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The Current Transcript for October 3, 2019

Host: Laura Lynch and Tom Power

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

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3 first-time voters explain why they're excited to cast their ballots

Guests: Zahra Sultani, Ryan Beardy, Breanna Lee

TOM POWER: Hello everyone and welcome to a special edition of The Current and Q from Glenn Gould Studio here in Toronto.

[Cheers and applause]

TP: My name is Tom Power I am the host of Q.

LAURA LYNCH: And I am Laura Lynch host of The Current. We have a great show for you tonight.

TP: Our musical guest this evening is The Weather Station.

LL: We're also going to hear from some young Canadians who are voting for the first time in this election.

LL: [Applause]

TP: Here to talk about what needs to happen to get more people out to vote is legendary Canadian satirist Rick Mercer.

[Applause]

LL: We are going to talk about voter engagement and why it is so important to get involved in this election or in any election.

TP: And we want to hear from you our audience. This is The Current and Q: Two Shows. One Stage. Your Vote.

[Applause]

LL: Let’s get the party started. We are going to start our discussion tonight with three people who might be a little more excited than the rest of us about October the 21st. And that is because they're all voting for the first time in a federal election.

[Applause]

LL: Breannaa Lee is from Mississauga and she's involved with Operation Black Vote Canada. Zahra Sultani divides her time between Toronto and New Market and volunteers with Muslim vote Canada. And Ryan Beardy is Cree/Saulteaux from Lake St. Martin First Nation. And he's a volunteer with Winnipeg Indigenous Rock the Vote. Hi to you all.

[Applause]

LL: You can applause each other. Zahra. I'm going to start with you. What does voting in a federal election for the first time mean to you?

ZAHRA SULTANI: For me it's very different. I'm a new Canadian. I can't see the faces. I was wondering if people are disappointed that we're a bit older.

LL: How do you feel about this? Isn't it just great that they're actually voting?

[Cheers and applause]

ZAHRA SULTANI: Coming from immigration refugee background and adjusting to the culture to Canada, and actually becoming a citizen. Very exciting being able to vote. It's a privilege and it's good to know that you have a part to play in running in the administration of governance of a G7 country. So that's pretty big.

LL: Particularly because of where you came from, born in Iran of Afghan parents where you don't get to vote.

ZAHRA SULTANI: Coming from a background where I had no rights. I was kicked out of school for not being an Iranian citizen and all that, and moving to Canada. Just having that right, having that ability to add my voice to others is pretty powerful.

LL: Yes. I bet. Breanna. How about you? What you're voting for the first time. How are you feeling about it?

BREANNA LEE: I'm definitely really excited to be voting. I at a young age kind of got interested in policy and legislation and how those decisions are made. So for me this is my way of putting out my own opinion and my own voice into the policies that got passed.

LL: And Ryan you haven't voted before now, why not?

RYAN BEARDY: Won't be really honest with you. I didn't think my vote mattered. I was. I spent a large portion of my life with in and out of the criminal justice system and affected by a lot of the policies that govern me in there. I saw a lot of human rights abuses. A lot of these proportions. A lot of things that need to be addressed. So I got my high school diploma in the penitentiary and decided to see if I could do something about it. I ended up in university studying political science at university Winnipeg for last two years.

[Applause]

RYAN BEARDY: And now I understand that my ancestors fought for the right to vote and we were just allowed to vote without disenfranchisement in 1960. So here I am to continue that fight.

LL: And so you've changed your mind. Something has happened the light bulb went on and you know your vote is worth it.

RYAN BEARDY: Absolutely. I know my vote will make a difference and indigenous vote will make a difference as well.

LL: Breanna what issues matter to you?

BREANNA LEE: For me my biggest my biggest like passion is with within this election and all elections really is the youth engagement. I just feel like in general the youth don't engage as much as they should. And a lot of that is due to a lack of information and a lack of them thinking about their vote doesn't actually count, because they don't understand the bureaucracy system. Given that like I'm kind of at that age now where I'm starting to think of you know buying a house stuff like that. That's kind of not in the near future but a bit in the far future. I'm looking at stuff like housing, education, how governments are trying to create jobs and whether or not they're doing policies even though they're trying to create jobs are actually taking away jobs in other areas.

LL: So here's the nosy part. Which way are you leaning at this point at this point?

BREANNA LEE: I am. I'm kind of I'm still on- I'm on the liberal side. However the NDP a few of the things that they've listed in their platform have been piquing my interest a lot. So I'm kind of looking at both at the moment but I'm probably in a bit more towards the liberal side.

LL: Okay. Zahra, what issues are going to help you make your decision?

ZAHRA SULTANI: For me I think the standard of living, costs of living especially for recent graduate, young person who's trying to build a career build their life with you know the student loan and everything else that come see you when you become an adult. It's difficult and that's what I'm dealing with on a daily basis. And like when they say that millennials are the first generation that are worse off than their parents, it is a thing. It's an issue I cannot afford to live a normal life like live independently from my parents and be able to pay my OSAP debt and all that stuff and keep my sanity. You know it's a struggle.

LL: So do you think the parties are speaking to you?

ZAHRA SULTANI: No.

LL: There's nothing they're saying that speaks to your situation?

ZAHRA SULTANI: No.

LL: Well then where does that leave you? You want to vote your but your issues aren't being talked about what are you going to do?

ZAHRA SULTANI: So as you mentioned I'm working with this organization called the Canadian Muslim vote. I am a right leaning person and I have been active in conservative campaigns. And I am hoping that through my participation, through my involvement, through having conversation with like minded people that we are able to push the society, the politicians, the campaigns to talk about things that actually affect our lives. To talk about things in a smart way. When policies come from a good place when some announcements come from a good place that doesn't necessarily mean you're smart. It doesn't necessarily mean that they're going to produce those results. For instance, the ban on guns that was announced by the Liberal campaign. If it's going to make us safer make our communities safer. I'm all for it. And you know I'm not a gun owner. I have no interest in that whatsoever. If that policy is actually going to produce those results then that's a good thing. But if you're going to just throw an announcement to get you know to get visibility, to to use people's emotions in a way that's going to that's going to win you votes, I don't think that's the kind of campaigning we should have in such a country that we live in.

LL: I'm going to put you on the spot, which way are you leaning?

ZAHRA SULTANI: I mean the closest to me would be the Conservative Party of Canada. But it's not going to be easy to win me. I want small conversations. I hope everyone's listening. It's not going to be easy just because I'm a centre right person doesn't mean that I'm going to just give it to them. But.

LL: They have to earn your vote.

ZAHRA SULTANI: Yes.

LL: Ryan let's turn to you what issues are motivated you to get out and vote?

RYAN BEARDY: Obviously justice issues. I think that's often overlooked. I think we need justice reform. We need a lot being done. Like I said I was incarcerated and I'll tell you all the truth. It was mostly brown in there and it was the disproportionality that exists in this country. And I saw that for four years and I saw that the ratio skew and I saw that with my own eyes when I got out I looked at the statistics that it's true. And these statistics have been studied but what's being done about it. Acknowledgement is great but we need to dress as well as I believe in our environment. I believe in any digitally epistemology. We believe that we were put here as stewards of the land to protect it. And we see we're undergoing a climate crisis right now and that's very important to me.

