Good afternoon, members of committee.
Rainbow Resource Centre has a 45-year history in our community. We've been engaged in education for better equity and inclusion for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, two-spirit, and queer people in business, education, and social and government services for most of our existence.
We've been seeing newcomers access our counselling program for the last dozen or so years, and in the last nine months we've seen 97 unique clients who are refugee claimants or who require settlement services.
All of us—those in this room, members of the IRB, and everyone in the world—has a gender identity. This is how we see ourselves—as male, female, both, neither, gender queer, two-spirit, or something else entirely—and each of us has a sexual orientation, be we straight, gay, lesbian, two-spirit, pansexual, queer, or again something else entirely. Are we confused yet?
This is why training is so important when working with gender and sexual minority people. Our identities and experiences are as unique as each individual.
Each of us also finds ourselves in a geographical, social, and political context that celebrates some gender identities and sexual orientations and marginalizes others. How we understand our gender and sexual identity is unique and personal to each of us, but shaped by the family, community, and society we find ourselves in. My experience growing up as a gay man in Brandon—Souris in the 1980s and 1990s will be quite different from that of a south Asian gay man growing up in Vancouver East today, or that of a lesbian woman recently arrived from Nigeria with her children. In many cultures worldwide, including here in Canada, there are sexual and gender minority identities that do not fit our western ideas of being LGBTQ. I ask you to consider this, because it may not be something that you have thought about. I also ask you to consider your own sexual orientation and gender identity within your own context, because this is where good adult education starts: with the learners' experience.
I would encourage IRB to follow sound principles of adult education when training members. The need for training around sexual orientation and gender identity and expression is clear. Chairperson's guideline 9 is a great foundation to understanding the complexities of SOGIE realities. I would encourage the department to consider training that is more than one day and is ongoing.
The realities in communities of LGBT2SQ+ Canadians are dynamic and constantly changing. This is also the case with SOGIE minorities around the world. I would encourage training for IRB members that considers the realities of refugee SOGIE minorities but also the reality of Canada's LGBT2SQ+ communities and how they are the same or different internationally. It is not uncommon in our experience for IRB members to ask why a lesbian has children or is married to a man; well, it's for the same reason that a lesbian in Canada may have children or that a gay man is married to a woman.
Many of our transnational realities are similar, yet many are different. Much of what the IRB is looking for in SOGIE cases is someone to prove their identity as LGBTQ, yet if one's behaviour is the reason for persecution, we need to be looking at the persecution faced by the individual regardless of their identity.
Often in SOGIE cases IRB members are looking for inconsistencies in statements. Inconsistencies of SOGIE claimants occur as a result of people feeling unsafe. Most in our communities are constantly assessing our safety and deciding who to come out to based on a sense of safety and relevance to the discussion at hand. Imagine being held in a U.S. detention centre, often with the general inmate population, and asked to state your basis of claim in public. Would you be comfortable disclosing that you are LGBTQ+ in such an environment?
I was fortunate to have the opportunity to speak with a community member whose hearing took place just before the IRB SOGIE guidelines were released. As a community supporting this person, we were horrified by the invasiveness and inappropriateness of the questions asked. The claimant said to me that some questions are triggering and bring back sudden sadness, thoughts, and flashback memories. These can lead to loss of focus, memory loss, mental imbalance, and so on. She said that at this point the claimant is likely to be perceived as not telling the truth.
We ask for IRB training to be trauma-informed and to consider how the hearing process itself can be retraumatizing for claimants. It is essential that IRB members understand that the chairperson's guidelines on SOGIE claimants, gender-related persecution, and vulnerable persons are interrelated and may all apply to an individual case.
While the committee will hear from experts, we strongly encourage you to engage those who are experts in SOGIE claims, those who are seeking Canada as a refuge due to persecution based on their sexual orientation and gender identity and expression. It is integral that these voices be heard by this committee, and even more important that they be engaged in the development, delivery, and evaluation of IRB training related to sexual orientation and gender identity and expression.
Thank you.