Status of Women Committee on Feb. 8th, 2018

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Okay.

Since indigenous women are more likely to plead guilty when they get to trial, would expanding our funding for legal aid be a good thing for these women?

[Kathryn Ferreira]

Adequate legal representation or positive legal representation for women who are being charged with serious offences? For certain, yes.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

I only have 10 seconds, so thank you very much for your work. I think that's what I will end on. We really appreciate what you're doing there.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

We have time for one more question, so we're going to pass that over to Stephanie Kusie.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

We've talked a lot today again about self-determination, and about solutions being intrinsic to the indigenous people themselves. With that, I wanted to touch again on Gladue reporting. In your opinion, is Gladue reporting helpful in compensating for the history and cultural context of indigenous persons and what has brought them to the point of sentencing and incarceration?

[Kathryn Ferreira]

I think Gladue reporting is very necessary. The problem is, it's not translating into any kind of positive solution on sentencing or on decisions that are made after sentencing. People are talking about it and there's lots of consideration of it, but clearly, given the numbers we're talking about, it's not translating into positive decisions for aboriginal people.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Excellent.

Thank you very much, and thank you for joining us today and providing your testimony. We'll find it very, very helpful.

We're now going to suspend for two minutes, so that we can switch up our panels.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

We're going to come back to meeting 88 of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. Thanks for the notes.

We're going to be joined now by two video conferences. By video conference from Vancouver, we're going to have Debra Parkes, professor and chair in feminist legal studies, Peter A. Allard School of Law, University of British Columbia; and also by video conference, we have, from Saskatoon, Eric Michael, executive director of Willow Cree Healing Lodge, Prairie Region.

I'm going to turn the floor over to Ms. Parkes.

You have seven minutes.

[Professor Debra Parkes, Professor and Chair in Feminist Legal Studies, Peter A. Allard School of Law, University of British Columbia, As an Individual]

Thank you for the opportunity to meet with you today.

I've been researching issues associated with women's imprisonment for the past 20 years, and the alarming rise in the incarceration of indigenous women is an urgent issue for Canada. I commend the committee for studying and working to address it.

I know that the committee has heard from other witnesses about the fact that indigenous women represent the fastest growing prison population in Canada; they do harder time than other prisoners; they are more likely to be in maximum security, put in segregation, restrained, and subjected to force; and they are less likely to get parole.

At the same time, it's useful to keep in mind the fact that the sharp line the law likes to draw between victim and offender utterly breaks down when we look at the situation of indigenous women who are in prisons across this country. These are the same women who are going missing and being murdered in alarming numbers.

I'm going to spend my short time today on three issues and discuss solutions to those issues.

The first is the disproportionate impact of mandatory minimum sentences on indigenous women, including, most problematically and often not discussed, the mandatory minimum life sentence and parole ineligibility period for murder.

Second, I'm going to talk about some of the ways that section 718.2(e) of the Criminal Code—the Gladue analysis meant to reduce their incarceration—is not benefiting or effectively being applied to indigenous women.

Third, I'll address the urgent need for community release options for indigenous women, and correctional policy and planning oriented toward community release.

First, with respect to the mandatory life sentence and mandatory parole ineligibility periods for murder, everyone convicted of murder in Canada gets the mandatory life sentence and mandatory period of parole ineligibility of at least 10 years for murder and 25 years for first-degree murder. During the last decade, Parliament has amended the Criminal Code to allow parole ineligibility periods to be made consecutive to one another and has abolished an important opportunity for early parole review, the so-called “faint-hope clause”.

Indigenous women are vastly overrepresented among those sentenced to life. From 2005 to 2015, 44% of women sentenced to life or an indeterminate sentence were indigenous. A closer review of each year in this range reveals a particularly grim picture. From 2008 to 2009, four of the six women sentenced to life were indigenous. From 2012 to 2013, six of the seven women sentenced to life were indigenous.

I'll talk in a moment about the particular ways that mandatory sentences are unnecessary, costly, and disproportionate, particularly for indigenous women, but it's important first to step back and understand at the outset that while murder is obviously the most serious offence in our Criminal Code, research has shown that policy-makers often overestimate punitive desires among the public for long prison sentences. In fact, members of the public, when properly informed, are actually less punitively minded than what you may expect.

Specific to the mandatory life sentence for murder, in a 2010 study in England and Wales involving over 1,000 public participants, two-thirds of those who participated concluded that a life sentence was not an appropriate penalty in the majority of the homicide situations they were presented with. There's a huge range of situations that we often don't think of when we think about our law of murder.