[Applause]

LL: Given all of that, who are you looking to vote for in this election?

RYAN BEARDY: I'm leaning left. I really liked the NDP platform right now in terms of you know they speak to the retailing of Bill C-262. Understandably there was some controversy behind the consent. But I think if we get beyond that. We can move forward and have a great country for all of us.

LL: All right seems we have a leaning liberal, a leaning conservative and a leaning NDP I don't think we cooked that up. What's your message to people who might be feeling disillusioned with the process? Ryan let's start with you.

RYAN BEARDY: I would say get out and vote. I would say use your voice. Like I said I never thought anybody would be listening to me. I sat in a cell you know in a gown with nothing. And here I am. Now you listen to me. I think anybody can do this. Anybody can vote. Anybody can use their voice. Anybody can be heard.

LL: Breanna.

BREANNA LEE: I think people everyone needs to get out there and do your research on all the platforms and look at what they're actually representing. And it might be the party that you've never even given a thought that is the party that is representing what you need in that election. So I think everyone needs to get out there. Put your vote out there because it does count. If you don't vote then there's no way for us to know if you didn't vote because there was nobody that matched your needs or if you just didn't vote because you didn't care. So you have to get out there and to put something out.

LL: Zahra last word to you. What do you say to those people who might not feel that passionate about getting out and voting?

ZAHRA SULTANI: God. It's so hard to say anything to them because I think I'm kind of one of them or was one of them. Get out and vote. Get involved. Get involved with an issue that you care about whether it's mental health or violence or justice. Any of those issues. Hold these people to account. This is your money. This is the money that taken out of your pocket. Put in the government and they spend it. And think about it that way. Get out and get involved with anything that you're passionate about. And even if you don't end up actually voting for one of those candidates go to the debates. Go see them face to face. Ask them questions face to face. Make them work for it.

LL: All right. The voting gauntlet has been laid down our first time voter panel. Ladies and gentlemen. Breannaa Lee from Mississauga. Zahra Sultani from Newmarket. Ryan Beardy from Winnipeg. Thank you so much for being here.

[Applause]

LL: We have a great crowd here tonight and I want to know- by your applause - who here is planning to vote in the election?

[Applause]

LL: All right. So who wants to weigh in on why you're voting. Show of hands. Passionate audience someone wants to tell us why we're voting. Okay. This gentleman over here.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hi. So I am planning to vote because it seems to me that this is a moment of crisis of different types of crises economic, political, environmental. And it seems to me that it's important to have someone in power who can balance the long term and a short term view, in terms of our general well-being. I also think that this is a moment of a crisis of crisis of agency. And I think it's very easy to think that we don't have agency, to think that the dice have been cast. But I think it is equally important to try and stand up and do something.

CATHY: Hello my name is Cathy and I like to think that our family will be able to make a difference because in our nuclear family - my husband and I and our children - we have five voters. So you know in a small poll that might make a difference. My big concern in this election is that I feel as Canadians that we're giving up our freedoms inch by inch. I feel like there is an erosion of rights happening in our great country. And it concerns me. An example of this is my MP, knocking door to door, when I spoke to him this week said that if he votes against the party line - the Liberals - in a in a bill or on the floor he will get kicked out of caucus. He was concerned about this and I'm very concerned about this. Another example is that I have friends who are doctors and with Bill C-14 - the medical assistance in dying bill - they they are telling me they have senior citizens coming into their practices who are scared to go to hospitals because they'll they think they'll be euthanized. And they cannot set up institutions because of this bill that senior citizens could go to where they know that this will never happen because of the way that the law is. We're a democratic country. How can this be happening and why aren't we talking about it.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hi my name is Bangor and I'm a first time voter as well and I recently became a Canadian citizen. So I'll be voting this election and I'm very excited about it. So the issues that are of concern to me of course bread and butter issues, housing affordability. I'm being a millennial, like it so hard so difficult. So I'm still when the platforms to see what they have to offer. You know the same time obviously the big elephant in the room is climate change issues. But I feel that issues that affect my pocket and my bottom line and things I want to focus. So I'll be weighing the platforms and seeing what they have to offer so I can make an informed decision.

LL: You sound undecided.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Very undecided.

LL: Oh boy and you gave out your name they'll be after you now. All right. Many thanks to all of you. I am Laura Lynch and this is a special edition of The Current and Q: Two Shows. One Stage. Your Vote.

TOM POWER: Ladies and gentlemen please welcome a Canadian icon: Rick Mercer.

[Applause]

LL: What do you think it is that keeps young people from voting?

RICK MERCER: I believe the voting age to be 16.

TOM POWER: Let's talk more about that. Tell me how you are you arrived there at the voting age.

RICK MERCER: Well you can join the Canadian military and go overseas. You probably won't get sent overseas but you can certainly join the army at 16. You can drive firm equipment. We expect you to follow the laws of the land and to understand them. You know 16 year olds have responsibility and I also think that it would be very exciting. Imagine if everyone in Grade 12 voted.

TOM POWER: How do you think that would change how the politicians talk to young people? Or even the issues that they present.

RICK MERCER: I would suggests that they might actually talk to young people. When was the last time you saw... [Applause] Yes.

TOM POWER: I usually see them on commercials.

RICK MERCER: You go to Newfoundland and Seamus would be in the high school.

TOM POWER: What would that change if we get to the voting age guy?

RICK MERCER: Well I think that 16 year olds I think they would leap at the chance to vote, I believe. And like I say it's habit forming. And if they vote then they'll vote four years later. And then you have them. I don't know anyone who-- I thought the panel on first time voters was very interesting and when I heard there was a panel of First Time Voters I was hoping it wouldn't be all 18-19 year old right. I was really glad to hear that there was you know a gentleman who was 32 because I think they're very few and far between. I think if you haven't voted and you're 30 you're probably never going to vote. So we got to get them young.

[Applause]

LL: And we're going to pick up on part of what Rick said, he was talking about lowering the voting age for teenagers. We want to talk to some teens now about voting.

AMAN: I'm Aman grade eleven.

LL: And how old are you?

AMAN: I'm 16.

LL: Okay. Do you think teens younger than 18 should be allowed to vote?

AMAN: I do. Teens in my generation have different perspectives than other people who are voting. We face different challenges such as climate change which has been raised other challenges such as post-secondary education for example, affordability in the future that other people such as those in their 60s and 70s won't be facing. Because we are shut out from voting. It's almost like our perspectives aren't as valuable as others perspectives when that's not necessarily the case.

MUSHABA: Hi my name's Mashaba I'm 16 years old and I'm here on behalf of Helping Hands and I'm against 16 year olds voting.

LL: Okay. Why?

MUSHABA: I've made a lot of mistakes in my life and that.

LL: You're only 16.

