Good afternoon.
Thank you for having us today. My name is Chantal Arseneault, and I work at the Regroupement des maisons pour femmes victimes de violence conjugale.
The Regroupement has been around for 40 years. Its members are fighting for the right to women's psychological and physical integrity.
Our organization consists of 42 assistance and shelter homes throughout the 15 administrative regions of Quebec.
In 2016-2017, its members provided shelter to some 2,700 women and 2,200 children. They provided over 14,000 services and responded to more than 46,000 requests for assistance.
The Regroupement des maisons is very concerned by the committee's topic of study. The shortage of spaces in shelters is a crucial issue. Beyond the shortage of spaces, it shows in particular a lack of access to support services abused women need. We will try to suggest some potential solutions today.
In 2015, the entire Quebec police service registered 19,400 crimes against persons committed in a domestic context. Those offences accounted for nearly one-third of all crimes against individuals.
However, the domestic violence phenomenon is much larger. According to Statistics Canada, only 36% of women allegedly report abuse to the police. Women can also be victims to a number of other types of violence: psychological, verbal, sexual, economic and spiritual.
According to the World Bank, rape and domestic violence represent a greater risk to women than cancer, road accidents, war and malaria combined. In addition, according to the UN, violence committed by an intimate partner is allegedly the most common form of violence women experience.
Why do women need services? Because it is not easy to escape domestic violence.
Let me tell you about a woman who is currently at the shelter. Sylvie has been married for 15 years. Violence took root in her life when she became pregnant with her first child. At that point, the control wielded by her husband greatly intensified. He insulted her constantly. After the birth, she became increasingly isolated, and she stopped seeing people and talking to them. Her husband went as far as to control the amount of time she had for grocery shopping and forbade her from buying bread, among other things. She had to bake the bread herself.
Sylvie decided to end the relationship, but she became pregnant with her second child. She felt completely destabilized by that unplanned pregnancy. Her husband promised her he would go to therapy and would no longer cause her any problems. One evening, while the children were in the living room, the husband noticed that Sylvie had bought bread. Violence erupted, and insults and threats spread throughout the household. The children were hearing and seeing the violence. The husband got enraged, hit Sylvie, held her head against the kitchen counter and put a knife to her throat. The children were still in the living room. A few hours later, she arrived at the shelter with her two children.
You can imagine how Sylvie and her children feel. They are terrorized, panick-stricken, stressed, tired, really exhausted and very anxious. Sylvie feels trapped, completely powerless in relation to everything she is going through.