Status of Women Committee on Jan. 21st, 2011

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Dona Cadman]

Would you give it to the clerk so we can all see it later?

[Muriel Stanley Venne]

But just let me conclude.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Dona Cadman]

Okay.

[Muriel Stanley Venne]

What is basic or fundamental to violence against aboriginal women in this country is the lack of funding to the women, to our organization and to every other organization in this country, to be able to be full citizens. They're not full citizens; they take the brunt of the hatred that pervades....

I urge you, I beg you, to make the strongest possible representations to the Government of Canada, because we have the programs. We are the experts. We know what needs to happen, but we don't have the money to go for that.

In the 16 years that we've been in existence, there hasn't been one year that we haven't struggled to keep our doors open, and it's because of the way in which aboriginal women have been treated, categorically, across this country.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Dona Cadman]

Thank you, Muriel.

Now we'll have a round of seven minutes of questions, and we'll start with Ms. Neville.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, the three of you, for being here most of the morning.

I'm going to direct my questions primarily at you, Jennifer. I'll put my questions out and you can answer however you want.

I'd like to know what recommendations of yours you didn't get to.

I'd also like to know if you have done any work on the current government's crime bills and their impact on women. We've asked for some information, which we've not received yet. We're looking at it through Parliament, but I'd be interested to know if you've done anything on them.

Thirdly, one of the issues that has come up in the discussions is that there are many aboriginal women who are incarcerated, and I want to know if you have done any work on whether the reason for their incarceration is in response to violence against them.

I'll let you go with those.

[Prof. Jennifer Koshan]

Thanks.

I think I'll start with your second and third questions and then come back to the first one about my recommendations.

I haven't done specific research on the impact of the government's new crime bills on aboriginal women, but I do think it's fair to say the following, because aboriginal women face violence more often and in unique forms.

Every single time the government passes a law that has any relation to violence against women, or even violence more broadly, that law is always going to have a specific impact on aboriginal women. That has to be acknowledged, and aboriginal women therefore have to have a role in the development of that law and in the implementation of that law, because it is always going to have a specific impact on them, given what we see in the statistics.

Again, I haven't done specific research myself on the incarceration of aboriginal women, but I think there is research out there that shows that aboriginal women who are incarcerated are victims of violence themselves. Even if the particular incident that led to whatever placed them in jail was not one in which they were defending themselves, overall they are still experiencing colonization and oppression, and it is reactions to that colonization and oppression that end up with their being criminalized. I think the Elizabeth Fry Society of Canada has done some really excellent work on that topic, and works closely with aboriginal women in doing that research.

As far as my recommendations are concerned, I've already talked a little bit about the importance of information gathering. I think mandating police as well as Statistics Canada to collect that information is key. I've talked about the importance of ensuring that every time legal responses to violence against women are made, aboriginal women have to be involved in those developments and in the implementations of those laws. They have to have adequate funding to enable them to have that consultative role.

It's important that there be specialized education and services for aboriginal women to assist them in navigating the civil and criminal justice systems, because we know that crime is underreported. There is the fear of racism within the criminal justice system, and if aboriginal women have actually taken the step of engaging with the justice system, adequate supports need to be in place for that to happen.

On the jurisdictional front, the issue of how governments can work together to try to solve some of these issues came up earlier this morning. I think there are strong models already in place for that kind of approach. The federal, provincial, and territorial ministers of justice sometimes combine their efforts to deal with particular issues, and I think the issue of violence against women is an area in which it's critical for all levels of government to come together with aboriginal leaders and aboriginal women's organizations to try to achieve those solutions.

I think I'll leave it at that so that other people can....

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Do I have any more time?

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Dona Cadman]

Yes, you have about two and half minutes.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Okay.

Muriel, you obviously want to respond to these questions.

[Muriel Stanley Venne]

I wanted to note that there was an aboriginal women's summit held in Corner Brook, Newfoundland. Have you ever seen the results of that?

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

I was not at the Corner Brook one, but I was at the one that was held in Yellowknife, and yes, I have.

[Muriel Stanley Venne]

I think it's fair to say that nothing has come of it.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Thank you.

