I think two months ago I was at a hearing on legal aid, and I was completely misunderstood in the first five minutes.
We appreciate the committee's decision to invite women's groups to speak about violence against aboriginal women and about our struggle to end it and achieve liberty and freedom for all women.
Surely in this room we can agree that although women in Canada formally have equal rights, in reality women in Canada, and aboriginal women in particular, do not have equality in their political, economic, and domestic lives. Aboriginal women do not have representational power in the living political institutions in the democracy of Canada: the federal Parliament, the government, and the Supreme Court. Therefore, independent aboriginal women's groups have a crucial role to play in bringing the voice, the experience, and the wisdom of aboriginal women to the political decision-making arena.
We are calling on the Government of Canada to provide appropriate funding--with no strings attached, with no demands, with no conditions--to the only national aboriginal women's group in Canada, NWAC, the Native Women's Association of Canada; and to consult with NWAC regarding any issue that can affect aboriginal women in Canada.
My second point is about policing male violence against women. We know from 35--