Special Committee on Indigenous Women Committee on June 13th, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Stella Ambler]

Thank you so much.

We'll go over to you, Ms. Truppe, for seven minutes.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

Actually I think it's Ms. Block.

[The Chair, Conservative, Stella Ambler]

Okay, it's Ms. Block.

You're sharing your time, I believe.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

I am, thank you very much, Madam Chair. I will be sharing my time with my colleague, Ms. Rempel.

I want to thank our witnesses for being here today. This is turning out to be a very interesting and intense study, and we haven't been at it very long. That's for sure.

I did have the opportunity a number of years ago to travel with the status of women committee to Nunavut and Labrador and New Brunswick, and heard first-hand some of the testimony of women. It was a study on violence against aboriginal women, and certainly, the challenges that are faced when living in rural and remote first nation communities.

Obviously, we've heard from other organizations, and it's obvious that each of you has highlighted some of the tensions that exist with regard to identifying the root causes, which is our first focus in this study, and building capacity in communities yet needing to address immediate and often urgent situations as they arise in communities. There are these three things going on for many different organizations and folks who are providing support to individuals in these rural and remote communities.

I'm going to ask a question of Commander Brosseau. In your opening remarks you spoke of a joint agreement between the RCMP and the Assembly of First Nations, and you highlighted a work plan that aligns your organizations in working collaboratively on issues related to missing and murdered aboriginal persons. I wonder if you would be able to speak to any particular initiatives, any on-the-ground projects that are happening as a result of that work plan.

[A/Commr Kevin Brosseau]

Thank you.

I will speak briefly about the work plan more generally and then turn it over to my colleague Tyler Bates to give a little more granular information.

At my level, how it really works, the key aspect of the work plan from my perspective is building mutual understanding and communication so that when an incident happens in a first nation community I'm in direct contact with a leader of the AFN in the province of Manitoba and/or nationally to talk about the implications of that on the community. The supports for the people, family, if you will, if it's a tragedy, someone who fell victim to homicide and such, those resources are mustered immediately and provided to those people. That's one tangible way this work plan is working in the province of Manitoba.

I'll turn it over to Superintendent Bates to flesh that out for you.

[Superintendent Tyler Bates, Director, National Aboriginal Policing and Crime Prevention Services, Royal Canadian Mounted Police]

To further answer your question, when a traumatic incident impacts a first nation or aboriginal community, it's important that the proper supports are put in place for the family that's affected. We recognize that we're one level of that support, but other levels of support are critical to assisting the family in crisis, assisting the community that has been victimized in a regrettable way.

Following through with our commitments in the work plan, our commitment is to engage the Assembly of First Nations as early as possible, so they can liaise with their regional contacts and they can reach out to the families and communities that are affected.

That is the most tangible aspect of the work plan—open and transparent communication about incidents that are transpiring, as much as we're able to without compromising ongoing investigations. We need to involve our partners early so they can intervene and provide for the support of those affected.

I should comment as well, further to that, that the work plan is under further dialogue. We had discussions most recently with AFN and our commissioner that we're going to review the work plan and its work, and commit to further engagement and further initiatives.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

Thank you very much.

I'll turn it over to Michelle.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Centre-North, AB]

Very briefly in the time I have remaining, Ms. Proulx and Ms. Crozier, I looked through some of the recommendations you had in your brief. A lot of them had one common element, and that was working closely with the leadership within first nation communities.

I wonder if you could comment on how many leaders you work with in first nation communities right now who are women, and if you think that potentially looking at strategies to enable more women to seek leadership positions within first nation communities would help to get some of your work done more effectively.

[Jamie Crozier]

I think the leaders we are currently seeing are not necessarily designated leaders. Yes, the vast majority are going to be women, but they are whom Ruth referred to as the natural leaders. They're the stronger, healthier pillars of the community, the matriarchs everybody goes to.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Centre-North, AB]

They're not formally in band leadership, in elected positions.

[Ruth Proulx]

Not necessarily.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Centre-North, AB]

Do you think that impacts some of these outcomes you guys are looking at achieving?

[Jamie Crozier]

Yes.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Centre-North, AB]

I find that very interesting. I wanted to tease out our previous witness groups as well. In talking to some of these women you deal with in non-official leadership positions, what could we do or implement to try to get them into more formal governance roles, to seek office?

[Jamie Crozier]

That's a really good question. From our perspective, some of the suggestions have been not necessarily changing who's governing, but more of making sure the people who are in those positions are healing themselves. Then you will experience the trickle-down effect.

If you have a healthy healer or a healthy individual at the top, in that position, it's going to impact all others.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Centre-North, AB]

I'm a woman in office myself, and I think it's great when women have voices at the legislative table and implement these things. If that's something you're recommending this committee look at, I think you'd have a lot of voices around this table on both sides who would support it.

