Order of Canada appointees far less diverse than the population, analysis shows

The 2022 list of appointees to the Order of Canada is far less diverse than the Canadian population and even less diverse than it was in 2021, a new analysis shows.

The Governor General made 184 appointments to the order in 2022. It's considered one of the country's highest civilian honours, one which recognizes "people who make extraordinary contributions to the nation," according to Rideau Hall. Over 7,600 Canadians have joined the order's ranks since its creation in 1967.

But analysis by retired public servant Andrew Griffith, who served as Canada's director general of citizenship and multiculturalism, found that last year's appointees were not representative of the Canadian population.

Women make up about 51 per cent of the population, according to 2021 census data. Griffith's analysis reported that just 28.7 per cent of the 2022 Order of Canada appointees were women.

And while the 2021 census reported that about 26 per cent of people in Canada come from a racialized group, just 7.4 per cent of 2022 Order of Canada appointees could say the same, according to Griffith's report.

Griffith's analysis of the 2021 appointees found that 40.7 per cent were women and 12.6 per cent were "visible minorities."

Griffith, who has done the analysis every year for a decade, said representation of people of colour in the order has improved broadly over time — but the same can't be said for women.

"If I look at visible minorities, it's slow progress, but overall it has increased over the last 10 years," he told CBC News.

"Women are the ones that seem to vary the most, depending on the year ... You can't say that women are really making progress."

Indigenous people made up 8.5 per cent of appointees in 2022 and accounted for 5 per cent of the Canadian population in the 2021 census.

"They're the one group — along with white men — who are basically more than represented in relation to the size of their population," Griffith said.

The Governor General makes appointments based on recommendations from the Advisory Council for the Order of Canada. The council advises her based on nomination suggestions from the general public.

Griffith said this process makes it difficult for Rideau Hall to choose a more diverse list of inductees.

"This is a program that depends on nominations from the outside public, and so there's less control, if any control, over who gets nominated," he said.