Waterloo, Ontario, Friday, October 30, 2015

It is a special occasion for David and me to be on the Renison University College campus to open your newest building.

It’s hard to believe that just five years ago, David was President of the University and I was running a horse farm called Chatterbox Farm. We welcomed students, faculty members, staff, and generous donors into our wonderful home surrounded by horse-and-buggy Mennonites. Our neighbours have remained our friends and made sure we kept up with the births, courtships, marriages and deaths of their families. They gave us friendship and love.

As an institution that will educate future social workers, Renison is close to my heart. I was raised by a single mother social worker who, at fifty years of age, returned to do a master’s degree in the inaugural rehabilitation social work program at the University of Toronto. The year was 1966—the age of Aquarius—all touch and feel. This required adjustment on my mother’s part, having worked for twenty years as a social work pragmatist.

Old Age Pensions, Disability Benefits, Mother’s Allowance put individuals and families back on their feet. But the new concept of rehabilitation provided practical education and sometimes university degrees rather than social assistance.

David and I were finishing our own degrees in 1966 in the midst of social upheaval that tested everyone’s values. But there is one value that never changes and that is caring for people in need.

That’s why I’m so pleased to see so many great people here today at Renison. People who care. Bishop Spence suggested I speak to you today about my recent novel Matrons and Madams because it touches on social issues that are not often spoken about. It covers an era after the Great War and up to the Great Depression, when prohibition, prostitution, vaccination, venereal disease and sex education were the public health issues of the day. Back then, of course, the Internet did not exist to educate the public on these social issues.

For instance, in the 1920s, the medical officer of health for Ontario hired a train and travelled to small towns with posters treating sexually transmitted diseases as a public health (i.e. social welfare) issue rather than as a moral disgrace.

The novel is partially based on my grandmother, a well-trained British nurse who immigrated to Lethbridge, Alberta, to set up the first venereal disease clinic in the province. She, of course, is the Matron not the Madam in the book!

No clinic could be successful without the co-operation of the ladies of the night who contributed to the spread of venereal disease. In those days, a significant percentage of Canadian military members were diagnosed with this and passed it on to their wives and girlfriends. Imagine what you as a social worker would do when faced with such a public health issue.

Now, back to the present and my own continuing interest in social development and social work. For the past five years, I have travelled throughout all of the provinces and territories to witness innovative social practices to help the homeless, veterans, at-risk youth, drug addicts, alcohol abusers and prostitutes.

I have witnessed people living through some very difficult situations, but always with compassion. I have spent some time with the Vancouver Police Department, whose officers do social intervention on a daily basis. In fact, the city’s East Side is a living laboratory for social work. I visited a needle exchange clinic called Insight, with Dr. Julio Montaner. He described how drug addicts are taught to carry an opioid antagonist injection in case they come across a fellow addict who has overdosed on heroin. I had to stop for a moment to digest this fact. Despite debilitating drug use, addicts can still save another addict’s life. This is a profound example of human caring.

You’re doing important work here at Renison. I’m so glad to see that you’re expanding and having continued success. You’re helping real people and making our communities and our country healthier and more caring.

I shall now pass the podium to my husband. I wish you all the very best with your work.