Kwe; hello.
I would first like to acknowledge the territory we are on. We are on Algonquin territory, the territory of my ancestors. Meegwetch for inviting me here today to speak on behalf of Families of Sisters in Spirit.
It breaks my heart to be here again. I was invited to speak two years ago by the Committee on the Status of Women and here I am again, two years later. I started this journey for justice in 2001 when I lost a very important person in my life, my mother, Gladys Tolley. Tonight I'm here to speak as a family member on behalf of all our families.
As a family member for almost 12 years, I have not seen any change for our missing and murdered women. We know that so many of our sisters, so many—I don't want to put a number here because there are too many different numbers so I'm saying “so many”—of our sisters are missing and murdered and it continues even more today.
I know this because I post these women. Almost every day I post two or three, sometimes five or six, during a week. Today, I'm here to ask you to hear from the families. These families have been left out. The same voices are being heard all the time, but with no result and with very few families involved. So many people are speaking out on our behalf, but nothing is coming out of these meetings except another meeting.
We don't want to wait any longer. They had a national aboriginal summit in Winnepeg in 2012. They had an AFN-NWAC assembly in April. We haven't heard anything. All we know is that there's going to be a meeting in 2014 for the missing and murdered women. Well, families don't want to wait that long. We want action, and we want action now.
Enough studies—here's all the studies and even more. Recommendations, if you guys want recommendations they're all here. Books and books and books are here. Is this what we need, more reports, more recommendations? How about starting right here with Amnesty's “Stolen Sisters”? There are so many recommendations. We don't need any more recommendations. We have them all here. All we have to do is come back and look at these. We don't need to make any more recommendations, there are so many here already.
What we need are financial resources to assist families. We need resources for anti-violence work, prevention work, grief and counselling, community safety, programs for men and women and children, for families going through trial. We need billboards. We need front-line workers. We need so many services and we need them now.
How much did this committee cost? We could have used those resources to help families. I also wonder what the RCMP are doing to help indigenous women and families. There was also a national database. What is it doing to help families? We don't need any more studies. We need action.
In one of the interviews with Prime Minister Harper, he said the issue has been studied extensively and “it is time to pass to action.” I think it's time to pass to action, too. This is why we shouldn't have any more studies.
No one has the right to condemn you on how you repair your heart, or how long you choose to grieve because no one knows how much you're hurting. Recovering takes time and everyone heals at their own pace.
Meegwetch. I'm going to pass it over to Colleen Cardinal.