Forget MacKay, a woman’s place is on the bench

One of the better rebuttals to MacKay’s arguments on lack of diversity:

Mr. MacKay essentially suggests that female lawyers have no judicial ambition. But where is his proof? The federal government’s Office of Federal Judicial Affairs refuses to publish statistics about the number or breakdown of applicants. It can and it should. Consider Ontario, which does publish such statistics. Between 2006 the year the Harper government came to power and 2012, 299 women applied out of a general pool of 636; in other words, 47 per cent. And Ontario appointed 32 of those women to bench out of a total of 72, or 44 per cent.

Can Mr. MacKay plausibly explain why this pattern would be markedly different at the federal level? We doubt it.

Mr. MacKay’s comments perpetuate tired tropes about women, motherhood and professional ambition. Forget the fact that most women applying for or considering judicial office will be well past the stage where they are balancing a toddler on each hip. Forget that the reference to “riding circuit” dates back to times when judges traveled by horse and buggy some Canadian superior court judges do travel, but none who sit on provincial courts of appeal or the Supreme Court of Canada. Even more troubling is that suggestion that women define themselves by motherhood. Not only is the claim sexist and unsupported by evidence, but it locates the fault for any disparity among women themselves.

Equally disturbing is the government’s apparent lack of interest in other aspects of judicial diversity. Statistics from a 2012 Globe and Mail study combined with Ms. Cairns Way’s recent findings suggest that the appointment rate of aboriginal judges hovers at 1 per cent, while the appointment of members of visible minority communities is an abysmal .5 per cent. Clearly, ensuring that the judiciary reflects the community it serves is not a priority for this government.

Make no mistake – the failure to appoint women to the bench is not “a women’s issue”. It affects us all. It is not the fault of women, either. It is a pattern by a government hostile to the judicial role and apparently indifferent to pervasive patterns of under-representation in our judiciary.

Forget MacKay, a woman’s place is on the bench – The Globe and Mail.