Best Practices & Statistics

Statistics
Did You Know?

  1. 81.3% of lone parent families are female led (this % has not changed much in 20 years but the number of single parents has tripled)
  2. In 2001, 20% of all families with children were headed by a female lone parent
  3. Female lone parent families earn $32,500 compared to $54,700 for lone parent men
  4. In 2003, female lone parents made up 38% of those with income below the Low-Income Cut-Off compared to 13% of male lone parents
  5. In 2004, women lost on average 10 days per year (7 in 1996) due to family and child care issues compared to 1 ½  days per year (1 in 1996) for men
  6. In 2004, women made up 92.6% of Parental/Adoption EI beneficiaries
  7. About 7 in 10 part-time workers are female
  8. Women are increasingly represented in several professional fields (in 2004, women were 55% of doctors and dentists)
  9. In 2004, women were in 22% of senior management positions but only earned 60% of their male colleagues’ income

Statistics Canada, Women in Canada Fifth Edition: A Gender-Based Statistical Report, March 2006
 
Heterosexual Intimate Partner Violence

  1. In 2004, 7% of women and 6% of men reported at least one incident of spousal violence in the last 5 years (down from 8% and 7% respectively in 1999). That represents approximately 653,000 women. 1
  2. Women were 84% of spousal violence victims in 2004 2 and 93% of the victims of domestic homicide between 2002-2005 3
  3. Women were 3 times more likely than men to take time off work as a result of violence 1
  4. 30% of women (5% of men) were fearful as a result of the violence 4
  5. In 2004, 47% of female victims of spousal violence and 20% of male victims used social services 4
  6. In 2004, only 36% of female victims had reported it to the police 1
  7. In the ten years from 1995-2004, 81% of spousal violence offenders were only reported to the police once 2
  8. In Canada, 1 in 5 homicides involves the killing of an intimate partner 1
  9. Between 1991-2004 the spousal homicide rate decreased 39% for women and 59% for men 1
  10. In 2004, only 22% of all female homicide victims were killed by a stranger. 37% were murdered by a spouse or ex-spouse 4
  11. In 2004, 62% of homicide victims under age 18 were murdered by a family member. 85% of these were murdered by their own parent--the father, in 59% of the incidents between 1995-2004 2

1 Statistics Canada, Measuring Violence Against Women: Statistical Trends 2006, October 2006
2 Statistics Canada, Family Violence in Canada: A Statistical Profile 2006, July 2006
3 Domestic Violence Death Review Committee, Annual Report to the Chief Coroner, 2005
4 Statistics Canada, Women in Canada Fifth Edition: A Gender-Based Statistical Report, March 2006