Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on June 15th, 2021

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

That's quite a testimony. Thank you so much for being so candid about these issues which are important to our committee as we move through this investigation.

I'm going to ask Ms. Blaney to give us her six-minute presentation, and then we'll move on to the next round of questioning.

Ms. Blaney, once again, please go ahead slowly and clearly.

[Fay Blaney]

Okay, thank you very much.

Briefly, I just want to say that the Aboriginal Women's Action Network has been in existence since 1995. For the past 10-plus years our focus has been on issues of trafficking and prostitution of indigenous women. I think our interest in that was really piqued when there was an effort during the 2010 Olympics to license brothels, so we really began to focus intensively on that.

I want to make my presentation in three parts. The first part will deal with the complexities of indigenous women's experiences and how we become sexually exploited. The second portion I'm borrowing from my friend Cherry Smiley, whom you'll be hearing from on Thursday. She said to me that incest is....

Sorry, I'm feeling really rattled because the technology drove me crazy before I got on, so I'm struggling a little bit right now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

So am I, Ms. Blaney. Don't feel bad about that.

Go ahead.

[Fay Blaney]

I couldn't get onto Zoom. It was insane.

Anyway, Cherry said to me that incest is the boot camp for prostitution. My second point that I really want to make is that indigenous girls are sexually exploited, and it leads right into being trafficked or prostituted.

In my final section, I want to offer some recommendations. I'm titling that section “Nothing About Us Without Us”. It's kind of ironic, and I'll explain that later.

In the first part about the complexities that indigenous women face, I want to borrow from the literature review that the Native Women's Association of Canada did. They cite a UN global study talks about how trafficking victims are targeted. Traffickers go after women who are young, female, poor, undereducated and who come from dysfunctional homes and are searching for a better life. To that I would add the child welfare system. Indigenous women coming out of the child welfare system are very much targeted for trafficking.

I really want to underscore the fact that there's a huge lobby in this country to legalize prostitution, the sex work lobby. They're one dimensional in their perspective. I want to point out that there are huge complexities with indigenous women that are not factored into their equation. I don't need to say a whole lot about that because there has been so much happening in the media, such as the 215 children, plus the 104 more who have been found.

We know we struggle with racism—deeply rooted racism—and genocide in this country. Out of that we have a great deal of poverty. That's showing up in the levels of homelessness across this country. Indigenous women and their children are very much impacted by that.

Further, I just think that misogyny gets missed so much in our conversations around colonization. Misogyny plays a huge role—patriarchy plays a huge role—in what's happening to indigenous women and girls.

We have a member of the Aboriginal Women's Action Network—I'm hoping she's watching today—who never lets us forget that women with disabilities are often not considered in our conversations about sexual exploitation. Often, indigenous women become disabled as a result of violence.

We're marginalized in all of the institutions across this country. There are the cases that have been brought forward by Cindy Blackstock on child welfare, and right across this country there is the fact that so many of our children are in care.

The justice system, the racism within the justice system, and the police misconduct.... It's right through the whole system; I'm not picking only on the police. There have to be justice reforms. There should have been more in the mandate of the national inquiry to address the behaviour of the justice system.

The health care system, as my friend there has mentioned, the way she was treated.... Within our first nations government even, indigenous women are marginalized in all of those systems.

Within that process, we begin to believe what's being imposed on us, what's being force-fed to us. That message comes to us daily, routinely, everywhere. Every which way you slice it, indigenous women are marked to be lesser than, so we're very much targeted for trafficking. That's deemed to be the only role that we're capable of in Canadian society.

That's my first point. The complexities that indigenous women face in how we end up being sexually exploited have to be factored in. It's not an isolated instance of, “Oh, I'm so proud to be a sex worker, look at me.” There are many more factors at play that result in women being sexually exploited in the indigenous community.

For my second point, with regard to young women and girls, I often point to Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond's report when she was the representative for children and youth here in B.C. She released a report that looked over a three-year period. She examined all cases of sexual abuse within foster homes. The result of her study was that almost 70% of victims were indigenous girls. I think 20-something per cent were indigenous boys. When you look at all those percentages, there's barely anybody else being abused besides indigenous children.

We are definitely groomed for sexual exploitation, and we come to accept that as our fate in our lives. There are numerous other studies. I looked at the study that came out of the Vancouver Rape Relief & Women's Shelter, where they also examined 100 calls over a certain period of time. In their report they said that 12% of the callers were under the age of 14 when they were being sexually exploited, 12% were between the ages of 14 and 15, and 18% were between the ages of 16 and 18. That's pretty high when you think that almost half of indigenous callers were underage when they were being sexually exploited or trafficked.

