That's fine.
Evidence of meeting #51 for Status of Women in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was family.
Evidence of meeting #51 for Status of Women in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was family.
Noon
Liberal
Noon
Conservative
Nina Grewal Conservative Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Obviously, when all of us are sitting around this table talking about violence against aboriginal women, I think there is a perpetrator, and the perpetrator is a man. According to you, are there any programs for men so they can come out of all this violent behaviour?
Noon
President and Founder, Institute for the Advancement of Aboriginal Women
We had a declaration on the Decade of Difference for aboriginal women, which we proclaimed in 2005. A man and his wife drove all the way from High Prairie, Alberta, which is quite a way up north, to be there. What he said to me, and I admire him for his courage, was, “The woman goes in for treatment for 28 days, and when she comes out, the man is just the same.” He said he was trying to start a men's group in High Prairie. He was talking to the men and trying to convince them that they should come together and talk about the violence, but he was having a really rough time.
My thought is that this man was very courageous, very determined, and that's where it has to happen. It won't happen by women's organizations saying, “Oh, you men, you have to do this.” That won't work. The men themselves have to do this, with our support, of course, but not with us taking the lead.
I wanted to bring up one quick example. When the massacre of women happened at École Polytechnique, one of the mothers came to Edmonton to one of the ceremonies, and she said she had tried to get any women's organization to look at the role of men and how men were being brought up. She, as a mother, said, “We have boys; we need to nurture them.” She was totally blocked. No women's organization would listen to her. But I think she needs to be listened to. Even though it's several years now, I think nothing has improved, so the idea that the government may consider assisting men who are dedicated to changing their attitudes and the lives of the women they are with, that may be a startling new initiative that could happen.
Noon
Conservative
Noon
Professor, University of Calgary, As an Individual
I have just a couple of things to add. I think in addition to the importance of having specialized treatment for aboriginal men who are perpetrators of violence, we also have to recognize that systemic problems continue in Canada and that aboriginal men are also victims of ongoing colonization and oppression. Until we deal with those issues as a Canadian society, we're not going to deal with the systemic nature of this violence, and that's an issue for aboriginal men as well as for aboriginal women.
Noon
Author, As an Individual
I agree with both of the previous two speakers, but I would like to add that I am aware of at least one program for abusive men in Fort McMurray that was initiated by the women's shelter, and they've been funded for this for a few years. They're finding it quite successful. Oftentimes, their participants are mandated by the courts.
On my communications with them, when aboriginal men come they often don't stick around very long, and it's really unfortunate. There's obviously something missing in the programming and the delivery, so perhaps that's something that should be looked into.
12:05 p.m.
Conservative
Dona Cadman Conservative Surrey North, BC
I would like to know how many aboriginal women there are in Canada, and if there is one woman who could group you all together, be a figurehead, and come forward to fight for you.
12:05 p.m.
Author, As an Individual
The aboriginal population is one of the fastest growing in Canada, and that's also true in Alberta. I hesitate to say. I ignored my statistics for today. I think it's between 5% and 8%.
12:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
Can I ask someone to think about that? Maybe at the end of the session, if you can get that data or at least have something to offer on Dona's question, we can go back to it. We may be able to have another round in which we can explore that again.
Now I'll go to Madame Demers.
12:05 p.m.
Bloc
Nicole Demers Bloc Laval, QC
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
Jennifer, I would like to go back to Bill C-31. That is where we see the importance of the education and awareness that you were talking about earlier.
After having consulted Quebec Native Women and all the aboriginal women's groups in Quebec, our caucus had decided to vote against Bill C-31. A few weeks before the final vote, aboriginal women's groups contacted us and said that they had changed their minds and that we had to vote for it. They said that, even if the bill affected only one or two children, at least they would be accepted and recognized by the community and would become full members of it.
It is very difficult. All through this mission that we have set for ourselves, we have heard a lot of stories that have made us understand how important it is for mothers and grandmothers to see that their children are accepted by the community. That is why we rose to vote for the bill.
You are telling me today that we should have voted against it. But we voted for it because that was what the communities wanted.
So where should we get our information from? How are we supposed to react? How do we know that we reacted correctly? I just don't know any more.
Personally, I do not like making decisions for other people. I would like to be sure that the decisions that are made come from the people I represent, and not from me.
12:05 p.m.
Professor, University of Calgary, As an Individual
I have a couple of thoughts as a result of what you've said. First of all, no one speaks with one voice. We have a huge diversity of aboriginal people across the country, so we need to recognize that aboriginal women are not going to speak with one voice, whether it's on Bill C-3 or on issues of violence against women. It's important to hear all of those different voices.
I know in politics sometimes compromises have to be made, so I understand the difficulty of the situation you are facing. But I think, again, there's a more fundamental systemic issue here, and that's the ongoing colonization of the aboriginal peoples of Canada through the Indian Act. So we're tinkering with that through Bill C-3. We're not addressing the fundamental systemic problem of that ongoing colonial document, and that needs to be addressed.
