in our riding, to participate in all activities,” she said. “If you don’t take care of your files, your riding, maybe in the next election you lose your riding. So you have to be very present in the riding and in Ottawa, too.”
Ms. Mourani said she’s talked to a number of young women who say they don’t want to get into politics because of the difficult work-life balance and concerns over being able to have a baby. But having a House of Commons that’s representative of Canadian society includes the presence of women, including women of child-bearing age, said Ms. Mourani. With the House’s shortage of facilities and options, Ms. Mourani said concrete things need to be done.
The presence of Ms. Dockrill and Ms. St. Hilaire’s babies in the House caused some commotion about 20 years ago, said Green Party Leader Elizabeth May (Saanich-Gulf Islands, B.C.) but today, nothing seems to have changed.
On Feb. 7, NDP MP and first-time mother Sana Hassainia (Verchères-Les Patriotes, Que.) brought her son, Skander-Jack, into the House Chamber. She had just finished breastfeeding when an unplanned vote related to Bill C-19, Eliminating the Long Gun Registry Bill, was called. Unable to find her husband—her support system—in time, Ms. Hassainia took her seat in the House, with her baby. Skander-Jack’s presence in the House easily caught the attention of MPs, and soon, Ms. Hassainia said a page told her the baby couldn’t stay in the House.
It was this experience, in part, that propelled Ms. Mourani to her feet in the House of Commons on Feb. 8 to ask for clarification on whether there was a rule or custom against bringing a baby into the House Chamber, and moreover, to ask that a few more change tables and other “tools for us to take care of our small babies” be added.
“It is like a scavenger hunt to find the infamous change tables in the Parliament buildings,” said Ms. Mourani in the House.
At their most recent meeting on March 7, the all-party women’s caucus discussed the unique difficulties faced by members in federal politics in maintaining a work-life balance.
“Right now what we’re talking about is how can we change the structure of the system in order to encourage more women to run, especially young women who have young families or who are going to get pregnant during the course of their lives as an MP, how those things impede them, especially in a federal government,” said caucus member Liberal MP Hedy Fry (Vancouver Centre, B.C.). “[MPs] have to travel across the country. This is the second largest country in the world. This really harms family life and children. Whereas at a local level of government … it is not as much of a hardship, you can still go home and spend time at home.”
The all-party women’s caucus has existed, on and off, since 1989, said Ms. Fry. The purpose of the caucus is to provide a platform in which women can cross partisan lines to discuss specific issues concerning women, determine good ideas and priorities and then work with their respective parties in turn, said Ms. Fry.
So far this Parliament, the caucus has met around four times, said Ms. Fry, and attendance fluctuates depending on respective schedules. At the March 7 meeting last week just under 20 female MPs gathered together. Ms. Mourani is also a member of the caucus; Ms. Hassainia said she has not yet had time to attend as she’s been juggling her son’s care, but said she plans to in the future.
House Speaker Andrew Scheer (Regina-Qu’Appelle, Que.) ruled on Ms. Mourani’s point of order, and explained to the House Chamber that in the past, Speakers have turned a blind eye to babies being in the House, so long as their presence didn’t create a disturbance. Mr. Scheer said in the case of an unexpected vote, provided there is no resulting disruption, “the Speaker’s attention will likely not be drawn to the situation and the work of the House can proceed as usual.”
But Mr. Scheer also made two recommendations: that the Clerk of the House assess whether there were sufficient and appropriately located changes tables in Centre Block and elsewhere, and that, as the Procedure and House Affairs Committee was already reviewing the Standing Orders, it might be time for them to review existing practices around babies in Parliament.
Since Mr. Scheer’s recommendations, changes have been made. On March 7, a pleased Ms. Mourani told The Hill Times she found a newly-installed change table in the women’s washroom in the House foyer.
Ms. Hassainia said the change table was not only good for her, but will be helpful to future mothers who choose to have children while working as an MP. “It’s a good thing for all the women, I don’t think it’s enough, perhaps, but it’s a good beginning,” said Ms. Hassainia.
