Status of Women Committee on March 23rd, 2023

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Thank you.

First of all, thank you to both of our witnesses for being here and providing amazing and very helpful testimony for our study.

I'm going to start with Ms. McGuire-Cyrette.

You said that your organization has helped 850 people out of trafficking over the last few years through 12,000 contacts. That's your anti-human trafficking program.

Considering the fact that we're trying to find a way to better the situation of human trafficking in Canada, can you give us some of the key takeaways of this program that you would want to share with other organizations that are trying to do similar work?

What's made it successful in helping bring 850 people out of it?

[Coralee McGuire-Cyrette]

Yes, definitely. First and foremost, it was designed and led by survivors. We went to the women who are the experts on this issue. They've designed and developed the entire strategy. It's a survivor-led strategy within the province.

It was comprehensive: We included everybody in our engagements. We engaged with service providers. We engaged with community members and survivors of human trafficking. That's the approach we took, which is recognizing that they know what's best. They know where the gaps are and what's needed.

We created our “Journey to Safe Spaces” report. Our report really is that road map of what survivors have said that they needed. We share our report freely. It's on our website; anybody can access our report.

You can really see that what's in there is how to create a safe space strategy where you need to have barrier-free access to programming and services. You need to create systemic change. You need to be able to address this issue from a policy level, an education level, a service level—from every level. It's across departments and across ministries because the issue is so intersectional with so many different issues. It's not just dealing with a “one bad man” type of thing.

Here in Canada, it really is that the sexualization of indigenous women and girls is so normalized in our communities and our behaviour that the trafficking of our children continues. We have to be able to break down that normalization.

How you do it is through comprehensive investments that will actually meet the need through long-term, sustainable funding.

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Thank you.

Earlier, we were talking with IRCC and with other government departments about certain pathways for women who are not from Canada. They were saying that very often women are reluctant to come out. Of course, many of them face deportation, but in general, women may feel unsafe to report themselves and to say they are being trafficked.

Through your program, what have you heard from some of the victims? What is it that helped them feel safe and often comfortable enough to come out? Do you think we should be taking a more proactive approach in order to get people to talk about it more openly and to get help when they're in these situations?

[Coralee McGuire-Cyrette]

Yes. The survivors have told us that they need barrier-free access to services, and to the services where it's safe for them to have these conversations. This is why, when you're looking at indigenous women's agencies and when you're going to an indigenous women's agency that has cultural programs and supports that have been designed and developed by you, for you, that's the change piece right there. They're more able to talk together to build that community of care, that community of support.

The biggest part of our program in what we do is that we walk the healing journey with the woman. We don't walk it for her. We're here as support, and as long-term support, because for so many of the women and girls who we work with, sometimes in the system you can work with a woman or girl for maybe only 48 hours or 72 hours. They put these barriers of time on it. For us, it's, “No, we're still walking that healing journey with them for one to two years, for however long they need us to be there with them.”

If you can just imagine that somebody you know has come to you and is experiencing this, it hits you. It changes you, because every single one of these women and girls is a beloved mother, daughter, auntie and/or sister, and just being able to care for them, to believe their stories...because there are many stories where systems are not believing the violence that these girls are facing. We start off by first and foremost believing that their story is their story is their story, and that's their truth.

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Thank you very much. I appreciate your responses.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thank you.

We're going to switch over, and we're going to have six minutes and six minutes. I'm going to give you an additional few seconds on top of that for both the Bloc and the NDP, and then we'll come back for one minute of questions from the Conservatives and the Liberals.

I'll pass it over to Andréanne Larouche for about six-ish minutes.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being here and for sharing the views of indigenous women on this issue. Indigenous women are unfortunately part of the statistics and are more often targeted by traffickers. Thank you for your comments.

You mentioned the importance of working with the various departments that are involved. Earlier this week, the committee heard from CBSA, Public Safety Canada and RCMP officials. After listening to what they had to say, I was a bit surprised. If the committee were to rely strictly on them to combat human trafficking, we wouldn't get very far, in my view.