Canada is increasingly an outlier among developed countries in the area of sentencing for murder. Only 11 of 42 European Union member states impose mandatory life sentences. I could talk about that, but I'll skip over those numbers to tell you that we are an outlier, other than when you look at the United States.

Mandatory minimum sentences disproportionately impact women and particularly indigenous women. Women are disproportionately impacted when sentencing judges are unable to consider the implications of removing mothers, many of whom are sole caregivers, from their children and family. The removal of the ability for judges to consider lower levels of culpability—for instance, being a party to a spouse's offences or acting in relation to an offence against oneself or one's child, which is often the case for homicide cases involving women—disproportionately impacts women, and indigenous women in particular.

Mandatory minimum sentences encourage wrongful guilty pleas, which are an important factor contributing to wrongful convictions. We have seen this in relation to child homicide cases and cases involving battered women in Canada in the past two decades.

Research suggests that indigenous people are less likely than other accused to benefit from the exercise of prosecutorial discretion to proceed with a mandatory sentence or not. Indigenous people tend to be overcharged and plead guilty at higher rates than non-indigenous people.

Mandatory minimum sentencing undermines section 718.2(e) of the Criminal Code, which is aimed at reducing the over-incarceration of indigenous people. It is at odds with the proportionality principle and interferes with a judge's ability to take circumstances into account.

that brings me to the second issue, which is paragraph 718.2(e) of the Criminal Code and the Gladue analysis meant to reduce the over-incarceration of indigenous people and the fact that it's not effectively benefiting indigenous women.

Why do I say that? The whole purpose of a Gladue analysis is to understand the social context of an indigenous person's involvement with the criminal justice system, the way that their experience connects to what we know about systemic discrimination, and the impact of colonization. The second purpose is to identify ways to get indigenous people out of prison and into the community where the results are going to be more positive.

However, Gladue factors—and these are social history factors—are, in effect, used against indigenous women in the context of risk assessment decisions at all levels of the criminal justice system—bail, sentencing, correctional placement and planning, security classification, parole, and other correctional decision-making. The fact that indigenous women have often experienced extreme trauma, poverty, substance use, and other forms of marginalization is used as evidence that they need more correctional intervention and more time in prison. Their needs are equated with risk, and this means more time in prison, even though we know prison is not necessary for public safety in the vast majority of cases, and it does not work well for indigenous women.

That connects to my third point, which is the urgent need for more community release options for indigenous women, and correctional policy and planning oriented toward community release. This is not, I should say, for the most part a problem with the law.

The law is generally set up to facilitate community release. The restrictions on the availability of conditional sentences that have been enacted in recent years, and on limits on the Criminal Code availability of conditional sentences should be repealed, in my view. I can talk more about that in questions, but with respect to the Corrections and Conditional Release Act the principles and legislative provisions are there. Sections 81 and 84 in particular—and I think other witnesses have spoken about these provisions—are meant to transfer resources to indigenous communities, both urban and reserve, to host community members there, to support their reintegration in a way that benefits the whole community and broader society.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Ms. Parkes, I'm going to cut you off so that there will be lots of time for questions. Thank you very much.

I'm now going to move over to our second panellist. I would like to welcome Eric Michael.

You have seven minutes.

[Eric Michael, Executive Director, Willow Cree Healing Lodge, Prairie Region, Correctional Service of Canada]

Good afternoon. Bonjour. Tansi.

With great respect I approach this opportunity to appear before the honourable members of this committee. The work of this committee is vital, and I feel privileged to contribute to your study.

I am the executive director of Willow Cree Healing Lodge, a Correctional Service Canada-operated healing lodge for indigenous offenders. I am a member of the Beardy's & Okemasis' Cree Nation on Treaty 6 territory, the indigenous community in which Willow Cree Healing Lodge is situated.

My comments today will centre on my experience working in a men's healing lodge facility for nearly 15 years, and the contributions that healing lodges collectively provide toward the mandate of indigenous corrections.

One of the CSC's key priorities is to provide effective, culturally appropriate interventions and reintegration support for first nations, Métis, and Inuit offenders. Healing lodges are a fundamental element of delivering on this priority as they provide culturally focused interventions, programming, and services. Healing lodges are minimum or multi-level facilities, which can be operated by CSC in co-operation with an indigenous community or run by the indigenous community under section 81 of the Corrections and Conditional Release Act.

The purpose of a healing lodge is to aid indigenous offenders in their successful reintegration by using traditional healing methods, specifically holistic and culturally appropriate programming. The first CSC healing lodge to operate in Canada, beginning in 1995, was the Okimaw Ohci Healing Lodge for Aboriginal Women on the Nekaneet First Nation in Saskatchewan. This healing lodge paved the way for other indigenous communities to embark on a journey that would revolutionize how the Canadian corrections system engages indigenous communities.

