Status of Women Committee on Nov. 21st, 2016

[Awar Obob]

I feel it spans all age groups. Personally, I've seen it from all age groups and I've also read plenty of stories and publications of experiences where the violence was introduced within the home. It stems from the parents and the society around us in any size of town. I'm also from a small town. I'm from Lower Sackville, Nova Scotia.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Oh, that's awesome.

[Awar Obob]

It's very small.

I've seen it face-to-face quite often and it really does cover all age groups.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

The reason I ask is that I look at my generation. I'm in my forties. We were at the cutting edge. There were some social changes happening. Racism used to be a big thing, especially at that time. Nowadays, it's great because when I speak to my children, maybe they're just really special kids, but I'm finding that there's not a racist or a sexually negative bone in their body. They are very accepting. That's what we need to do.

Do you think there are ways we can do that? Maybe it's just my family. I feel like this new generation is much stronger and much more aware of the social issues and the fact that they can't be ignorant about them. Do you think there's more we can do? What are some of the techniques we should be doing for even our older generations?

[Awar Obob]

Well, I think there's definitely a positive lean in this generation. I think a lot more is coming from collecting and organizing themselves to stand up against all the injustices that they face and we face. A good way to teach people who do not live these experiences is to recognize their own microaggressions against people who are not like them.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Thank you.

One final question for the Native Women's Association. If we're looking at stats comparing on-reserve versus off-reserve, what is the difference in stats for aboriginal women being abused? Do you have those stats available?

[Marilee Nowgesic]

The short answer is no. Sometimes we know that, in the cases that get brought before either the law enforcement, or to a triage unit in a hospital or a clinic, the questions about your ancestry or your origins are not ones that are going to be prevalent. It is going to be about drugs or medications or if there is someone they should be contacting.

The questions about where do you come from come after the fact, when the hospital administration or clinic administration is chasing someone down to pay the bill. That's the only time the issue about ancestry or origin arises.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Marilyn Gladu]

All right, we'll go to Ms. Malcolmson for seven minutes.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

I'm really grateful to the witnesses. I'm going to reflect a lot on the testimony of the Canadian Council for Refugees and Babely Shades in our final recommendations. I'm also going to really focus on the work that NWAC has done. Thank you so much for the work that you've done. You have pushed so hard over 10 years. You're changing the country and will change the country. I salute your stamina.

I'm going to ask you to answer really briefly, so I can maximize my time.

Is your operational funding adequate for the work that the country is asking you to do?

[Francyne Joe]

No.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

I note that in the context of the discussion around building new domestic violence shelters, especially focused around indigenous women, there is a recognition that the rate of violence is so much higher. We've had information that indicates that 70% of Inuit communities do not have access to safe shelter. There are only 15 shelters for the 53 Inuit communities across the country, and there are no new domestic violence shelters proposed for them in the budget money that's been announced already.

I also note your information. Right now we have a network of only 41 shelters on-reserve across the country. The new government's proposal is to build five new shelters over the next five years.

Is that adequate to meet the demand that's been identified?

[Francyne Joe]

Do you want to answer that?

[Marilee Nowgesic]

Sure.

I can't speak for my Inuit partner organizations. However, I am aware of the statistics, and I am aware of the, shall I call it, applaudable effort of their wanting to address something. That's better than nothing.

At the same time, five shelters over five years is, again, going to be a band-aid solution. It will be inadequate, and it will not address the issue. It's a matter of asking, what are we really looking at here? This is putting them into a room and saying, “suffer quietly”, or “suffer in pain”, but saying nothing about programs or services for when they get out of there. It's a matter of a quick fix, and then telling them to be quiet.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Is there any additional funding that you've seen that's proposed for domestic violence shelters to meet the needs of indigenous women off-reserve?

[Marilee Nowgesic]

We have just had a conversation with some of our external partners who are looking at urban and rural programs. The need is not only for shelters in the cases of violence, but also in cases where women are being thrown out of their homes because of substance, alcohol, or drug abuse, or because there are financial complications. They may have spent all of the welfare cheque, and then they're being beaten up because there isn't enough food or there isn't enough of something else.

We are trying to work closely with all of the partners as best we can because of the limited resources we have to operate nationally. We're spreading ourselves very thin, so it's better for us to just try to focus on the one thing that we can do well, rather than to try to bring a false light to too many.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

This is the last question that I have so, I encourage you to be more conversational if you want.

[Marilee Nowgesic]

Okay.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

On Friday, the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women issued a report. They do this only once every five years for Canada, so this is a very focused look at how we're doing as a country.

I note that in recommendation 27.(b) they're speaking specifically around Canada's efforts. This is their recommendation:

Ensure that all cases of missing and murdered indigenous women are duly investigated and prosecuted.

In 27.(c), they recommend that the government:

Complement the Terms of Reference of the national inquiry to: (i) Ensure the use of a human rights based approach; (ii) Ensure that the mandate of the inquiry clearly covers the investigation of the role of Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Provincial police, Municipal police, and public complaints commissions across federal, provincial, and municipal jurisdictions; (iii) Establish a mechanism for the independent review of cases where there are allegations of inadequate or partial police investigations.

Do those recommendations align with what you have been hearing from families and survivors of violence against indigenous women?

[Lynne Groulx]

Yes, they do. They definitely align, and in particular on recommendation 27.(c)(III) regarding the independent review.

In the last few days, we've heard about the situation in Val-d'Or and the “independent review” that was undertaken. What we've heard is that the Val-d'Or review was inadequate, that it, basically, was not independent. We had one police body investigating another police body. This certainly doesn't address the kind of investigation that needs to be done.

We agree with this wholeheartedly, and we hope that these recommendations will be followed because the families are calling our offices, and they are expressing their discontent with what's going on.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

NWAC made similar recommendations, or some alignment with these recommendations, when the terms of reference were being set.

[Lynne Groulx]

Yes.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

The terms of reference don't yet explicitly or sufficiently echo these recommendations. Are you continuing to push for an adjustment of the terms of reference, so that we get the best outcome at the end of the day?

[Francyne Joe]

NWAC did present in Geneva to the committee, and we are actually going down to Washington in the beginning of December to present to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to discuss missing and murdered indigenous women and girls and the suggestions we would like to make, including CEDAW's 38 recommendations, of which only one has been included in the missing and murdered inquiry so far.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you very much. That's my time. I really thank you for your work.