In the report by Melissa Farley and Jacqueline Lynne, they tell us that of the women who were involved in their study, 96% of the indigenous women said they were being sexually abused as children before they entered into prostitution, or were being trafficked.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Let me just interrupt for a moment. Normally we have about a six-minute testimony, and we have lots of questions to come before our one o'clock hour. How much longer would you like to take before we go to our rounds of questions?

[Fay Blaney]

I'll take another minute and just conclude with “Nothing About Us Without Us”. I find that comment very ironic because a lot of different social justice groups are saying this. They want to be included in the decisions that affect their lives.

I was saying earlier to my friend that everything is decided for us; everything without us. I made the case that during the national action plan to end violence against indigenous women and girls, the thing that came out of the national inquiry was that there were no women's groups. Why is it that women can't speak for themselves? It's hugely problematic as far as I'm concerned.

My recommendations for addressing the crisis that we're faced with is to have a comprehensive feminist exiting service for indigenous women to exit prostitution, trafficking, sexual exploitation, because there's practically no such service right now. All we have currently are services that promote prostitution. They have centres that keep the holding pattern called “harm reduction”.

A guaranteed livable income.... I heard my friend at the top there, and I'm sorry, I don't know her name. Her last name is Brown. Anyway—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

It's Bryanna.

[Fay Blaney]

Yes. She talked about guaranteed livable income under food sovereignly and benefits that came out of the pandemic.

Further, women-only detox and addictions treatment are absolutely critical. Here in B.C. we have treatment facilities that are co-ed. I've experienced that and I am a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. I tell you, it's not easy to sit in a room where offenders are disclosing their experience of offending and I have to listen to that.

Finally, the funding of autonomous indigenous women's groups and organizations goes back to “nothing about us without us”. That's missing practically everywhere I look. Indigenous women are not leading the educational process or making decisions about our own lives. I can go on and on, but will stop there.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thanks so much for really remarkable testimony.

We would like to get to the committee members' questions for all of our witnesses. We're on the next round.

Mr. Viersen, are you ready to take the Conservative...?

Okay, go ahead for five minutes.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank our witnesses for being here today. We very much appreciate your testimony.

Ms. Blaney, a few years ago you testified at the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls on the expert and knowledge keeper panel. You gave recommendations.

One of the things you talked about was to go upstream and address why indigenous women and girls are being trafficked in the first place. Do you have any recommendations for preventing indigenous women and girls from being trafficked in the first place? What needs to change?

[Fay Blaney]

It came out in the recommendations that I gave. I think that women-only detox and addictions treatment facilities are really critical. I, for one, got right into my addictions when I was a teenager because of the sexual abuse and other forms of abuse, like being orphaned and those things I dealt with. I do believe in having women's centres. That's where I sprouted my wings. It was in the women's centres that I had access to and in the women's studies programs. Those are the places where I developed a consciousness and self-awareness. I wasn't able to defend myself against the oppression I was dealing with until I came upon women's groups, women's centres and women-safe spaces. That is really critical.

In the national inquiry, I talked about the importance of consciousness-raising groups. These are groups of indigenous women sitting together, talking about the issues that impact our lives and identifying what the areas of concern are. That's how we operate within the Aboriginal Women's Action Network. We do not provide services. We aren't service oriented. Primarily, our task is education, consciousness raising and political action. Out of that, incredible things happen. Some of our members were travelling across the country on the national women's march against poverty and violence.

Those are some of the things I think are really important to prevent the sex trafficking of indigenous girls, primarily.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Some of my research shows that the average sex trafficking victim in Canada is worth about $325,000 a year. There is huge money in it. That's part of the reason it happens as frequently as it does.

Where does that money come from? That money is a huge incentive to drive people into it and to drive traffickers to pursue trafficking of victims. How do we get rid of the money? Where does the money come from and then how do we push the money out of the system?

I'll go with Ms. Blaney and Ms. Brown.

[Fay Blaney]

I think the money comes from male entitlement.

In Sweden, they did a massive educational process, with the Nordic model that they developed. An important element of that was education around equality issues for women.

The Indian Act is built upon patriarchy, and it's going to be a long time before we're able to undo what has been done to us, including the current government's resistance to implementing Bill S-3, I think it is, on the status question.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Ms. Brown.

[Bryanna R. Brown]

I'm sorry, but would you be able to repeat the question?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Yes. In the past, money was a big driver in a lot of things, whether it was coming to Canada for fish or lumber or the beaver pelts. Today, we see that a victim of sex trafficking is worth about $325,000 a year to their trafficker.

