Having appeared before standing committees many times in the past, I know how good it is for us that you have come here to Thunder Bay to hear from us. Nonetheless, I am not very pleased at getting five to seven minutes for this very important occasion, for being able to tell our story in a very real way.
I represent 14 reserve communities in the Robinson Superior Treaty area, and also seven off-reserve communities in our territory, spreading right up to Michipicoten and Collins and all those very isolated places in between.
Now I'm going to show you this Status of Women Canada women's program: I participated in the development of the first program for the Native Women's Association of Canada in developing the elements and principles of that policy. Today, when looking at what you fund now, it's a far, far cry from that: you don't do anything other than provide core funding to some groups.
You've provided us, Robinson Superior, with moneys to meet. Now we go to Canadian Heritage: we can get $25,000. We just got approved for that. The reason I'm telling you this is that all these things these women have said will be said again for another 40 years.
When the Berger commission came through northwestern Ontario in the late sixties, I went there as the president of the Ontario Native Women's Association to make a presentation on the effect of any pipeline and any of that kind of work in bringing in hoards of men. Soon, impregnation became a way of life for our women in those smaller communities. I was very forthright about what I saw and what I heard, and I told them at that time about what was happening to us.
I can go to any kind of conference, including this one, where each one of these women are saying the same damn thing that we said 50 and 60 years ago. Why? What are you people not doing that will have some meaningful impact?
I'm telling you that one thing is to re-look, to re-examine the Status of Women Canada funding criteria and the projects they will or won't fund. This government, including past Liberal governments, with the participation of the NDP...you people are not really, really recognizing what is needed in those little communities that I talk about. For those women.... You're not even going to get any real participation from our women in the development and implementation of the matrimonial property rights law that's forthcoming, because they're scared. They need people like me and these other women who will come out on the front lines and say: “Look, these women are scared to talk. They can't talk in their communities because they're going to get beat up”.
So not only do you have this other kind of physical violence, but you have all your systemic violence that is always directed to us. Who's the first to get locked up? Us. That's what happens to us. I've seen it. I've been there. I started this organization, Beendigen, in the seventies, and it bothers me greatly that these women are still suffering and dealing with inadequate funding resources. That's a shame. It's a shame on all of those people who are associated with these kinds of programs--and not just in Thunder Bay.
The other thing that still behooves me.... Why is there only one aboriginal-led program delivery in the whole of the north? You might have little smatterings of programs here and there, but there's nothing that can be of any real benefit to those women. They need the safe houses. They need all kinds of things.
I have with me three reports. I also have the workshop report from the founding conference of the Robinson Superior Treaty Women's Council that states exactly what the women were saying in that particular workshop. I'm leaving this with you. I'm sure it's going to end up on somebody's desk, but whether it gets read or not is another thing. But I want you to trust me: what I'm telling you, and what these papers say, is the truth.
We as the Robinson Superior Treaty Women's Council cannot rely on somebody to tell our story. We need to be able to be upfront and speak for ourselves, which we did at the gathering of the grandmothers. What a powerful conference. The women came out and cried. The grandmothers were crying because Dilico, the supposedly aboriginal-led child welfare agency, was taking their kids away left and right for money so that they could keep on hiring all these non-native people working—70% of them are non-native—and taking our kids away from us.
We had the aboriginal leadership there, John Beaucage. We had all of them there. They heard what these women were saying. “Oh, yes, we'll help you. We'll help you.” Where were they? For the last two years we haven't heard from them. He's now become the child advocate in Ontario. We still haven't heard from him. What is being done? What we see in the paper is that they're helping these child welfare agencies get more money to keep on taking our kids away. They're not hearing us. They're not listening to us. And they ignore us.
Our organization cannot continue to be a volunteer group. That's what we are. I wrote all the proposals to fund these gatherings. I'm retired, but I am called upon because there are no resources for our women out there. Every one of these women will agree the action has to come from the communities. The women themselves have to gather the tools among them, bring them in, and have discussions in the community about what they want. That's what we did. You have that information here. It's called the kitchen table tour. We went into every one of those communities and heard from those women, and they told us what they wanted. We have spread this around with, of course, our limited funds.
Finally, I know you folks are looking at hopefully revitalizing and whatever you have to do, but please include in your criteria funding for regional groups. Those include the Nishnawbe Aski Nation women's groups and ours—not just ONWA and not just NWAC, because they're mainstream and they hardly even exist in our territory. We exist in our territory. We do the work in our communities. Not just anybody can come in and tell.... I can't even go into Geraldton and say, “Well, you guys, do this”. No. Those women—and we've heard from them—told us what they want. We need to help them to develop those action plans into the things they vitally want.
Thank you.