Thank you.
Good evening, Madam Chair, and committee members. My name is Shirley Cuillierrier and I'm the officer in charge of the partnerships and external relations team for federal policing.
I would first like to thank you for inviting me to discuss the RCMP's role within the national anti-drug strategy and the important links it has to Aboriginal communities across Canada.
I would also like to touch upon the RCMP's Human Trafficking National Coordination Centre.
I'm especially pleased that the special committee is focused on violence against indigenous women.
An important issue, which is impacting the safety of all Canadian communities, aboriginal and non-aboriginal, is the prevalence and the use of drugs. The national anti-drug strategy, also known as NADS, is assisting the RCMP to take on those who produce and push drugs on our streets and in our communities. The RCMP, through its connection to over 600 aboriginal communities, is supporting the objective of the national anti-drug strategy in helping families and local communities, and steering vulnerable youth away from a life of drugs and crime.
NADS is a horizontal initiative led by Justice Canada, and includes 11 other federal departments and agencies. NADS is based on three pillars or action plans: prevention, treatment, and enforcement. The RCMP is actively involved in the strategy's prevention and enforcement action plans.
The RCMP's federal policing public engagement team supports the prevention action plan to prevent youth from using illicit drugs by enhancing their understanding of the harmful social and health effects of illicit drug use, and to develop and implement community-based interventions to prevent illicit drug use.
Collectively, these actions are contributing to increased awareness and to safer and healthier communities through coordinated efforts to prevent drug use, as well as to reduce production and distribution of illicit drugs across Canada.
The national anti-drug strategy has assisted the RCMP to expand its dedicated anti-drug teams to help locate, investigate, disrupt, and shut down organizations involved in the production and distribution of illicit drugs, and to help law enforcement stop the flow of money that organized crime makes from this illicit drug trade.
Collectively these actions are contributing to increased awareness and to safer and healthier communities through coordinated efforts to prevent drug use, and reduce the production and distribution of illicit drugs across Canada. The aboriginal shield program, and the drug abuse resistance education program, are two examples that fall under NADS and have been implemented in communities across the country. They provide information, tools, and skills on how to recognize and avoid bad situations and make healthy decisions.
The RCMP's Human Trafficking National Coordination Centre works with domestic and international agencies to develop an extensive network of partnerships, monitor investigations from a national perspective, facilitate requests from international law enforcement partners, and provide intelligence analysis to law enforcement partners.
The Human Trafficking National Coordination Centre has developed human trafficking awareness tool kits for the public, youth, and police, as well as an online police training resource and an advanced police investigators course offered to senior investigators. The RCMP has distributed human trafficking awareness materials to aboriginal communities and organizations in an effort to educate and support increased community engagement.
I'd be pleased to answer any questions you may have.
Thank you.