Honourable Dennis King
Premier of Prince Edward Island
PEI Government Administration Shaw Building
95 Rochford St
Charlottetown, PE
C1A 3T5
Via email premier@gov.pe.ca
April 7, 2021
Dear Premier King,
The pandemic has highlighted inequality in our society. As Unifor’s Atlantic Regional Director, I am urging the Atlantic provincial governments to build back better and take steps to address the structural systems that underpin much of this inequality. One of those areas is the gender pay gap.
The PEI Pay Equity Act covers few women in PEI. Women in the private sector and across the public sector deserve proactive legislation that contributes to closing the gender pay gap. Once the federal Pay Equity Act comes into force, likely later this year, a portion of PEI women will have access to a mechanism for achieving pay equity. Their sisters who work in provincially regulated sectors in their communities and their homes will be left behind.
Everyone deserves to be paid fairly for the value of their work, whether their job is done mainly by women, or mainly by men. It is clear that our province will not recover from the economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic until women in PEI recover from the devastating impact that the pandemic has had on their livelihoods. Addressing the gender pay gap is a necessary and important step your government can take to lead our province into a pandemic recovery.
We urge your government to take swift steps to address the gender pay gap that is being worsened by this pandemic. Work done predominantly by women is undervalued. The pandemic has highlighted this. We need quick action to address this inequality. Without women’s work, our economy doesn’t work.
Sincerely,
Linda MacNeil
Unifor Atlantic Regional Director