12:10 p.m.
Bloc
Nicole Demers Bloc Laval, QC
Muriel, what do we have to do to convince the government to stop funding projects? It is true that $28 million has been invested since 2007, but the money has gone to 200 projects, meaning $10,000 per project. You do not get very far with that. It means 8 months per project, 10 months, 12 months. How do we make the government understand that we do not need 200 projects funded at $10,000 each? To make long-term changes and to make a difference, we have to take the $28 million and spend it on four or five projects.
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
We've gone over time here, but I will give you an opportunity to very quickly respond, if you can.
Muriel.
12:10 p.m.
President and Founder, Institute for the Advancement of Aboriginal Women
The amount of money is not sufficient; $23 million is nothing. Divide it up across the country and you have nothing. The question, as I understand it, was how can we better appropriate the funding to realize some results. Number one, stop the $10,000 to $20,000. They have denied totally the cost of administration. So my question was, do we run it out of the parking lot? I think there needs to be a national strategy and a coming together. We did have the aboriginal women's summit, which nobody seems to know about or read about. I don't think it's even been brought to the attention of Parliament, although it was hosted by the premier of Newfoundland and the premier of B.C.
I think there is a mechanism, which I would love to be a part of, to assess the long-term value and the long-term progress that needs to be made. But I must say I liked the ideas that have come before me, which is a national campaign, national awareness, national acknowledgement of the aboriginal women in this country—who are brilliant, by the way. I hope and pray that you will read my presentation, because we have done that. We have the Esquao awards. Esquao is a beautiful Cree word for “woman”, which has been stylized, and we honour our women. But we are very different in our honouring. We have no jury. The communities nominate the women and we honour them. It has created such goodwill in this province among the women because there isn't one woman in this province who will not be honoured. If their community, or their mother, or their son, or their father nominates them, they will be honoured. So they get their 15 minutes of fame on television.
I would love to be part of a campaign to bring this forward to the Canadian people, because we also have social justice awards in which we have honoured, for instance, Irene Khan, who was the secretary general of Amnesty International, who did what we couldn't do, which is bring the issue of the deaths of aboriginal women to the international scene.
There are exciting ways to address this issue. The incidents are horrific, but that does not mean that we cannot progress in this country and make it welcoming to aboriginal women.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
Thank you very much.
I am going to go to Ms. Crowder now for five minutes, because she has to leave in five minutes.
12:15 p.m.
NDP
Jean Crowder NDP Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC
I'm going to apologize, because I have to bolt. I have a plane to catch.
I wanted to comment, Muriel, that I absolutely have read the summit reports. I attended the second summit and I agree there has not been any action.
My question, Jennifer--and you and Sandra raised it a couple of times--is around the need to examine the impact on aboriginal women when policies and legislation are developed. I think you only have to look to matrimonial real property to see how that hasn't played out. There was a ministerial representative's report; Wendy Grant-John did a very good report, which was disregarded when the legislation was developed. The Native Women's Association and other organizations did a minimal consultation process because they weren't funded and there wasn't enough time, and their findings were largely disregarded, so even when people are asked for their views and opinions when the legislation is developed, it simply doesn't happen.
In theory, departments do a gender-based analysis, a GBA, when they examine any legislation, but we know from witnesses who came before the status of women committee in 2004-05 that it's largely lip service: “Let's check--yes, we did it.”
If the gender-based analysis could be implemented in a more meaningful way and have the impact on aboriginal women incorporated into it, do you think that would help?
12:15 p.m.
Author, As an Individual
I think it would. I think any time you can involve the grassroots, the people who actually experience this stuff, it is always valuable, and it's more valuable than having one representative from each province give some kind of feedback.
12:15 p.m.
NDP
Jean Crowder NDP Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC
Well, I think it touches a point. I'll come back to you.
There is no pan-aboriginal woman, so to have one voice out of each province or one voice nationally try to represent the interests of aboriginal women simply isn't realistic.
Would you comment, Jennifer?
12:15 p.m.
Professor, University of Calgary, As an Individual
I agree with that. On the consultation front, I teach constitutional law, so I teach the duty to consult and the duty to accommodate. I think sometimes we forget about the accommodation piece. We think about the consultation piece, but once those consultations are done, they have to actually find their way into whatever response the government makes.
Rather than having legislation litigated once it's developed--because it hasn't done a proper job of accounting for the diverse needs of aboriginal women--why not actually make that accommodation at the time that legal responses are developed, rather than having to go through challenges like Sharon McIvor's after the fact?
12:15 p.m.
NDP
Jean Crowder NDP Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC
Jennifer, just to come back on that point, I'm not a lawyer, and I'm certainly not a constitutional expert, but is there a way to develop legislation that is more flexible and that can recognize the nation differences? We are talking about nations within nations here. Is there a way to develop legislation that recognizes those differences?