Commencing operations in 2004, Willow Cree Healing Lodge is the most recent CSC-operated healing lodge. CSC entered into a memorandum of agreement with the Beardy's & Okemasis' Cree Nation to ensure that the community provides guidance, support, and assistance to the healing lodge. I meet regularly with a board of directors to ensure that the management and operation of the healing lodge accomplishes its mandate within a restorative model of justice. We ensure respect for the cultural and spiritual vision, values, and traditions of the indigenous community. The healing lodge engages the local Beardy's & Okemasis' Elders Council and the Citizen Advisory Committee to ensure community input, collaboration, and consultation.

Healing lodges occupy a fundamental role in providing indigenous spiritual services through access to indigenous elders. Emphasis is placed on spiritual leadership. Staff and community members act as role models. Programs are delivered in a context of community interaction, and focus on preparing an offender for his or her eventual release. Elder involvement in the delivery of the correctional programs is fundamental as they contribute culturally relevant teachings and ceremonies.

It has been my pleasure to work with the passionate correctional professionals in healing lodges dedicated to the vision of healing. Many offenders who come to the women's and men's healing lodges are seeking a path forward. They come with the dream of creating a better life for themselves. They come hoping for personal transformation and healing from the ravaging impact of personal trauma, and the way that trauma has played out in their lives.

The healing journey from the indigenous world view will challenge you spiritually, emotionally, physically, and mentally. The healing journey requires honesty, humility, and courage. It is a journey where those things that torment the soul are confronted with the spirit of a warrior to restore wellness, heal relationships, rebuild one's sense of dignity, and create a healthy path moving forward.

Healing lodges are intended to be places of transformative power as indigenous ceremonies provide an outlet for cultural and spiritual renewal. The healing lodge aspires to achieve the spirit of wahkohtowin, a Cree spiritual law that encourages all living things to come together in a spirit of kinship. Wahkohtowin means “everything is related” and identifies the sacred obligations we have to one another, recognizing the social history experienced by indigenous peoples disrupted the roles, values, and traditions of the indigenous family. We call a resident of Willow Cree Healing Lodge a nicisan, an indigenous word from the Cree people meaning brother or relative. This reference signifies the healing lodge commitment to restore the kinship ties to the community for each nicisan, to ignite their sense of belonging to the greater purpose and to support their effort to overcome the stigma that comes with incarceration.

During the last five years, Willow Cree Healing Lodge has been privileged to collaborate with our CSC partners, the Beardy's & Okemasis' Cree Nation, the local town of Duck Lake, and community stakeholders on a worthwhile initiative.

In 2013, Willow Cree Healing Lodge entered into a partnership with the first nations and Habitat for Humanity in order to provide training and meaningful work release to the offenders. The offenders provided the labour to construct five Habitat for Humanity homes, one per year, in the community of Duck Lake, Saskatchewan.

The offenders participated in a construction worker preparation certificate program offered through a community college. They received on-the-job training during temporary absences to the construction site and were mentored by a journeyperson carpenter.

Willow Cree Healing Lodge recently completed the fifth home and witnessed each home awarded to a deserving and grateful family in need. The spiritual principle of kinship has become more integrated into the lives of the offenders who participated in this initiative, and it was an integral part of the offenders' personal transformative process as they offered their time, energy, and skill to a benevolent endeavour. I witnessed indigenous and non-indigenous people, CSC offenders, and community citizens working side by side toward a common goal as they helped families in need.

The example I provide is just one that illustrates the many ways that healing lodges strive to achieve the spirit of wahkohtowin, to honour the vision of healing, and to support the successful reintegration of indigenous offenders. The healing lodges are full of potential and are an essential component of fostering healthy relationships and a constructive dialogue with indigenous communities.

I thank you, and I welcome any questions you may have.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thank you for your opening statements.

We're now going to move to Pam Damoff for seven minutes.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Thanks to both our witnesses for being here today.

My first question is for Mr. Michael.

I've heard that work release is the best pathway for success for someone who is in an institution. If they have a successful work release, it bodes well for when they are released from the healing lodge or the prison. But I also heard that there are real barriers to getting the paperwork done for that, so there can be challenges when an employer says, “Yes, we'll take an offender to come in and work”, but it can take a very long time to work its way up the chain.

Do you think it would be beneficial to remove some of the paperwork process in order to make sure you can match the offender with a work release placement more quickly?

