‘It’s being levelled’: advocates worried about potential 81 per cent cut to Women and Gender Equality Canada’s budget by 2028
Women's advocates call the department's three-year forecast 'extremely shocking' and 'disproportional' for the small ministry. 'The level of support will be radically reduced,' says Katherine Scott, who isn't 'holding her breath' for the fall budget.
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RIDDHI KACHHELA | July 25, 2025
Women and Gender Equality Canada expects to see its spending cut by 81 per cent by 2027-28, and staffing levels drop from 444 full-time equivalents this fiscal year to 254 on the three-year horizon, according to the department's latest plan
The 2025-26 document for the department, known as WAGE, was released in late June and outlines a $407-million budget this year, which drops to $284.7-million in 2026-27, and $76.3-million in 2027-28.
The cuts to staff and budget aren’t truly set in ink just yet. Prime Minister Mark Carney's (Nepean, Ont.) government has yet to release its budget for the current fiscal year, so it's possible WAGE could receive more cash through that fiscal blueprint.
Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne (Saint-Maurice—Champlain, Que.) has called on ministers to slash 15 per cent of their department's spending over the next three years.
Katherine Scott leads the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives’ gender equality work. She said women’s organizations have been trying to get clarity from the government about future funding plans for about a year.
"So clearly, this departmental plan would suggest that there are no renewals that have yet been planned or booked.”
She added that she isn’t “holding her breath” for the fall budget, but it would certainly indicate whether the government is committed to supporting gender equality.
“But it's really clear that it's being levelled. The level of support will be radically reduced.”
WAGE's spending reduction has been largely attributed to the ending of temporary funding for two major federal programs. The first is the implementation of the National Action Plan to End Gender-Based Violence, and the other is the 2SLGBTQI+ Community Capacity Fund.
The action plan was first announced in 2021, when the government earmarked $601-million over five years with an aim to make Canada free of gender-based violence.
In Budget 2022, the feds proposed an investment of $539-million over five years, starting in 2022–23, as transfer payments to provinces and territories to help them implement the 10-year plan. Ottawa entered into bilateral agreements with the provincial and territorial governments to this end in 2023.
That funding for the plan will be sunsetting in 2027-28, and some are concerned about the program’s future.
During a recent gathering of ministers responsible for the status of women, WAGE Minister Rechie Valdez (Mississauga—Streetsville, Ont.) said she is committed to backing the national action plan, but did not say how much the government would be setting aside to fund the work. Carney’s election platform also reiterated the government’s support for the policy.
The Hill Times asked about the government’s funding plans for WAGE, and Valdez’s office said “any funding decisions” will be communicated through “official government channels at the appropriate time.”
The prospects of WAGE potentially losing a major chunk of its funding has alarmed women’s organizations and policy experts, some of whom have played a direct role in the drafting of the action plan.
Amanada Dale, the lead author of Women’s Shelters Canada’s framework for the action plan, said it would be "hypocrisy" for the federal government to defund WAGE. She said Canada has “always played a lead” in holding other governments accountable for actions on gender-based violence.
Anuradha Dugal, now the executive director of Women’s Shelters Canada, was the co-chair of one of the working groups set up to build the four pillars of the plan. She said the cuts shown in the departmental plan are “extremely shocking” and “disproportional” for a small ministry like WAGE.
Women and people from queer communities are “essentially being abandoned” by the government, based on the figures in the plan, she said.
Grassroots organizations that get funding to execute the national action plan will not be able to maintain the level of service they need to fulfill the promises made in the plan without additional cash, she added.
The government called gender-based violence an “epidemic” in 2023 and said it had no place in Canada. But violence against women remains an entrenched problem. Statistics Canada reported there were 28 more women homicide victims in 2024 compared to the previous year, with a large hike in the proportion of women killed by their spouse or partners—going up from 32 per cent in 2023 to 42 per cent in 2024.
A version of this piece first appeared in Politics This Morning, your go-to source for insider news, analysis, and updates on where all the key political players are that day. Get more insider coverage directly to your inbox from The Hill Times’ editor Peter Mazereeuw and reporter Riddhi Kachhela in this subscriber-only daily newsletter. Sign up here.