Thank you.
My name is Laura Holland. I'm an organizer with the Aboriginal Women's Action Network and we're part of the B.C. CEDAW Group.
I want you to take a moment just to acknowledge that you are on native land. I know this is a really important time for aboriginal peoples in British Columbia and in Canada as well because there are many land claims that remain unsettled, and there are many aboriginal women and children who still remain without access to lands and resources. I think it's really important that we pay attention to that.
It's also a really important time for aboriginal women in B.C. because we are looking at an inquiry into the Pickton case. It's really important that we pay attention to that as well as the fact that aboriginal women and children are still being murdered, and aboriginal women are still disappearing.
Today I want you to pay special attention and I know it's difficult to pay attention at the end of a long morning, but I would like your attention. I'd like you to pay special attention to our brief concerning police and government failure to prevent or effectively investigate violence against aboriginal women and girls.
All the indicators of equality and well-being, educational attainment, health status, income level, housing adequacy, participation in paid work, and rates of child apprehension reveal an entrenched pattern of inequality and dismal conditions of life for aboriginal women and girls. These disadvantaged conditions are the result of both historical and ongoing colonialism, including systemic racism and sexism.
It's really hard for me to say what the consequences of 500 years of colonialism and racist violence against women are, but I will do my best. Aboriginal women in Canada report rates of violence, including domestic violence and sexual assault, 3.5 times higher than non-aboriginal women. They experience high levels of sexual abuse and violence in their own families and communities and high levels of stranger violence in the broader society. Also, young aboriginal women are five times more likely than Canadian women of the same age to die of violence.
I totally support the housing initiative that Justice for Girls was talking about because I quite often house these young women at my house.
In March 2009 the Native Women's Association of Canada issued the second report of the Sisters in Spirit project, documenting 520 cases at the time, which I believe is now 586 cases, of aboriginal women and girls who have gone missing or have been murdered across the country in the last 30 years.
We also know there is anecdotal evidence or information that these numbers are much higher. They could be in the thousands. Most aboriginal and human rights organizations agree that the count of missing and murdered women is much higher.
In B.C., since the 1990s, 69 women have been reported missing from the downtown east side in Vancouver, Canada's poorest neighbourhood. The majority of these women were aboriginal. Many of my friends and my friends' sisters are included in those 69.
Two facets of this problem have been identified by aboriginal women, families, and non-governmental organizations: first, the failure of police to protect aboriginal women and girls from violence and investigate promptly and thoroughly when they are missing or murdered; and second, the disadvantaged social and economic conditions in which aboriginal women and girls live, which make them vulnerable to violence and unable to escape from it.
In its 2008 concluding observations, the UN CEDAW Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women wrote:
Although the Committee notes that a working group has been established to review the situation relating to missing and murdered women in the State party and those at risk in that context, it remains concerned that hundreds of cases involving aboriginal women who have gone missing or been murdered in the past two decades have neither been fully investigated nor attracted priority attention, with the perpetrators remaining unpunished. The Committee urges the State party to examine the reasons for the failure to investigate the cases of missing or murdered aboriginal women and to take the necessary steps to remedy the deficiencies in the system. The Committee calls upon the State party to urgently carry out thorough investigations of the cases of aboriginal women who have gone missing or been murdered in recent decades. It also urges the State party to carry out an analysis of those cases in order to determine whether there is a racialized pattern to the disappearances and take measures to address the problem if that is the case.
Moving to our recommendation, the B.C. CEDAW Group is calling on the federal government to take responsibility for determining the reasons for the failure to investigate the cases of missing or murdered women--and design and implement steps to remedy the system--and for the failure in compliance with Canada's international human rights obligations; and to implement a national strategic plan to address the disadvantaged social and economic conditions of aboriginal women and girls.
The Aboriginal Women's Action Network talks with women locally, provincially, nationally, and internationally. As aboriginal women, we are fighting for our lives, and we're asking for your help.