MUSHABA: But that comes with people in my age group because we don't have that life experience which I believe is necessary for being able to vote. We are 16 year olds we live in pretty sheltered environments from- we have the support of our parents. Until we actually get out in the real world, we won't actually be able to comment on that as thoroughly as we should be. Most of us when we're 18 we start becoming independent. We start losing that sheltered view from our parents. So we start having our own views. So that's why I believe it should be restricted to 18.

LL: Okay. All right. And we have?

EERA: Hi my name is Eera.

LL: Okay. How old are you?

EERA: I'm 16.

LL: Okay. What's your point of view? Vote or no vote at 16?

EERA: You think that 16 year olds should be able to vote simply because 16 year olds care. Youth care. I do think that it's unfair that 16 year olds are expected to abide by largely ineffective government policies but aren't able to cast our votes on new and better ones. Don't come for the youth who are raising our voices and striking when we're not able to express ourselves and bring about any change in any other way to fight for our own futures.

LL: All right. Thank you. And we have one more. Hi what's your name?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hello good evening everyone. My name is [unintelligible].

LL: How old are you?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: And I am 16 years old.

LL: And vote or no vote for 16 year olds?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: The fact that I am here alone is enough for me to say that this is a reason why I should vote. Why? Because I am dedicated enough to be here. I'm knowledgeable enough to be here and I am more politically inclined than a lot of adults out there.

[Applause]

AUDIENCE MEMBER: In addition to all of these things, I'm 16 years old and I'm actually going to be a registration officer for one of the election campaigns for the federal election. I should be allowed to vote because I know what's going on and I'm dedicated enough to come out here to express my opinions and to be a good Canadian citizen. Thank you.

LL: Well I think whatever side you come down on I'm just plain impressed by the fact that you all have been so thoughtful about this and expressed your views so well. So thank you for sharing them with us. I am Laura Lynch and this is a special edition of The Current and Q: Two Shows. One stage. Your Vote.

[Cheers and applause]

[Music]

LL: We've been listening to highlights at this week's town hall at Glenn Gould Studio a co-production of The Current and Q. To hear all of Tom Powers interview with Rick Mercer tune into Q today at 10:00 a.m. We will continue with more after the CBC News.

SOUNDCLIP

The fact that someone could win a majority even though most people didn't want them and then you put on top of that the fact that employees don't even have a role anymore. The House of Commons is just a kindergarten place of of adults yelling at each other. All power has been centralized in the hands of the PMO. So the whole thing's really become a farce. So I say hats off to you, to the people who are considering not voting.

LL: Is the system broken? Author and activist Dave Meslin thinks so. More from our town hall. Two Shows. One Stage. Your Vote in six minutes. I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

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Town Hall, Election Satire

Guests: Dave Meslin, Phylicia Davis

LL: Hello I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current. Coming up our friends from This is That have another special election report. Today a candidate who's campaigning hard but for his opponents. That's in half an hour. But first back to Glenn Gould Studio for our town hall. Two shows. One Stage. Your Vote. Is the system broken? If it is, how do we fix it? And how to Canadians get out to vote?

[Applause]

LL: We want to get your ideas about how to get people more involved and to people who are working on that very thing are with us. Dave Meslin is an activist, artist, community organizer and author of Tear Down: Rebuilding Democracy from the Ground Up. And Phylicia Davis is a project coordinator with the democratic engagement exchange at Ryerson University. Let's give them a warm welcome.

[Applause]

LL: Welcome welcome welcome. Thanks for joining our party tonight. Dave let's start with you. We heard earlier from those passionate first time voters, the not yet voters. But it's not always so easy to get people excited about voting. Why is that do you think?

DAVE MESLIN: Because the system sucks?

LL: [Laughs] Ok.

DAVE MESLIN: I mean we could we could point our fingers at those who don't vote and say they're apathetic, they should really get off their ass and pay more attention. Or we could point our finger at the system which hasn't been upgraded in 150 years. Have any of you upgraded your your cell phone operating system in the past year? Hands up. That's right. And we've never done it once here in Canada. So we have a political system that is maintained by a cartel of dinosaur parties and they like it that way. And we all know that in October either blue is going to win or red is going to win and it's the same two parties who've been trading power back and forth for one and a half century. That's really boring and then you put strategic voting on top of that. And then you put on top of that the fact that someone could win a majority even though most people didn't want them. And then you put on top of that the fact that employees don't even have a role anymore. The House of Commons is just a kindergarten place of adults yelling at each other. All power has been centralized in the hands of the PMO. So the whole thing's really become a farce. So I say hats off to you to, the people who are considering not voting .

LL: [Laughs] That's not the message tonight.

DAVE MESLIN: At some point you need to stand-- No the message, I think voting is the most sacred thing you could ever do. But to legitimise a system which is screwing us over every election. That's what I did in Ontario for the provincial election last year. I went to the voting booth, waited in line, got to the front showed my I.D. and I declined my ballot. And we should have an option like that on federal elections to say: I care about my country. I care about elections. But first pass the post sucks, the way the House of Commons runs soft and our election sucks, because they do.

LL: Isn't the answer to that, to your dissatisfaction with the system, the way it is, is to get involved maybe more involved than voting. Maybe you need to be a politician.

DAVE MESLIN: No. You don't. So there are so many ways to change democracy and the history of democracy from the Magna Carta, to the American Revolution, to a thousand points in between is people not just saying, oh, who should I vote for. It's people rising up against the centralization of power, against polarized infighting and saying, we want to have meaningful participatory dialogue. And if the system today is in delivering it, we're going to rise up and fight for change. So the book that I've just written is about two things. Number one: the system is completely broken. Stage four cancer. Number two: we can fix this. There are so many remedies that we could start experimenting with and implementing to actually make democracy meaningful in Canada, which is something I've never seen in my lifetime.

[Applause]

LL: Phylicia Davis, what do you hear so Lisa what do you hear from people you work with about well why they're disconnected from the voting process?

PHYLICIA DAVIS: From what I hear is that people don't feel connected to the issues. People are not being asked like what issues matter to them in an intentional and authentic way. You have politicians that will Johnny go to their base and just strictly stays with that base, but don't engage other people that could learn about those issues, get the information that they need in order to therefore cast their ballots with confidence. And so with the communities that I work with this is some of the things that I'm hearing. So that people need to feel connected to the issues.

LL: So we said you're working with the democratic engagement exchange. So what kinds of things are you doing to get people more involved?

PHYLICIA DAVIS: So there are two things that we're actually doing. One is the Canadian vote Coalition, which is a national nonpartisan voting engagement campaign where we engage our organizations across the country to get people to go out to vote. The second piece is democracy talks which is actually asking people what actually matters to you. Those are a series of activities that gets people to have nonpartisan conversations.

LL: But that's not just at election time. That's all the time.

PHYLICIA DAVIS: This is all the time. So this is a constant dialogue. So even though the election is coming up on October 21st, the big question is what happens after that. It's to keep that momentum going.

LL: And are you finding you're able to do that?