[Ruth Proulx]

There is another thing I want to point out, and I pointed it out to Jamie. I was looking around the room to see how many men were at the table. We know that domestic violence is a male-dominated crime and we need men to hold men accountable, as well. Just as much as we need women to stand up for themselves, we need men to stand up to other men and say it is unacceptable. I want to point that out.

[The Chair, Conservative, Stella Ambler]

Thank you very much.

Over to you now, Ms. Bennett, for seven minutes.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Thank you very much.

Thank you both for your really clear message around the bottom-up and the need for natural healers and helpers to actually be identified as a way forward.

I've been asked by the previous panel to ask about the Human Rights Watch report, “Those Who Take Us Away”. I assume you thought that was coming.

Of the five recommendations in the report to the Government of Canada, three actually relate to policing. First was around the historical relationship between police and indigenous women and girls, the problems with incidents of police misconduct, and the socio-economic marginalization of indigenous women and girls that predispose. The second was around the accountability and the coordination of government bodies charged with preventing and responding to violence; and the third was the need for independent civilian investigations of reported incidents.

I think what we're hearing is that there has been a breakdown of trust. If people don't feel they can come to the police with a situation, then things get worse. If it's not a trusting relationship.... I think we've seen that, even within the status of women committee in terms of harassment. If even women within the force don't feel they can report things or else they will become a target, then how can you expect a young indigenous woman to think it's a safe place to go and tell her story?

We are hearing time and time again about sexism and racism within policing as being a root cause, that it's not a safe place. You've seen this report. There were people who asked why these individuals didn't come forward. Well, we know why they didn't come forward. I guess I'd like to know where you think this committee should go in terms of finding out what the next step should be, and how we get this fixed.

There are people who think the force is 20 years behind the Canadian Forces in terms of sexism and racism. How do we deal with this so we can get the respect back, so that people can feel that at the earliest situation they can report it fairly to the police and have something done about it, instead of saying, “What did you expect?" because it's an indigenous girl or woman?

[A/Commr Kevin Brosseau]

It's a question I could probably reflect on for some time, Ms. Bennett. You've said a lot, undoubtedly. Perhaps Superintendent Cuillierrier can also provide her thoughts.

Let me, first of all, speak to the Human Rights Watch report. You've read it, and you know what it says. The RCMP did respond and met with the Human Rights Watch authors and discussed some of these horrendous allegations. We asked if we could help get some of these folks to come forward. I don't believe anything like that has happened.

Importantly, this past May, the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP, an independent civilian agency, initiated a public interest investigation into policing and alleged policing abuses across northern British Columbia. This was in direct response, I think, to the Human Rights Watch report and the allegations that were made. I think that's exactly what was being called for, and it will be an important process. The RCMP will collaborate and cooperate fully with that investigation. This will be an independent civilian agency, where I hope people will feel enough trust to come forward and talk about some of the things that have happened.

I paused when you asked the question because this is not lost on me. I'm a small-town person, a small-town guy, and many of the communities we police are small towns where my perhaps naive belief is that I'd like to see young people running to the police car when it pulls into the school as opposed to running away from it. That's really what I'd like to see. Will that ever happen? It happens. It happens today in some communities. I'm proud to say that my members feel this sense of belonging. They are coaching hockey teams, soccer teams, Girl Scouts, Cubs, you name it. They are helping to bring healing to many communities across the country.

But this isn't taking place everywhere, and it needs to. Much work remains to be done.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

In any organization there are bad apples. How does your organization deal with bad apples? I think the recent legislation may sometimes give perpetrators power over the complainants. I think people know and are concerned that whether or not people like yourself....

My dad was a policeman before the war. He was a nice guy and he spent a lot of time dealing with domestic violence. I know there are great people who choose to do this. But what we're hearing from the families is that there seems to be some people who choose this work because they're already bullies and somehow the training builds the bullying presence up, and we don't know how to take this back down.

Is there a screening to make sure that we get the right people doing these jobs? If we have the wrong people in certain positions, we should be able to move them out.

[The Chair, Conservative, Stella Ambler]

Please give a short answer, if you would.

[A/Commr Kevin Brosseau]

Yes, there is screening. Yes, there are efforts to be more representative. I believe recruiting through a window as opposed to a mirror is critical. We represent the communities we police. We'll be far more effective and more trustworthy if we look like and represent the various cultures and genders in our communities. That would be a short answer to your question.

My position—and I'm directly accountable for this—is to ensure that when misconduct occurs in my workplace, I will deal with it swiftly and effectively.

[The Chair, Conservative, Stella Ambler]

Thank you.

Over to you, Ms. Truppe.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll just get right to some of my questions since we don't have a lot of time.

Thank you all for being here. I have a few questions for Ruth from PACE. I think you've done a great job on the reserves on some of the programs, who you are trying to work with, and what you're trying to achieve. You mentioned that you teach crisis intervention, and I believe you said you were teaching volunteers so that they could teach others. Is it easy to get volunteers?