The question basically is, where is that money coming from and how do we get that money out of the system?

[Bryanna R. Brown]

I think there's a large demand for it, of course.

I've noticed that people from all different backgrounds contribute to that demand, and I know that financial abuse is heavily tied in with the issue of human trafficking and indentured servitude.

About a year or two ago, someone was trying to groom me for human trafficking, and I luckily caught on to what they were doing prior to it actually happening. In the beginning stages, they tried to be in a relationship with me. It started off as something that seemed completely normal, just a regular boyfriend or relationship, and then they tried to get me tied to as many contracts as possible. I would have something under my name that I would have to pay back that also had the name of the trafficker on those contracts, say, for a car, or a two-year phone contract with Bell or Rogers—anything like that. Because they're so hard to get out of with those companies afterwards, it kind of ties you to that trafficker even more, and then you're forced into it in those ways.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thanks so much.

We'll go on to Adam van Koeverden for five minutes.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I just want to send out an extraordinary thank you to the witnesses today for providing such personal and vulnerable testimony. This is hard work for the government to do, but it doesn't compare to your lived experience. Your lived experience does contribute to progress, and I want to thank you on behalf of people who will be protected by future policies that this work will create. Thank you.

I'm joining you today from the traditional territory of the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation.

I also want to say that violence against women is almost always men's violence against women. In saying that, I want to cede my time to Lenore Zann, my colleague. This is her space and this is her work, and I think she has more valuable questions to ask than I would ask.

I want to thank everybody once again.

I'll go over to you, Lenore.

[Lenore Zann, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Thank you so much, Adam. Thank you for being so generous and for thinking of my time as well.

I want to say thank you to the witnesses. I know this is a difficult topic, but it's very, very important.

I want to highlight some of the things that Ms. Blaney mentioned, which are totally what I agree with. It is about misogyny. It is about patriarchy. It is about the inequality for women in society and the complete disdain and contempt that some men have towards women and girls. It needs to stop now. The more femicides we hear about, the more angry, really, I become. I know that these can all be averted if people are educated to believe that we are all equal, that you can have your emotions and be upset about something, but it doesn't mean you can kill somebody or try to control somebody else. This is all about control and domination. These are all colonial attitudes and actions anyway. By and large, I believe most women have been affected by this, our first nations people in particular, and I'm so, so, so sorry.

In the submission to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, the Native Women's Association of Canada stated that some of the recurring themes that contribute to the recruitment of indigenous women in trafficking include—we've talked about them today—precarious housing and poor living conditions; high rates of unemployment, unstable employment and low working wages; lack of access to social and economic resources and programs; prior exposure to human trafficking and sex trade from a young age, through family or friends; and family violence and the impacts of colonization, such as residential school experience and intergenerational trauma.

So tell us about “nothing about us without us”. What are the first steps we need to take to make sure we can crack down on this terrible practice of human trafficking? Putting a price—a price—on a woman's life is disgusting.

Ms. Blaney and Ms. Anderson, would you like to comment?

[Fay Blaney]

Hilda, would you like to go first?

[Hilda Anderson-Pyrz]

No, you can go first.

[Fay Blaney]

Okay.

I tied “nothing about us without us” to the funding of autonomous indigenous women's organizations so that we can spread our wings, like I did, in women's centres and in university. Studying women's studies there is where I learned about what happened to me.

It becomes so normalized. There is a book called Black Eyes All of the Time. I think we need another book that talks about the sexual abuse of indigenous girls and how that becomes so normalized that being trafficked isn't so far removed from our reality. The remedy to that, as far as I'm concerned, is capacity building amongst ourselves as indigenous women.

I never know how to do this respectfully, and I do want to be respectful. I have concerns about the fact that we have a well-resourced Assembly of First Nations but a poorly resourced Native Women's Association of Canada that can't adequately represent our interests across the country, much less at a local level. We really need to do that capacity building ourselves. As a result of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women, in 1972, I think, non-native women got women's centres all across this country. They got Status of Women Canada and the Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women. All of these things happened for non-indigenous women. We need our turn to do that. We need to decolonize from what was done to us in the Indian Act.

That's a long process. I fear we're not even starting that. We're still under the umbrella of our band councils and under this banner of colonialism, without specific focus on gendered colonialism, gendered racism and gendered poverty. Those things are pretty much absent, and they're eclipsed by the bigger questions of colonialism.

That's what I talk about a lot.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thank you.