PHYLICIA DAVIS: Yes we are.

LL: Okay. So in that case then I'm wondering do you worry about the health of democracy?

PHYLICIA DAVIS: In some cases I do but I'm a hopeful person so I'm quite optimistic.

LL: Good thing you're here with him.

[Laughter]

DAVE MESLIN: I'm very optimistic but you can't fix something without having a an honest diagnosis.

LL: Well look what I want to do now is turn to the audience. If we can get the house lights up.

MADIGAN ROCK: Hi my name is Madigan Rook. I'm 17 and I think that our democratic system has a lot of really good things. But there are also some things that are not so good. And one of the biggest problems is that political parties, as well as voters, have become increasingly partisan. We're focussing a disproportionate amount of our attention on who the leaders of these political parties are, what are their actions and how we perceive them. And we need to focus more on policy and less on personality.

LL: Dave, what do you think of that suggestion?

DAVE MESLIN: That was a very eloquent monologue from a Canadian who's not allowed to vote. If you've ever needed living proof that we should lower the voting age which I know came up earlier. So first of all you should absolutely be allowed to vote. And it is such a crime in Canada that 16 year olds are allowed to drive, carry a gun in the reserves, marry someone, offer sexual consent, make medical decisions about your body. So you can sleep with your MP, marry your MP, but not vote for your MP. What are we doing?

[Laughter and applause]

DAVE MESLIN: Again, that's what happens when you don't upgrade a system and you just do it based on tradition.

LL: But also how do you refocus from the personalities that are involved in politics to the policies themselves? I think that's what she's looking for.

DAVE MESLIN: Looking I think the elections are just a reflection of how the House of Commons operates. So everything you were referring to isn't just a problem during election period. It's a problem in the House of Commons when power becomes so centralised in the office of the leaders and MPs literally have no role in the legislature. We don't have a legislature in Canada. It doesn't serve any political function. It's theatre. So if the House of Commons isn't operating in a way that puts policy before personality, how could elections. So I think what you're focussing on is a symptom of a much bigger problem. We need to fix parliament.

LL: Julie let's go over to you next, you're with someone there.

PHIL: Hi my name is Phil.

LL: What do you wish were different in the electoral democratic process?

PHIL: Well I think Dave Meslin hit it on the nose in terms of a lot of the problems. Really what we see is much more cooperation and want to see much more independence of the MPs because those are the people that we were actually electing into office unless we happen to be in the prime minister, or whoever becomes the prime minister's writing. We're voting for somebody to represent us in our local writing. And we're not really getting good representation. And we're not really not getting the real issues talked about. I think the things that are really important to us are ignored. I mean I was involved for a while when I lived in Scarborough with a local riding association. We were involved in between election cycles that some things we kind of just tune out often between election cycles. And it's only in during election that we actually you know say something.

LL: Okay thank you. And we're going to go over to Joan right now who has someone else with her. Hello.

JOAN: Good evening my name is Joan. I'm here with Joan.

LL: Makes it easy. So what are you looking for when it comes to the electoral democratic process?

JOAN: Well my context is I have a 14 year old son. And regardless of whether we lower the voting age or not he's going to vote in the next election. So one of the challenges that we face is, as his parents, we talked to him about this process but I don't want him just thinking, Oh well, Mom votes this way, Dad votes that way, Grandma votes that way off we go. I want him to actually take a more non-partisan stance and look at the policies, look at the process as they've talked about you know being the disruptor and blowing that up. What's the possibility there. And look at what the policies and platforms are so that he's not simply by route following as you point out a system that's been around forever. So as parents how do we , A, talk to him about that but then, B, what do we do to spark him to be more engaged like some of the young people that are here tonight?

LL: Okay Phylicia let's throw that one to you.

PHYLICIA DAVIS: Sure. I think like with your question there I think what's important is, for me, is to ask what does what do we want a country to look like in the next 20-30 years. In Canada, we consider ourselves to be very progressive. But then what that means is looking at all the party platforms, what are some of the policies that they are proposing that will reflect the changing demographics of this country. And so as a young person that's the key, is to go out and seek that information, to be involved whether that be volunteering on a campaign, to sort of learning what the issues are and seeing what issues are they are connected with. So that's what I would suggest especially he is a young person.

LL: What's your name?

DWAYNE: Dwayne.

LL: Dwayne.

DWAYNE: Gentleman, sir. You know I think this whole conversation, I have not been more engaged until you started speaking. When you when you spoke it sounded to me like you were a revolutionary. But you know when we talk about revolution people are afraid. Because what will it take. And.

LL: Are you worried about violence?

DWAYNE: No I don't know if we know what revolution means and what it means to change a system. It's not an easy thing right. We would like to put the onus on the people. But the system is something that is not willing to change.

LL: Dave I want to turn that over to you. Is there a fear that this could just go too far that holds people back?

DAVE MESLIN: No. I mean the revolution doesn't have to be militaristic In fact I'm rebelling against a militaristic aesthetic of politics. If you look at the way MPs talked to each other in the House of Commons, that's militaristic. I'm calling for a revolution against our own cynicism, against the false assumption that change isn't possible through the democratic system, that we need to cling to traditions just because our grandfathers use the same system. So it's absolutely a revolution but it's the same revolution that brought us so many other rights and movements over the last few decades. It does involve being in the streets sometimes but it doesn't involve guns or shooting people or changing the premise that we want to live in; a democratic society. And there's been MPs on the inside pushing for real change. Michael Chong is a great hero of mine. The Conservative MP who put forward a bill called the Reform Act three years ago and the goal of that was to completely decentralize power within Parliament to give more power and voice to our MPs. Because as a few of you have mentioned, we don't elect the Prime Minister, we elect our employees. If they don't have a voice, we don't have a voice.

PHYLICIA DAVIS: So just to add to Dave's point, because the word he uses power and I think that is pretty key because when people do believe they have power they can actually believe they can make a change and can change the system. But I think we don't realize the power that we have when we do go out and cast our vote and the power that we have after that vote is casted. So it's a constant, as I mentioned, a constant conversation, a constant dialogue between whether that be amongst ourselves, between our local politicians in order to ensure that when we do go out and engage in different ways that they actually are listening.

LL: Okay I'm going to go back out to our audience to Julie, she's got someone there. Hi. What's your name?

JESSICA: Hi my name is Jessica Dekita. I would just like to say that I have strategically voted in the past four elections. This next election will be the fifth election that I've strategically voting in. I have become completely disillusioned by our electoral system, by the promises made by the Liberal Party to do electoral reform which never came through. And I'm pretty much fed up with having to go to lead now to see who I should vote for, instead of voting for the party they believe in. And I realize that we all have a lot of responsibility beyond just voting in terms of doing our full civic responsibility.

LL: So are you going to vote this time?

JESSICA: I am going to vote. And I have actually gotten involved with the NDP to do canvassing with them and with lead now to do volunteering with them, because I feel like those are the best avenues to take action at this point.

