OHL scholarships spawn questions about gender equity in Ontario

Ontario University Athletics (OUA) is calling on the Ontario government to do more for female athletes after the province announced $3-million in scholarships for the Ontario Hockey League (OHL).

The OUA penned an open letter that calls for equal treatment for female athletes.

"Prioritizing male-dominated avenues, like the OHL, only serves to perpetuate the commonly held belief that women in sport are deemed lesser," the letter said.

If $3 million are being provided to the men, $3 million should be going to the women, the OUA said.

The letter goes on to add:

"Support for scholarships for women student-athletes cannot be ignored any longer and the lack of equal public financial support cannot continue if proper gender balance is ever to be realized at the post-secondary level and beyond."

Lisa MacLeod, Ontario's Minister of Heritage, Sport, Tourism and Culture Industries, was asked to respond to the letter while in Sudbury on Tuesday.

MacLeod described the letter as "misleading."

"As a female sports minister, as a former athlete myself, as a hockey mom to a young woman, I found that the letter was quite misleading," she told reporters.

"This ministry has invested a significant amount of money to female athletes across the province, including our 'Quest for Gold' in which 52 per cent or $3.2 million was dedicated to elite, high-performance female athletes."

The OUA countered that the difference lies in how much funding is dedicated to female athletes.

When MacLeod was asked about that difference, and whether the same amount should be given to both genders. She said the OUA was given an additional $300,000 and they are more than welcome to give all of it to female athletes.

The minister said they've put forth an additional $30 million for sport and the OUA is trying to confuse the issue.

Want to be welcoming to young women

"For the first time ever, we started funding female sports that were never funded before," she said. "Skip rope, which is female-dominated; gymnastics which is female-dominated; and, cheerleading, which is female-dominated. Our goal is to make sure at the grassroots level that community sport is welcoming to young women."

Athletes at Laurentian University, like fourth-year student Maria La Rosa, told CTV News she was disappointed by the minister's comments.

"I think it's great that the government provided the OHL with money, but at the same time it's like, did they forget about us?" La Rosa said.

"They didn't really mention what they're going to do for us and we deserve the same amount."

She said it was "fascinating" MacLeod mentioned funding for skip rope, but not funding for female athletes in the OUA.

"The OUA is the elite of the elite athletes in Ontario and we play in a league that's supposedly the best league in Canada," La Rosa said.

'We're not mentioned at all'

"Yet they mentioned skip roping and they're comparing that to the OHL players, which is the elite. So how come we're not mentioned at all?"

LU athletics director Peter Hellstrom said it's a missed opportunity on the part of the government, adding female athletes work every bit as hard as his male athletes.

"A hundred dollars goes far, $3 million would go a long way for students," Hellstrom said.

"These student-athletes are putting in 50-60 hours a week between their school, their training, their travel. They're balancing a full academic load and they can't work. Both male and female put a ton of time in."

The OUA said it had to apply for that $300,000 and that nothing was given to them. But MacLeod rejected their claims.

"We have continually supported female athletes," she said.

"We have an action plan within the ministry that we continue to follow, but I reject their notion and I reject their open letter."

News of the OHL scholarships was delivered on International Women's Day. Also Tuesday, independent MPP Lindsey Park tabled a motion in the Ontario legislature calling for male and female athletes to receive the same funding.