Sandra, I am particularly interested in the justice system, as you heard in my questions this morning, and in what your research and experience have shown. I'm not solely interested in it, but I am focusing a little bit on it.

[Dr. Sandra Lambertus]

This is a huge report with the findings that I have in it, and seven minutes just doesn't give it enough time, but one of my concerns is with provincial victims services programs.

These programs are supposed to be front-line service providers for people who have been victims of crime, and also provide extra funding, but oftentimes in Alberta they are police-based, and that in itself becomes a barrier for women seeking help. Another problem is that because they're police-based, these victims services are not mandated to provide services in cases of double-charging. Most times when double-charging is involved, particularly in a domestic violence situation, the police have not done good investigations. They just say, “Let's just charge them both.” It's like having a motor vehicle accident; people just say, “Well, you both have to pay for your own”, and that's--

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Has this come out in your research?

[Dr. Sandra Lambertus]

Absolutely. I checked, and this is still happening.

Another issue with victims services is not so much out of the justice piece, but that the services are based on a middle-class, non-aboriginal model in which people in a community might have the resources to offer their volunteer time, but when they try to apply that model to aboriginal communities, they're forgetting that in some communities there are not a lot of people who have that kind of resource. They can't afford to buy gas for their cars to go visit victims. If they've already been victimized themselves, becoming a helper for other people can actually trigger a lot of the memories for themselves, so burnout rates are horrible. There's a huge problem throughout the province in getting aboriginal people in their communities to volunteer because there's too much baggage for them. It's too much. It's too heavy. At the end of the day, they deserve to be paid because their problems are important.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Dona Cadman]

Thank you.

We now go to Madame Demers.

Nicole.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Good morning. Thanks to our witnesses for being here this morning.

I am happy that your presentations are over this morning. We really needed a kind of cooling-down period. It was a very emotional climate and we probably needed to get back on a more rational track. That was quite difficult for me. I am a very passionate woman, and I lost it a little this morning. It was very hard.

Muriel, tell me what you think of the perpetuation of colonial attitudes when bills like the one on matrimonial rights are imposed. Aboriginal women's groups were not consulted and the result will be that the violence will continue. If the bill is passed, aboriginal women will not really be able to exercise their rights.

[Muriel Stanley Venne]

I would certainly advise that there be consultation before the implementation of the bill. It's critical that the women be consulted, because, as you say, it could possibly result in more violence and more disruption. It's long overdue, but it's just one in the list of many violations of aboriginal women's rights in this country. It's good. I applaud the actions by the government to address this, but without the concurrence and the realization of the effects, the good part may be lost. I'm hoping this can still happen.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Jennifer.

[Prof. Jennifer Koshan]

There's an issue that is quite similar to the application of matrimonial property legislation on first nations reserves, and that's the issue of provincial family violence legislation. That's an area I've done quite a bit of research on. That was actually going to be my concrete example, but I ran out of time before I could give it.

One issue with that legislation is that police often don't enforce it on reserve. Even though I don't think there's the same sort of constitutional barrier to the application of family violence legislation on reserve, police seem to be under a misapprehension about that. That's really depriving aboriginal women of a key tool to help protect them against family violence. This kind of law allows them to phone 24 hours a day and get an emergency protection order, exclusive possession of their family home, and a no-contact order, but police are not adequately enforcing this legislation on reserve. Even outside of reserve communities, we see that sometimes RCMP officers move into a new jurisdiction and they're not even aware that this legislation exists. Even within the city, even off reserve, they're failing to make the best use of these really important laws. Another important recommendation is--and you've heard this already--that there be education for police officers, both RCMP and provincial, as well as awareness about violence against aboriginal women.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Thank you.

Sandra, you talked to us a lot about the importance of statistics. Could you tell us what you think about the long-form census disappearing?

[Dr. Sandra Lambertus]

Well, I disagree with it, because I think we need to have that additional information. At the end of the day, politicians and policy-makers look at those kinds of reports and findings. Without those, I don't believe they'll be able to target well taxpayers' money into proper programs.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Jennifer, you told us that we do not have a lot of statistics on aboriginal women. Do you think that the abolition of the long-form census will make that problem worse?