[Applause]

LL: Thank you. Now I'm going to turn the spotlight on us, the media, and ask you about what role the media plays in all of this in voter engagement or voter disengagement. Phylicia, let's start with you.

PHYLICIA DAVIS: In terms of voter engagement disengagement I think it's actually going out into community, going out and finding out looking at statistically which are the communities that tend to not go out and vote.

LL: You mean the media should be doing that?

PHYLICIA DAVIS: I think playing an active role in that and in terms of going out to see what is happening in those communities or even in terms of the lack of disengaging. But also there are many people that are involved in civic engagement activities and highlighting those because those are actually quite important. So I think the media does play a role in that peace.

LL: Dave.

DAVE MESLIN: I would love to see on election night just a little more emphasis on the distinction between the popular vote and the seat count and obviously you have to report on the seat count. That's what makes up the House of Commons. But the other number is just as important and highlighting the discrepancy between the two would be really informative. I did a little one on one with Ian had a man sing on election night in 2015 at his Lego bar graphs and it was at the end of the broadcast. Peter Mansbridge's gone home. Andrew Coyne gone home and we just played with these Lego things and was like look this outcome is a total scam. That video clip was the most watched video clip on CBC Facebook page in the entire year. People are so hungry to learn about why the system is failing them, how it's failing them and how we can fix it.

LL: All right. We have one more guest from the audience.

CHERYL HINES: Hi my name is Cheryl Hines and I'm the founder of Helping Hands, a youth civic engagement organization and I actually brought some of the amazing youth here today. And I've come pretty disillusioned because the most popular thing I hear when I go out to try to engage young voters is: my vote doesn't count. And they're actually looking at a lot of universities don't even use First Past The Post to elect student unions. And if student unions have figured out a better way, it's kind of be why hasn't the Canadian government figured it out.

LL: What's your answer to your own question?

CHERYL HINES: Is that mixed member partial voting. I think is kind of the way I would like to see it go. And also making sure that when the candidates are going up to vote to campaign it's who are they just choosing. The most popular thing I hear, especially with lower income voters, is oh I live in an apartment and no one has ever come inside, or I live in a townhouse complex and no one has ever come to actually campaign to us. And I've actually done research before that even showed that young people are called less by their candidates. They are just not engaged. And if they were engaged they say they would vote for those candidate. So those are kind of some the changes I would love to see in our electoral system.

LL: Phylicia why don't I get you to respond to what Cheryl had said.

PHYLICIA DAVIS: So I agree with what you're saying a hundred percent. I think the the challenge right now is the barriers that are put in place in terms of youth and more low come individuals to go out and vote. Because, as mentioned earlier, usually politicians just cater to the people that systematicly always vote for them. So generally when they see that they don't actually take that extra step to go out into those towers, to those apartment buildings to actually engage a lot of the marginalized and mostly racialized individuals that will have an impact in the election.

LL: All right. We have one last person from the audience with Julie.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: My name is [unintelligible]. And thank you for starting this conversation. It's very important because why are we left with the choice of choosing the best of the worst. Why are we like broad don't about right. My vote matters more than that. [Applause] So a lot of people probably in Canada don't even know that a party won such a big majority based on having electoral reform as part of their platform. And that got taken away from us without any reason. The conversation happened in the media for like maybe a week or two and that was it. Canadians don't even know about this daylight robbery that just happened with us. And frankly speaking who do we choose now, where do we go from this, how do we get that reform.

LL: Okay Dave I'm going to give you the last word on this.

DAVE MESLIN: Sure. So the previous speaker pointed out that you know even a lot of campuses don't use first past the post. Why haven't governments figured out. They have. No political parties in Canada use First Past The Post for their own nomination meetings or to choose their own leaders or to choose the speaker of the house. First past the post is an obscure fringe loser voting system hardly used anywhere in the world. It's an embarrassment to our country. So over the next few weeks please go out, learn about the candidates learn about the parties, volunteer, put up signs, donate money and absolutely vote. But the day after the election let's start working on the bigger question which isn't who is in power, but how do we decide who's in power. How do we share power. And how do those in power speak with each other and how do we replace conflict and divisiveness and polarization with meaningful thoughtful dialogue. We can reclaim our political ecosystem and that starts the day after the election.

[Applause]

LL: Dave Meslin, activist, artist, community organizer and author whose book is called Tear Down: Rebuilding Democracy from the Ground Up. There it is. Phylicia Davis is project coordinator with the democratic engagement exchange at Ryerson University. Thank you both for being here. Let's give him a round of applause.

[Applause]

LL: And that was part of The Current and Q's town hall; Two Shows. One Stage. Your Vote recorded this week at Glenn Gould Studio in Toronto. Tune in to Q today to hear Tom Power's full interview with Rick Mercer. And on Friday you can hear musical guest The Weather Station. Now we have another town hall to tell you about. On Wednesday October the 9th The Current will be exploring issues of affordability in one of Canada's fastest growing and most diverse communities, Surrey, British Columbia where they're struggling to pay rent keep the kids fed or put enough away to retire. Many Canadians are thinking about which party has the best plan to keep them afloat. I'll be hosting it next Wednesday night from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Westminster's savings theatre at Simon Fraser University's Surrey campus. We'll hear from residents, business leaders and community organizers and we want to hear from you. Visit cbc.ca/thecurrent for information on how to get your free tickets to this event. Well elections are about all kinds of choices. The first one being whether to vote at all and that is something George Elliott Clarke has been thinking and writing about. He's a poet, a playwright and a literary critic. Here he is with his poem To Vote or to Veto, an Elector's Vice Versa.

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Citizen I agree. Voting is pointless. Isn't every political shameless empty seat. As shortly there love's never uneducated, never clean of unscrupulous motives. Note they're insidious subtraction of once eager promises. The whole shebang be as cynical as champagne. All that blather and fizz and froth signifying zero. Citizen, I too dislike the schmucks the shills who gums, flapping, flim flam, pontificate on hot air, while they raunchy debauched the Treasury. And okay gerrymandering, money laundering and or whitewash crooks and blacklist do gooders. A cult of misers and prudes, killjoys and grifters they wreak havoc on lower echelon income brackets. Citizen, yes many governors are cash flush but piss poor in ideas or their sell sell-outs, pinstripes for sale so impeccably despicable. These vamps and vampires feeding on poor [unintelligible] blood. These snooty prevarications be labour overly elaborate, hoity toity vocabulary so they can scam the damned and the god damned. Citizen, sometimes I feel downright ashamed a pencil an X inside the ballot circle. For one thing it mirrors a gun scopes cross here, as if I'm assassinating the candidate via soft lead. But I always suspect that no matter who I choose I've screwed up and may be sending a screwball or a loose screw or some kind of Antichrist to a junkyard or graveyard Parliament. Citizen, I'm sick of choosing between sleaze bags and Scarlet wigs, rascals and scoundrels. Jeez, must my vote be so meaningful. I mean a waste. Too many lawyers as subtle as vermin want to be my voice. Yuck. Why must folks who get paid to talk end up doing all the talking and squawking. They blah blah blah so much my voice is silenced. Citizen, I too distrust all the campaigns shouting and propaganda and pure BS and also fake news BS, but I also despise one tawdry singular certainty; the same old mouths spewing the same old bilge. I prefer the wild pickings and election tosses up the new faces and fresh blood, vigorous enough to frenzy atoms and shake up nervous systems. Citizen, yes any election changes nothing. That's true but the change in government changes everything. In that case the elections and ennobling electrocution, the shocking upset recharges and rejects and revives and lightning scraps and in rapture is all stifling gloom. Always should the rabble be troublesome. And so never should we veto our vote but use always our vote as veto.

