The Charter of Rights protects citizens from discrimination based on gender and the courts have ruled that pregnancy and spousal abuse are grounds analogous to gender. Ms. Smith contends that unpaid caregiving, an overwhelmingly female role historially, is also a grounds analogous to gender. Smith is a member of a historically diadvantaged group because she is a woman but she also contends that within the group of women there is a subgroup, of married women who suffered particular disadvantage since they were last to get the vote or property rights, after single women.
Smith also contends that within the group of married women there is a subgroup of mothers, who historically have suffered particular disadvantage since they were denied rights to control their own reproduction and for many years had no say in the custody of their own young. 
Smith contends that the impugned laws, by forcing parents to use care arrangements for their children based on financial considerations alone, do not prioritize the flexibility parents are entitled to, to adjust care options to the best interests of the child. |  |
 | Section 15 (1) of the Charter of Rights states
Every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law without discrimination and, in particular, without discrimination based on race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability. Smith contends that the impugned laws discriminate on a basis analogous to gender and therefore are contraventions of the Charter. Smith also contends that when the state favors certain lifestyles over others, such as dual income over one and a half-income or single income, or work outside the home over work in the home, or care of children by strangers over are by relatives, this tilting of the balance is unbefitting a democracy and deprives citizens of autonomy and dignity. |
 |  |
|
