Status of Women Committee on April 26th, 2010

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Welcome, everyone.

Like all my colleagues, I am trying to understand how we are coordinating all that. I was told last week in a meeting that 582 women are dead, missing, murdered.

Ms. Morency, you told my colleague earlier that you have had an investigation going since 2006. We are wondering what this investigation is all about and what you are doing. My question is also for the RCMP because it seems that you are also saying that there is some coordination, some sharing.

Is the RCMP also involved in the investigation? We want to know what is happening to these women. What are we doing in terms of justice to try and solve this problem?

[Carole Morency]

First, it is not an investigation. It is a provincial and federal government working group. We also have partners from all sectors, like the RCMP and other federal, provincial and territorial departments.

This working group is doing a study. We are examining all the questions that come up in relation to the cases of missing women.

While the focus is to look specifically at whether we can identify best practices, and ultimately risk factors that perhaps lead to somebody who becomes a serial killer and targets women in particular, obviously the spectrum is broad, from a missing person to the situation where police and criminal justice professionals may think a person is a victim of a serial killer.

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

What stage is the study at?

[Carole Morency]

We hope to conclude the report and the study for federal-provincial-territorial ministers later this year, so it is an ongoing--

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

When?

[Carole Morency]

Later in the year--that's all I can say.

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Did the RCMP participate in this study? If so, how?

[A/Commr Bob Paulson]

Personally, I am not aware of that study, but that is not to say that...

[An hon. member]

She said they were partners.

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

You should be aware: 582 dead, missing women...

[A/Commr Bob Paulson]

I am aware of that study.

I'm aware of the study of the 582 missing women; I've read that study. I understand all of that.

Is that the study you are talking about?

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

We are listening.

[A/Commr Bob Paulson]

Okay. I'm aware of that study.

In terms of our responses to missing women and murdered women, I also wanted to give you some examples of some task forces that we run right now in northern British Columbia along the Highway of Tears and the current study that's going on in Manitoba right now.

I wanted to say that the RCMP and other police forces are working collaboratively to investigate, to search for the killers, the perpetrators. But it's not only the investigative steps that we focus on, because we do that. We also work with our colleagues in Justice and other areas throughout communities, to begin to get an understanding of the nature of the crimes that we're investigating to the communities to—

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

You have known that these crimes have been committed for some time. Other crimes are happening right now. Predators are still around. You are saying that you are doing a study to try to understand how that happens.

[A/Commr Bob Paulson]

That is not what I said, Mr. Desnoyers.

I said there are two dimensions to recognizing the magnitude of the problem, as evidenced in the study you started speaking of. When you realize that someone is preying upon vulnerable areas of our society, you want to try to stop that immediately, and we are advancing many best practices. There is the Picton case, for example, in terms of how we organized the detective work and the forensic work. Similarly, in other cases we're working very hard at bringing leading-edge technology and forensic techniques to bear to find the suspects. Simultaneously, though, we've recognized the community's need for information, for understanding, and for a fuller comprehension of the impact of those types of crimes on communities, so that can contribute to the prevention.

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you.

Mr. Buller, have you also contributed to this study? If so, how?

[Ed Buller]

I've sat as a representative of Public Safety Canada on the FPT working group for two or three years--a number of meetings.

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Are you saying that you have been working on this study for two or three years?

[Ed Buller]

I've been—

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Cathy McLeod]

Excuse me, I'll have to cut in now and go on to Ms. Mathyssen. Sorry.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I feel I should give everyone an opportunity to finish the statements that have not been completed, but I did want to talk a little bit about some of what we heard from other witnesses.

One of the things we heard was that it's problematic. They estimate that there are 582 missing or murdered women, but there is no clear and definitive answer to that. It could be far more, because there's no way of collecting data about the race of the victims. There was a suggestion that this would be an important piece, in terms of really coming to grips with what is happening in our communities. I know Amnesty International advocated for that.

Is that something that's possible? I know there's a lot of sensitivity about that kind of data collection, but is it something that would be a positive step?

[A/Commr Bob Paulson]

We're very careful about the information we collect with respect to people's ethnicity or their race and so on.

By way of numbers, though, I wanted to share with the committee that, as recently as March, we had 10,477 missing people reported in Canada, of which 5,824 were characterized as white and 4,653 were characterized as non-white. That's about as close as we can get to informing that sort of a discussion.

We do collect some data in respect of ethnicity and race, but only insofar as it advances the investigation in terms of trying to identify the victim, ultimately. It's a very sensitive area. It's an area that we, frankly, are careful about because we don't know.... We know that it informs the sort of public policy work that you are engaged in right now, but it's not necessarily helpful, and it's not always instructive to the investigative response that we have to bring to bear on some of these things.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Okay.

Mr. Buller, I know this tends to be provincial, but I wanted to ask about the issue of children in care, children who have been apprehended. It would seem to me that the impact that has on children is very negative, because they're removed from their community, from their family, and they're unable to have the kind of bonding that strengthens family and community, the kind of bonding, strengthening, that you're talking about in the healing process.

Have you taken a look at that? Have you any comments or suggestions to make in regard to the fact that so many children are being apprehended and taken into care?

[Ed Buller]

We haven't studied that specifically, but from having worked in a number of communities over the years, I feel there are two aspects to that question. First, if they're removed from their homes and sent to a non-aboriginal family, we know that creates problems later on when they come to realize that they're aboriginal but they don't live in an aboriginal environment or follow their own traditions or culture.

A number of first nations and tribal organizations have taken responsibility for the child welfare system. They will remove the child from the home but will try as much as possible to keep the child in the community or in another community where there are relatives of the child. So you wouldn't see an Ojibway child being sent to a Blackfoot community. Rather, they would look for a place for that child where he or she would be safe and would be able to live the life of an Ojibway child.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

We did have such a project in my community, but the funding was cut, and unfortunately it seems to have gone by the wayside.

Thank you for that.