LL: Phew. George Elliott Clarke with To Vote or to Veto, an Electors Vice Versa. Coming up in our next half hour a candidate with cold feet. Another special election report, This is That, Decision 2019 in a couple of minutes. I'm Laura Lynch. This is The Current.

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Don’t vote for me, Gendered pay disparity in the operating room

Guests: Fahima Dossa, Darby Little

LL: I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current. This week the People's Party of Canada lost one of its Nova Scotia candidates over a disagreement with the party's values. Chad Hudson, the PPC candidate in West Nova, said he was troubled by a quote "steady drip" quote of stories about the party and its leader Maxime Bernier. It turns out he's not the only one having second thoughts in this campaign.

SOUNDCLIP

[Music]

PAT KELLY: I'm Pat Kelly.

PETER OLDRING: And I'm Peter Oldring with a special report for The Current: This is That Decision 2019.

[Music]

PAT KELLY: Politics is a cynical business and when the news is full of tales of scandal and corruption it's easy to understand why some Canadian voters have become disillusioned with the political process. But what happens when a candidate loses faith in himself during a federal election campaign? After a recent debate in his riding of Winnipeg East independent candidate Roy Carrpanco was so impressed by his opponent's arguments that he completely disavowed his platform and experienced a period of personal crisis. Now he's actively campaigning to get people in his writing not to vote for him. Joining us on the line to tell us more about his political 180 is Winnipeg East federal candidate Roy Carrpanco.

PETER OLDRING: Welcome to the program Mr. Carrpanco.

ROY CARRPANCO: [Laughing] Hi. How are you doing Peter? It's- what a thrill. How are you?

PETER OLDRING: Well I'm doing very well sir and it's a pleasure to have you on the program as well. So tell us a little bit about why you're asking people not to vote for you?

ROY CARRPANCO: Well certainly you know the answer to that question is quite simple to be honest with you. You know after having a serious think on my platform, and obviously talking it over with my family and my wife, I realized that my platform was absolute junk. Totally worthless use of thinking. And anyone who is thinking about voting for me I'll tell you they need to get their head examined, because I'm certainly not the guy. And I'm encouraging people in my ridings to know that. And please I beg of you, don't vote for me.

PETER OLDRING: Well you're certainly making a compelling argument why not to vote for you. But I wonder what made you abandon your campaign platform.

ROY CARRPANCO: You know I can answer that with one simple word. The debates. And I guess that was sad. Technically that's [unintelligible]. Listen to me. That was two words. It was the debates. At my first debate this September I was getting up on the stage there and I was feeling confident about my platform and my arguments and my sound of my own voice. But I got up there and something happened to me, Peter. I was listening for the first time to the other candidates arguments and as I did, as I focussed on what they were saying, I said to myself 'Oh holy crap'. I'm sorry if I--

PETER OLDRING: I know that's fine. That's nice.

ROY CARRPANCO: I am sorry. I didn't mean to swear.

PETER OLDRING: No that's fine. It's not really even a swear.

ROY CARRPANCO: The point is I was up there and I know I came to this realization that I don't know what I'm talking about. I have no idea what I'm talking about. What I have been spewing to the people of my writing for the last few weeks has been absolute nonsense. I'm a fraud. To be honest with you, I'm too dumb to be a politician and I'm doing a disservice to the people of my riding. So I woke up the next morning and I said you know what? Throw your vote the other way because right look at me. You've got the wrong guy.

PETER OLDRING: Goodness. I mean that really is is a 180. Specifically what was it that made you doubt your beliefs?

ROY CARRPANCO: Well I mean there wasn't one thing. Obviously it was all the other politicians up there on that stage who were so confident and so knowledgeable and I thought, Man, these people are people that care. They obviously knew so much about taxes and climate change and housing and you know a lot of it was just simply going over my head and for the first time I admitted that to myself. And then I stared right in the mirror and I said you know what. I shouldn't be in politics. I'm not supposed to be here. Those guys are. That lady is. Not me.

PETER OLDRING: Well you know I think one of the things that I find the most surprising is you've had this realization and to me I would imagine that's the end of your campaign. But as I understand it you are still actively campaigning.

ROY CARRPANCO: Oh no. Yes. I've been out there knocking on doors making appearances as usual but my message is now: Don't support me. For the for the love of God, please do not vote for me.

PETER OLDRING: Well I would say that you do have your work cut out for you and just a quick glance at the polls in your riding it still seems to suggest that you are actually still in the lead as we speak.

ROY CARRPANCO: Yes yes yes. I know. I know that. I can't say that I'm happy about that. I love my constituents and I love the people of Winnipeg East. But I'm on here today obviously to help get the message out: Stop being so stupid. Do not vote for me. You know if I wake up on October 22nd and I'm an MP headed to Ottawa, then I have failed you. You have failed me. So I can't emphasize this enough. Do not vote for Roy Carrpanco. I'm not your guy.

PETER OLDRING: Thank you Mr. Carrpanco.

ROY CARRPANCO: Bye now.

LL: And thanks to our friends at Kelly and Kelly for that special report.

[Music]

LL: I'm Laura Lynch and this is The Current on CBC Radio One's Sirius XM an on the CBC listen app. Well it's a pretty significant pay gap. New research shows that female surgeons in Ontario make about 24 percent less per hour than their male counterparts. The study was published in The Journal of the American Medical Association surgery. Dr.Fahima Dossa, a surgical resident at St. Michael's Hospital and the University of Toronto, is one of the authors. She's with me here in our Toronto studio. Hello.

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: Good morning.

LL: Can you explain more about that 24 percent disparity? What exactly did you find?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: Sure. So this study looked at three years of data from Ontario what we were interested in looking at was how much surgeons were being paid for each hour they spent in the operating room, and comparing male and female surgeons. We knew that men had probably been practicing for longer, may have been more experienced, may have been seeing certain types of patients. So there were differences that we were expecting and we accounted for all those differences. And what we've shown this study which looks at one and a half million operations that were done in the province is even when you take out all of those effects - of the effects of male surgeons being in practice longer and seeing different types of patients - you still see this pay gap that exists between men and women. And I think that's particularly important in our system because the fee for service system that we use in Ontario has often been looked at as a solution to the pay gap that's seen in salary based system. Right.

LL: You think it's gender neutral.

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: Exactly. The thought is you should be being paid based on how hard you work. Unfortunately the system as we see in our study is still open to bias that negatively affects the careers of women in surgery.

