Status of Women committee  I would have to agree that, yes, we do. NWAC is more project-based. We get project-based funding to operate. Yes, every year we do have to, as you mentioned, tweak our proposals to meet the certain criteria put out by various government departments. Status of Women is one governm

Status of Women committee  I've been involved in the aboriginal health field for many years. I've worked with government departments other than Health Canada, the Status of Women being one. To my knowledge, and I have 30 years under my belt, I don't recall any government department coming to ask an aborigi

Status of Women committee  I'm not on that side--I'm on the other side--so I wouldn't know. I couldn't answer 100% on how those criteria that filter down to the aboriginal organizations are developed at the national level, but I think Ms. Lavell has something to say about that.

Status of Women committee  Yes, there was an article put out in response to a study that was carried out by Ms. Mann, I think, and it did identify what you just said, that a disproportionate number of aboriginal women are incarcerated. Although we haven't done any work in this area for quite a few years,

Status of Women committee  I forgot to mention that we are delving into the issue from another angle. We've received some funds through Indian and Northern Affairs Canada to look at it from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission aspect. We are just beginning. We have hired someone to look into where abori

Status of Women committee  The short answer is no. We're the Native Women's Association of Canada, and we do believe in the family and keeping the family intact. We don't have money for male-oriented programs. We barely have enough funding for female-oriented programs. So, no, we don't. About the issue o

Status of Women committee  That is always an issue with many departments. We do get funding at the tail end, at the near end, of the fiscal year, and we have to scramble and carry out the work as best we can. I'm sure that if there were something else in place whereby funding would be assured in April, May

Status of Women committee  Oh, you were talking about....

Status of Women committee  What I find, and this is not new, is that the governments operate in silos. You have one government department addressing one part of the issue and another part of the government addressing another issue, and they don't all come together in unison to address an issue. As long a

Status of Women committee  Well, I think when you have a Department of Indian and Northern Affairs...maybe they can take the lead. They can have the Status of Women at the table, they can have Health Canada, Canada Mortgage and Housing, Education, and they can address it as a whole. I think oftentimes one

Status of Women committee  I'm not a lawyer, but I know there are things that are being addressed with Bill C-3. There was a lot of inter-family conflict, and I think that was addressed and it's moving forward. I don't know if that's what you're referring to. Maybe Kat can add to this.

Status of Women committee  I was just going to say that core funding allows you to plan for a longer term and to put things in place. You're better able to manage programs. You do your long-range planning. You're able to evaluate. One thing about the evidence to action is that it is a three-year funding

Status of Women committee  Thank you. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for the invitation to offer testimony today towards your study on the abuse of older women and, in particular, your interest in the experience of older aboriginal women. My name is Claudette Dumont-Smith, as Ms. Ashton

Status of Women committee  I think anywhere we can get funds to develop our own projects or proposals we know will help to raise that issue amongst our women. The work that we will do, of course, will be to prevent the abuse of aboriginal female seniors. I would agree that all these kinds of programs are g

Status of Women committee  Well, there are very limited resources in communities, as my research showed, and that's also what the grandmothers told us in the Grandmother Spirit project. There's also always a limitation of funds, and we don't have the same services as you would have in off-reserve settings.