[Eric Michael]

I definitely think that any opportunities that will facilitate that gradual reintegration into the community for offenders are extremely beneficial. Work release is definitely one avenue to accomplish that and give them an opportunity to gain very important work-related skills so that when they're released into the community they're ready to undertake an opportunity to provide for themselves and to contribute back to the community in a healthy way. Anything that could facilitate that process more effectively I think is of great advantage to the men and women we work with in terms of facilitating that effective reintegration into the community.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Thank you.

Ms. Parkes, I have a question for you. You talked a lot about the mandatory minimums. I like to think that being tough on crime would actually be getting rid of mandatory minimums, so rather than sending a woman to a maximum security institution where she may be exposed to gangs and drugs, the effort would be better spent in providing her with services and programs, and then, in fact, when she is released she would be more likely to be a productive member of society.

Do you think that's a fairly accurate description, that we're actually creating criminals sometimes when we're sending them off to a maximum security prison?

[Prof. Debra Parkes]

Certainly that is what the evidence shows, the reality, especially in the women's prisons.

It's really wonderful to hear about these opportunities around Habitat for Humanity and work release and that sort of thing, but I was just at Fraser Valley Institution twice in the last month and a half, which is the women's federal prison here. In the minimum house, the women do not have access to work release—virtually none of them. It's available on paper, but not actually happening.

To your question, yes, if you have a majority of indigenous women being warehoused in maximum security prisons where they're in these segregated units within the institution, which is what is happening—and it's not all that's happening, there are certainly good programs here and there—as you know, there is just no meaningful opportunity for intervention: trauma counselling, vocational training, education. There is some of that, again, but not nearly enough, so it's actually counterproductive to their reintegration.

What I was getting at at the end of my remarks is that because indigenous women are assessed with so many needs and so many deficits and so many things that they need to address, their correctional plan has this long list of things that they're not actually able to address. Their parole has to be delayed, they waive it in alarming numbers, they even waive the women's opportunity to go for parole because they're simply not getting that in the institution.

If we were to spend even some significant amount of those dollars in more community release options, more work release, more of that, we would have much better results, I think.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

I heard from a parole officer about the lack of supports in the community when indigenous offenders are released. Quite often there's no housing and no employment, so someone who is going to a homeless shelter falls into a negative path. The supports that many people get from family and friends are simply not available. Family ties may have been broken, or they may have left the reserve at a young age to live in an urban setting, but those supports aren't there.

Do you feel that these supports are essential for success upon release?

[Prof. Debra Parkes]

Yes, they are. There are mechanisms already in the existing legislation to provide for them. Section 84 of the Corrections and Conditional Release Act provides for the opportunity for urban or reserve communities to provide community release options for their members. Sometimes they can't go back to the reserve community, for the reasons you've identified and others, but there are many places within urban centres, which is where most of the people go upon release, to which we could be transferring resources.

You can't do it without resources; it's simply setting people up to fail. We know about the lack of affordable housing, and we know about the issues that even people who aren't dealing with a criminal record, release, and time spent in prison face, but these women have additional challenges.

Yes, resources need to be there. We know that it costs more than $200,000 to incarcerate a woman in federal prison each year, and more for maximum security. Where are the resources to rebalance this situation to provide for the section 84 release plans on a much more creative and flexible basis than we're doing? There are a few happening right now, but they're mostly happening for existing halfway houses. Their beds are limited. We need more release resources along the lines of what you're suggesting.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Mr. Michael, you've had a long career in corrections. If you were to give us a couple of your top recommendations to put in place to deal with the overrepresentation of indigenous women, what would they be, very quickly?

[Eric Michael]

One would be to continue to enhance the dialogue with indigenous communities. In many cases, indigenous communities have the answers to some of these issues. Whatever we can do to continue to facilitate dialogue with those communities and invite their ideas and their perspectives on ways we can address these very pressing issues would be an ideal thing to continue to pursue.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

We're now going to move over, for seven minutes, to Rachael Harder.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Ms. Parkes, can you clarify what kind of crime a person would have to commit in order to receive a mandatory sentence?

[Prof. Debra Parkes]

I don't know what the most up-to-date numbers are, but there are on the order of 75 mandatory sentences in the Criminal Code. There are all kinds, ranging from drug offences to violent offences and that sort of thing.

I was talking about the mandatory life sentence for murder, so we are talking about intentional homicide, which includes, as I said, party liability situations and a whole range of different scenarios.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Thank you.

My next question is to Mr. Michael.

Mr. Michael, can you answer this for me: what would be the average cost for an inmate for one year within the healing lodge?