LL: So is that what surprised you the most, that after you accounted for all of that you still found that large a difference?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: Yeah. To be honest I don't think we were surprised by the findings. Part of the study was motivated by our lived experiences and those of our colleagues. So I don't think that any of this came as a surprise. The magnitude of the difference that we saw in this study was actually quite similar to what's been seen in the U.S. It's been seen in salary based systems. What we wanted to get out in the study is deconstruct some of the explanations that have been provided. So previous studies have really placed the blame on women. And have said women make less because of their choices because they work less and they don't negotiate for their salaries as hard as men do. And if only we fixed women it fix this pay gap. Well we wanted to explore was if that was true and unfortunately it's not. It's not women who need fixing. It's unfortunately the system.

LL: Okay so let's talk about that some more. How do you account for the lower pay for women surgeons in the system here?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: So we think it's a combination of things as it always is. One of the findings from our study is that women seem to segregate into certain areas of surgery. I think in medical school women are being told that surgery is not the right career for them and this perpetuates into their further training and residency where even once they enter residency in surgery they're told that certain areas of surgery are not for them. And it's no coincidence that those areas of surgery that women have not permitted into tend to be the ones that are the highest paying.

LL: Such as?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: Such as Orthopedics, cardiac surgery, neurosurgery. In fact there are so few neurosurgeons female neurosurgeons that we were able to study that there were some analysis that we did in our study where we had to exclude the neurosurgeons because they were just too few women. So women once they go into surgery, or are making that decision to go into surgery, are being told 'Okay fine if that's what you want to do'. 'Maybe consider gynaecology or general surgery'.

LL: Why? Why are they being told that? What's the reasoning for that?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: I think we have these ideas of the roles that women and men play in society and should be playing in society. They are archaic roles and they still perpetuate to this day. So if you think of what you imagine a surgeon to be, what often comes to mind is a strong, confident, firm assertive man. And if you think of what a woman's gender role tends to be, it tends to be something that's more nurturing and compassionate. And unfortunately when women exhibit the firmness or the assertiveness that men are often lauded for, they're looked at negatively and told that they're less likeable and hard to work with.

LL: And it is that gap that you found, is it unique to surgeons when it comes to medicine or as in other areas as well?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: So our study only looked at surgeons but I'm certain that these sorts of gaps exist elsewhere in medicine. Certainly we have data from salary based systems that show that the gap exists throughout medicine not just surgery.

LL: Okay but what about your own experience as a surgical resident when it comes to what you're talking about here? Does it reinforce what you found in the study?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: Yes. I think I have personally been cautioned against entering surgery. I think questions that female trainees are often faced with that their male colleagues don't hear as often are. Do you want to have a family? Do you want to have children? And that's meant to be the greatest priority. And so women are dissuaded from surgery and that's been my experience. Anecdotally I can say that, once in surgery, you're not often looked at as the surgeon. People question your competence daily. And you're often not even looked at as a doctor.

LL: I think they think you're a nurse.

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: They think you're a nurse or I think it gets compounded for women of colour who sometimes get assumed to be part of the housekeeping staff or some other hospital staff.

LL: It must be very frustrating.

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: It's very challenging, yes.

LL: How do you deal with that?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: I think talking about it is helpful banding together as women and realizing that your experience is not just your own it's you shouldn't be blaming yourself for it but it is something that exists for all women. But I think the way that I've learned to deal with it is to look for solutions which is what we've tried to do with this study.

LL: And we will get to that. But I want to bring someone else into the conversation right now Darby Little is a medical student at the University of Toronto. She wrote an essay titled Locker (Operating) Room Talk: Gender Equity and the Medical Students' Perspective. And it was the winning essay in the inaugural Federation of Medical Women of Canada Gender Equity and Diversity student essay contest Derby little is also here in our Toronto studio. Hello.

DARBY LITTLE: Hi. Thank you for having me.

LL: What was your reaction to the study and the results?

DARBY LITTLE: Honestly I wasn't surprised. I think I've experienced a lot of what Dr. Doe says already mentioned. A lot of medical students that identify as women are discouraged from entering surgical specialties. I've been mistaken for a nursing student many times. So truly I'm not surprised at all.

LL: Dr. Dossa I'm just wondering overall then you hear what Darby's reaction is what kind of reaction have you heard to your study?

LL: I think that there have been two types of reactions which is what we've expected. There are people who have really congratulated us for doing this work. People who felt that this was their experience but it always helps to have data to back up that experience. But the other side of it is people not wanting to believe it and wanting to say that we've looked at the data in the wrong way or this can't be true. And I think part of that comes from wanting to believe that we work within a meritocratic system, where we've gotten to where we are because of our accomplishments and we worked hard for all of those things. And so I can understand it being hard to accept this. But these are the numbers.

LL: Okay. Darby Little your essay about operating room talk, i.e. locker room talk. Tell me what happened.

DARBY LITTLE: Yes so when I was in first year of medical school I realized I had an interest in surgery and to explore that interest I started shadowing more in operating rooms. One day I was shadowing in an operating room and at the time there were only training residents in the room. They were all male and they started talking about who the best looking staff surgeon was in their specialty and they were actually ranking the female surgeons from best looking to worse. And this went on for a while I was expecting you know some teaching or maybe to be quizzed on anatomy and that never came. And truthfully I wasn't-

LL: They never even talked to you the whole time.

DARBY LITTLE: No I was just standing there. It was it was really it was really strange experience. But at the same time I actually wasn't surprised at all. This sort of fit neatly into the stereotype that I had about surgeons in the first place, and I think it fit in with all of the times I had been told you shouldn't be a surgeon because you need have a family. Or you know how will you balance your life. So I wasn't surprised at all.

LL: Did you speak up in the moment?

DARBY LITTLE: No I didn't. I wasn't surprised and I also in the moment I don't think I was actually offended. That came later.

LL: Really.

DARBY LITTLE: Yes. I really I wasn't surprised. And later after talking to friends and classmates and mentors it was actually them who pointed out, hey, that was really not okay. And I think you should write about it and reflect on it and so I did. And the response has been overwhelmingly positive. I've had many classmates, many surgeons, many friends outside of medicine so in areas like engineering, law, business reach out to me and say, hey, that also happened to me or a very similar experience happened to me as well.

LL: I'm curious about the response from surgeons. What about male surgeons? What's their response been?

DARBY LITTLE: So it's actually been great. I've had a lot of mentors who are men in surgery and they've been very helpful in guiding me through this process as well. The chair of surgery at UofT actually reached out and asked to share the essay with the entire department. So I think from who have actually reached out to me it's been almost entirely positive, with a few people saying, well, that was just one experience, that doesn't really happen and sort of minimizing it. But generally an overwhelmingly positive.

LL: What's your reaction when you hear something like that Fahima Dossa?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: I think it's great that Darby has gotten a positive response. My concern would be the people whose response she hasn't heard from and what their inside voices are. I'm not surprised that this was her experience. I think the sort of thing manifests in a number of ways. Unfortunately surgery in some areas of medicine themselves are still very much boys clubs. And even when people aren't explicitly saying things that might be negative towards women. The conversations are still being had that exclude women and probably discourages them from wanting to continue pursue a career in surgery.