I realize that human trafficking happens in the shadows and that people are deceived by so-called good Samaritans whose true intentions are malicious. As a result, victims are isolated. The federal officials I mentioned told the committee that it was almost impossible to know whether a person was being smuggled across the border.

You work with victims. I understand that it's important to tackle the issue proactively, through education and the like, and to respond after the fact by helping victims. What happens, though, between the two? What have you learned in speaking with these women? What has your experience working with them taught you? How do they feel about police involvement?

Those answers could help the committee come up with recommendations for the RCMP, police services or CBSA, in terms of where they could make improvements. Where should they step up efforts or pull back?

I'd like all of you to comment from both the prevention and response standpoints. How can we do a better job of detecting cases of human trafficking? Please answer in whatever order you'd like.

[Coralee McGuire-Cyrette]

Thank you.

Definitely, the first thing that policing needs to do is believe the woman and provide that trauma-informed response to her. They have to be able to do that. But we're also dealing with a systemically racist system, and that's where we have to look at changing that system and breaking down and removing that bias and racism, so they're able to respond to the women and girls and connect them to programming and services in the community that would be able to help support them.

One issue is around project-based funding. The supports and resources for women in the community may or may not be there, because it's based on short-term funding. It's not a long-term response. It's being able to build that response in the community to support them. How do we get the data, in a good way, on what's happening on the ground with the policing and the services in order to be able to look at it holistically and respond to this issue?

Experts are saying about 10% of HT victims report working better with frontline agencies. Sometimes it's not safe to go through the justice system. Women have told us that there is no justice in the justice system for them. The biggest part that women want to work on is their healing. We need to really look at where the healing supports are for indigenous women. That's a key piece that's missing here.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Ms. Omeniho, would you like to add anything? You were cut off earlier just as you were about to share some recommendations with the committee. I know the chair asked you to send them to us in writing, but you can have a bit of time to discuss them now if you'd like.

We are looking for tangible solutions. Where could we make improvements?

[Melanie Omeniho]

Thank you very much for the opportunity.

I do support what Cora was saying. We need to have indigenous services that are available on the ground to women. We need to help build those. In fact, one of our recommendations would be building a Métis anti-human-trafficking strategy, with the victims themselves helping to develop that strategy. Moving forward, it's through the lessons that have been learned from them that we're able to do that.

The second piece in the recommendations, which I know hasn't been mentioned in the time that I've been here and listening today, is the fact that online processes are making our people very vulnerable, especially our very young people, to human trafficking. The laws in this country have not caught up to what the Internet is doing. We need to be able to establish and create laws to protect our young people from the perpetrators who are out soliciting them and trying to romanticize them to come to places that are making them victims.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

You talked about online violence and cybercrime. As we saw, human trafficking didn't stop during the pandemic. It just adapted. Is that what you observed?

Are you talking about the transition to cybercrime and the need to tackle online violence? Things can seem a lot more appealing in the online world, which makes it so easy to deceive people now.

[Melanie Omeniho]

Thank you.

That's exactly what I mean. Many of our young people especially during COVID-19 were isolated and put into positions where they were looking for their networks and community attachments through things like the Internet. This made them very vulnerable to strangers who were out there to exploit them.

Violence is a real thing in our communities. It's been so normalized that people don't realize that when these young people are being sexualized through the Internet, they become victims and fall prey to people who are trying to exploit them. We've heard many stories—I know they haven't been in the news—where many of our young people have been brought out of their homes and taken to other cities, even into other countries, and have been exploited. They're very hard to find. Our indigenous young women don't get sought after like a non-indigenous person who's gone missing.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Melanie, thank you so much.

I'll now pass it over to Leah.

Leah, you have six minutes.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you so much, Chair.

It's so good to see both of you here today. I want to thank you for your work.

One thing that I along with advocates have been pushing for is to immediately put in place a red dress alert for indigenous women and girls and 2SLGBTQQIA+ who go missing, like the Amber Alert they have for children. Both of you brought up issues around systemic racism and policing, and issues of over-policing and under-policing. One of the suggestions that I and advocates have made is that it must be led, in terms of jurisdiction and who has control over it, by families of murdered and missing indigenous women and girls. These programs and systems are often put in place without our input.