After the May 2 election last year, nearly 25 per cent of MPs in the House are now women—a Canadian record.
Prior to changes, there were eight washrooms in Centre Block equipped with change tables: three women’s washrooms, three men’s washrooms, one “spouse’s lounge” and one handicap washroom, said Heather Bradley, director of communications for Speaker Scheer, in an email to The Hill Times.
Following the Clerk’s assessment, change tables have been installed in both the men’s and women’s washrooms off of the House foyer, as well as in the women’s washroom located in the Speaker’s corridor. If space permits, a fourth will be installed in a second floor men’s washroom.
Ms. Hassainia said following the media attention, and as a result of NDP Whip Chris Charlton’s (Hamilton Mountain, Ont.) efforts, she has been designated a small area by the House Sergeant-at-Arms so she can breastfeed her baby on the Hill, if, as was the case, she can’t make alternative arrangements.
Liberal House Leader Marc Garneau (Westmount-Ville-Marie, Que.), who sits on the Procedure and House Affairs Committee which is currently studying Standing Orders behind closed doors, said the committee hasn’t discussed changing or reviewing rules around babies in the House.
“It hasn’t been brought up specifically within Standing Orders, it could, because we’re still allowing people to come forward with suggestions, but nobody has,” said Mr. Garneau, who added that it’s usually the committee members who would make such suggestions.
Over the years, some changes have been made to make life easier for female MPs. In 1993, Ms. Fry said the 35-women strong caucus pushed to get the women’s washroom located off of the House foyer added. It was a men’s washroom. A few years later, changes were made to the use of MP return trips, trips designated to all MPs to use, generally speaking, for travel between Ottawa and their constituency. MPs were able to delegate trips to designated travellers, and as of 1995, the definition of “designated traveller” was expanded “so it could be your mother, it could be your sister, a person that is your closest person,” said Ms. Fry.
Nancy Peckford, national director of Equal Voice, a multi-partisan group dedicated to getting more women elected to the House of Commons, said things like having an established family feeding room near the House Chamber or backup caregivers for exceptional circumstances are the sort of “modest” gestures that could go a long way.
“I think that we have to put a structure in place to help support them when they’re in the early stages of parenthood and they have infants that they can’t necessarily leave at home all the time,” said Ms. Peckford. “I think these considerations are very befitting of the 21st century, I really do, I don’t think they’re radical or out of step with where most Canadians are at.”
Though Parliament Hill has had its own daycare centre for the past 30 years, Children on the Hill gives priority to any kids of employees of the House, the Senate, the Parliamentary Press Gallery and the Library of Parliament—and with only 34 spaces, the waiting list is a lengthy one, with parents being advised to sign up as soon as they find out they’re expecting. Ms. Fry said more daycare service on the Hill is a change that could be made.
But in the wake of the attention garnered by baby Skander-Jack’s presence in the House of Commons, Ms. Hassainia has been met with some criticism from the public, with some commenting that it’s a misuse of taxpayer money.
“I received a lot of emails with negative views, some people told me that it wasn’t a daycare and I should stay at home if I want to take care of my baby, and some people told me that women shouldn’t come back to work if they have a little baby and they should stay at home. So it was very weird for me, because we are in Canada and we are in 2012, I thought the mentalities were more advanced than that,” said Ms. Hassainia.
Ms. Hassainia said the idea that she would work and have her baby was never something she questioned, and said it’s the reality of many Canadian women today. Despite any added difficulties, she said her experience in caring for a newborn while an MP hasn’t made her reconsider having more children until she’s off the Hill, in fact, she said she’s already planning for another.
That’s how it should be, Ms. Peckford said. “I think women who are really committed to being part of the political process are going to be there regardless, and they make arrangements and they make it work,” she said.
Original Article
Source: hill times
Author: LAURA RYCKEWAERT
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