LL: So we ask the Ontario Medical Association to respond to the study's findings and the OMA President Dr. Sohaill Gandhi sent us a statement and it reads in part: "The OMA strongly believes in equal pay for equal work. The reasons for this discrepancy are not well understood. And more research is needed so we can make an apples to apples comparison between male and female billings and identify the factors that are driving earnings differences. Once we have a clear understanding of the causes and how they interrelate we can take steps to address this problem and narrow the gap". Dr. Dossa, what do you say to that?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: I think some of that is certainly true. Our study wanted to quantify the difference and now it's true that there is work to be done to figure out where that difference comes from. But I would also say that our study certainly points to some areas, as well saying we were trying to look at, we're trying to debunk some of the explanations that have been provided in the past. So previously people have said women make less because they operate more slowly. We show that that wasn't the case. Something that's been shown in the U.S. is that procedures that are done on women tend to generate lower income for surgeons than procedures that are more commonly done on men, and more female surgeons will treat female patients. We show that that wasn't explaining the gap here. I think what was unique about her study and that does point to where these differences are coming from is we looked at what types of procedures are being done by women and what types of procedures were being done by men. And I think that that was the apples to apples comparison in our study. And what we showed is that women in surgery more commonly do the procedures that pay less and less commonly do the procedures that pay more. There are data from the US that suggest that there is a degree of gender based referral bias that happens in their system.

LL: Where people will only refer to, or more frequently refer to a male surgeon than a female surgeon.

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: Exactly. So people will more frequently refer cases to male surgeons but also they're quicker to stop referring to a female surgeon when a patient has a poor outcome. And not just the female surgeon who operated on the patient but all of the female surgeons who work in that area, who of course were not responsible at all for whatever outcome happened.

LL: All right. Darby Tittle, you're coming up in this year graduating in 2021 correct?

DARBY LITTLE: Yes.

LL: And you need to choose a specialty. How strongly are you considering surgery at this point?

DARBY LITTLE: I am considering it strongly. I think after that experience that I spoke about I wasn't considering it but I am considering it strongly. I think it is still difficult to manoeuvre, as a medical student, the constant micro aggressions that you face, being told that you should enter family medicine because you'll have a better work life balance and sort of these gendered beliefs in what people think women seek in career paths. But I am still considering it this despite this.

LL: All right well then maybe Dr. Dossa has some ideas about how you can fix what it looks like a real problem here. What do you suggest could be done?

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: Yeah I think that there is a real onus on looking for system level changes but also surgeons re-evaluating their own practices. From a systems level I think that what our study shows is we need to increase equity by moving towards say a centralized referral process, where we're taking the control out of the hands of the referring doctor and really the patient should be going to the next available surgeon and that'll help increase equity in our system, but also hopefully get more timely care for our patients. At the level that Deaby's at, I think the onus is really on the physicians to try and make a change. What we know is that women are less commonly referred to by their formal titles in medicine. Let's start calling everyone by their formal titles men and women. We know that there is gender bias that seeps into reference letters that Darby will ask for when she applies for her residency. We can use standardized reference letters that help take out some of that bias. And we need to start making assumptions that women prioritize certain things over their career and that those differences in how they prioritize their lives should govern what opportunities are available to them. Let's stop taking away opportunities for leadership roles. Let's stop taking away opportunities for spending extra time in the operating room just because of these assumptions that we've made in the past.

LL: How does that sound to you?

DARBY LITTLE: Yes I agree with that and I also think that because medical students are actually deciding their career paths in medical school, we need to address that bias that's happening also in medical schools to to enforce more women to enter surgery. And I think that that can be done by talking about experiences like this more openly. I mean it's not just gender based micro aggressions that are taking place. People are oppressed for a variety of identities and reasons and I think talking about that in medical school and also preparing medical students for that, through ally ship training as well, is really important.

LL: Through? Sorry I did not get it.

DARBY LITTLE: So ally ship training I think people need to learn how to be good allies because being able to speak up for someone else is also really helpful in terms of breaking down those barriers.

LL: Okay. Really interesting discussion with both of you. I'm going to be paying attention going forward. Good luck with the rest of your studies and becoming a doctor.

DARBY LITTLE: Thank you.

LL: And thank you Fahima Dossa.

DR. FAHIMA DOSSA: Thank you.

LL: Dr. Fahima Dossa is a surgical resident at St. Michael's Hospital Darby Little is a medical student at the University of Toronto. They were both in our Toronto studio now for a historical perspective, let's go back to the eighteen hundreds for the story of a pioneer in the field of surgery. Here's Jacalyn Duffin, a professor emerita at Queen's University.

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Dr. James Barry was a surgeon, a military surgeon, serving with the British forces in the 19th century and he was credited with doing a number of procedures for the first time. Every place he went sanitary conditions were improved. He practiced virtually all over the British empire including in South Africa, the Caribbean and even in Canada in the late 1850. Dr. Barry was single and people did describe him as slight and somewhat pompous. And it was only when he was laid out for burial that it was discovered that he had been a woman. We now know that James Barry spent his early years as a girl and was born female and wanted to pursue higher education, and through the good graces of Friends of the family was finally admitted at roughly the age 17 to the Medical School in Edinburgh. Medical education was not available to women at that time and consequently she became a man and remained demand for the rest of his life. We should remember how difficult it was for women to obtain education, not only as physicians, but higher education at all. It wasn't until quite late that women in Canada were allowed to go to university. So her determination to gather a profession and gather an education and see the world is something that we can only admire as much as marvelling at it. The other thing is that there were assumptions made about her. I can't imagine what it would have been like to meet her or him. He did have an encounter with Florence Nightingale and Florence Nightingale was horrified at how rude he had been. That too is another moment I wish I could have witnessed. What strikes me the most about the reports that she wrote. They are incredibly caring. When I first read one of the reports I didn't know that James Barry had been the author. And I was struck by the attention given to the care of the wives, the women and children who were part of the military camp. And this struck me as very unusual and I have to ask myself if it was because she was female and she could imagine the kinds of problems that these appendages of the army would be experiencing that made her attentive to what their needs were. And that I found very poignant. The story of James Barry is one of a number of stories of women who basically wear cross dressing in order to pursue an education and pursue a career. And her story is not an isolated one.

Jacalyn Duffin is a professor emerita at Queen's University in Kingston Ontario. That's our program for today. Stay tuned though to Radio One for q. You can hear Tom Power's full interview with Rick Mercer from our town hall. Rick will talk about how he's tried to encourage more young people to get out and vote. The musical guest at the event was the Weather Station. You can hear their performance Friday on Qbut we'll end today with their song Floodplain. I'm Laura Lynch. Thanks for listening to The Current.

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[Song: Floodplain by Weather Station]

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Thursday October 3, 2019 Full Episode Transcript

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