Do you agree with me that a red dress alert would save lives? Do you agree with the need for it to be indigenous-led and indigenous-driven in terms of decisions on how it's executed?

I'll start with you, Madam Omeniho.

Can you please share that in maybe 30 seconds? Then I'll move to Madam McGuire-Cyrette.

[Melanie Omeniho]

Actually, I would support a red dress alert. I think that's a fabulous idea. If there were more tools put into the tool kit to help our families when women go missing or when we believe people are vulnerable, I do believe that a lot fewer women would be lost to us permanently.

Thank you.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you for answering that part.

In terms of jurisdiction, Madam McGuire-Cyrette, you spoke a lot about the need for it to be led by survivors and led by families. Do you agree with me that in terms of jurisdiction, it needs to be led by indigenous women and girls and families and survivors?

[Coralee McGuire-Cyrette]

I do agree with you. I agree with Melanie and you that this is a tool that's needed. I think it's a great idea. It's something that we would support in the implementation.

Particularly around jurisdiction, I think we have to remember that violence doesn't know jurisdictional bounds, whether it's first nation, whether it's urban, whether it's rural or whether it's across the province or across Canada. There are no jurisdictional bounds for this type of violence or any type of violence, particularly for indigenous women. It would have to be implemented across and those barriers removed.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

My next question is related to a guaranteed livable basic income.

I put forward a bill in support of a guaranteed livable basic income in response to call for justice 4.5 of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls and two-spirit people.

Do you agree that a guaranteed livable basic income is a necessary step to mitigate this ongoing genocide against indigenous women and girls and diverse-gendered people?

[Melanie Omeniho]

I believe a basic livable income would change a lot of factors for many women who are vulnerable and who end up putting themselves into situations that put them at risk. I believe if we had a basic livable income, it would make sure that women are not as vulnerable as they are today.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Madam McGuire-Cyrette, you spoke about we are not a program. I asked a question in the last round and noted the zero dollars that were put in the 2022 budget to address the crisis of murdered and missing indigenous women and girls because of what you both indicated, normalized violence against indigenous women and girls and diverse-gendered people.

How is the failure of consecutive governments, all levels of government but particularly the federal, because we're here, to provide sustainable funding costing lives?

[Coralee McGuire-Cyrette]

Definitely. When we look at the situation referenced out of Winnipeg, I think.... That's most recently on our minds. It shows evidence that we haven't invested enough in indigenous women's safety, and it's not acceptable. We have to make this change now.

It has to be long-term, sustainable funding. When we ask for core funding for indigenous women's agencies, so we can do this type of work, a lot of the time—Melanie and I talk quite a bit about first nations women's councils and urban indigenous women's agencies—you have to fundraise to keep your doors open, or you do project-based funding, which is piecemeal funding. You're then held to a level of account.... Non-indigenous women's agencies have had sustainable core funding many times and are provided with the resources to ensure the best programming and services are available. The funding doesn't allow you to have, for instance, an executive director, a finance director and a human resources manager. The funding also isn't there for data or to have the policy that supports it.

When we're looking at making changes, I think this is something that would make a huge impact relatively quickly: providing indigenous women with sustainable core funding.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you.

I think it was you, Melanie, who spoke about displacement and resources. We just did a study on the connection between violence and the resource-extractive industries.

How is displacement from lands connected with sex trafficking?

May I have a quick response? I'm sorry, but I'm running out of time.

[Melanie Omeniho]

People who don't have their communities, families and the land they came from, where they learned to survive, become very vulnerable. They become victims of things like sex crimes, especially in our oil and gas sector, as much as nobody wants to admit that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thank you so much.

We're now down to one minute each. I'm going to pass it to Anna for one minute, then Anita for one minute.

Anna, go for it.

[Anna Roberts, Conservative, King—Vaughan, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'm going to ask this question of Melanie. I can't remember if it was Melanie or Coralee who made a comment about barrier-free access to service.

I can't remember which one of you made that comment. Can you explain that to me in detail?