Status of Women Committee on April 17th, 2023

[Cst Joy Brown]

Yes, definitely.

Other things it may present as are intimate partner violence or domestic violence, or even just a noise disturbance, maybe at a hotel or an Airbnb. It definitely would be an opportunity to put some information in that database, as well as missing persons. We know that oftentimes they'll go missing for periods of time. It may not present itself as maybe being grooming or human trafficking, but that's also an opportunity to enter it into that database as well.

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

Thank you so much.

I have one final quick question.

If I can go back to Mario, we have definitely seen the historically high usage of food banks. I hear about the cost of living crisis every day from my constituents. They're people who are making good money. Parents are highly stressed. They're not able to be as present for their kids. Their kids are turning to social media. They're looking for that core need of being recognized. They're vulnerable.

Do you think there is a correlation between the cost of living crisis and the increase in human trafficking?

[Mario Catenaccio]

It's hard for all of us now—and a lot of us earn good wages—to survive, let alone someone who is vulnerable, who doesn't have access to those funds. It's almost as though they have nothing else to turn to, so they turn to the sex trade to try to make some more money, because it is a very lucrative business.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thanks so much, Mario.

We're now going to pass it over to Jenna Sudds.

Jenna, you have five minutes.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata—Carleton, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to all of the witnesses for joining us today.

I'd like to direct my first question to Sergeant Scott.

One of the things you said that caught me was that you receive reports of exploitation on a daily basis. Perhaps this is a simplistic question, but are those calls coming in via a hotline directly to the Winnipeg Police Service, or is this via the national hotline?

[Sgt Andrea Scott]

These are calls that we receive on a daily basis directly to Missing Persons. We have a phone line for the public, for child welfare agencies and for our partner agencies to report youth and adults missing. That's why we're a combined unit, and the information that's gathered through that phone call shows us where there is exploitation.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata—Carleton, ON]

Okay. Thank you.

Adding on to that, one of the things we heard during our travels across the country last week on this study was some concern about province-to-province referrals that came through on the hotline.

I'm wondering if you can speak to your experience in Winnipeg. If you are looking to support a survivor who has come forward, sometimes that means leaving the province to get away from others. We heard a bit about some challenges with getting those support services if you're going out of province.

[Sgt Andrea Scott]

We utilize our partner agencies. The Salvation Army has been phenomenal.

In one instance that I can think of off the top of the my head, we had a survivor from Ontario come into Winnipeg. Ultimately, there were charges laid against an individual, and then we were able to work with The Salvation Army to fly the survivor home. They provided that, and they provided her with some safe housing within the city in order to transition, to get healthy, and then to fly home. However, I would have to agree with Constable Brown when she said that information sharing between provinces, between agencies, is lacking.

We have a Canadian police data bank, but it looks different for every agency. There needs to be some sort of universal data bank that we can all access, because traffickers move. We often see within our city that there are traffickers from out east or out west, and if I were aware of what they're doing out west, that would definitely give me some benefit and lead to knowing what they're doing within our city, and then sharing that information with our agencies.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata—Carleton, ON]

That's excellent. Thank you for that.

We have heard a few times now about the importance of that consistency across the country and of being able to share information. I'm sure that will make its way into our recommendations in the report.

There's one other item I want to ask you about. You mentioned that the digital age, obviously, has changed what human trafficking looks like and how young women, in particular, are being reached.

I'm wondering if you can speak to—obviously, as that has evolved—what that means for convictions; i.e., are the laws that we currently have in place able to address the increase in the use of digital means to prosecute or to take forward charges?

[Sgt Andrea Scott]

In a way, there are things that are easier, because we can utilize search warrants and things like that. Once something is on the web or online on a digital platform, we can capture that, and that's good evidence to use in court. You also have platforms like Snapchat and Instagram. From a law perspective, it's very different for law enforcement to obtain user information and IP addresses. It's not easy for us. These are lengthy search warrants, and sometimes these platforms are not that easy to deal with from a law enforcement perspective.

On Instagram and things like that, things like Snapchat or LeoList, some of these chats disappear once they're opened, so it is challenging, and there are definitely challenges for us in order to obtain that information that becomes very good evidence in court.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thank you so much.

The next round is for two and a half minutes.

Andréanne, you have the floor.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I had finished saying everything I wanted to in my last round, but would like to briefly ask another question. I was talking about coordination among the various groups involved, whether departments, levels of government or even people working on the ground, like community organizations and the police. My colleagues have already asked about this, but I'll give you time to come up with other recommendations for the committee to keep in mind.

The question is for the two police representatives, and the two other witnesses. Is there anything that hasn't been mentioned yet?

If no one wants to answer that question, I'll just ask another one.

[Jody Miller]

I can address that, if you would like.

I think that it is crucial to our being able to provide the continuum of supports that are needed to address this issue. I think that all levels of government need to be working together and collaborating to address it and to be working with our communities and those who are in the community, collaboratives such as those in Peel and other communities as well that are doing that work and helping to tailor responses that work for those particular communities and the needs they have.

I feel that being able to have sustainable long-term funding in communities is essential as well, so that we don't have to rebuild these supports that we've put in place and we don't have to start over, and so that we can also provide our staff, who have been trained in providing these models and who are primarily female, with stable employment in providing these services.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

My next question is more specifically for Ms. Scott.

My colleague Ms. Gazan raised the question of indigenous women. One of the witnesses we heard this morning reminded us that there had been the Report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, which Contained 231calls for justice.

How should we go about making sure that existing reports are taken into consideration to ensure that similar situations don't recur?

[Sgt Andrea Scott]

Well, I certainly think that we're all very aware of the recommendations from the first inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women. We try to implement the recommendations that were put forward to us.

As I said in my testimony, education in our schools and over social media is really the key. Sometimes it's not schools, because some of our vulnerable youth aren't going to school, so we need to get it to those kids on a different platform, like social media.

I can't stress enough the addictions piece. There is an addictions crisis in our vulnerable youth, and we need to address it in order to change the outlook.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thank you so much.

We're now going to pass it over to Leah Gazan.

Leah, you have the next two and a half minutes.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you.

Continuing on with you, Sergeant Scott, you mentioned that there is a new missing persons joint unit that has been created between the Winnipeg Police Service and the RCMP.

According to a CBC article on March 23, 2023, in Winnipeg alone, 9,315 people have gone missing. Because we don't have enough time in committee, can you please submit to the committee, out of all those cases, how many were indigenous; how many were indigenous women, girls, and two-spirit people; how many were safely returned to the family; and how many HR hours were spent investigating missing cases involving indigenous people.

My last question is in response to that. Given that Manitoba now has this integrated missing persons response that has been established, I presume that there's going to be an annual report of your activities and related data. I'm hoping so. If there is, because we know that Winnipeg is ground zero for murdered and missing indigenous women and girls, will there be a specific chapter related to the ongoing crisis in our city of murdered and missing indigenous women and girls?

[Sgt Andrea Scott]

I just want to address that joint initiative. It's just under way; it's not in a working process right now. The funding has been announced, but we haven't got the unit together yet. There are a lot of pieces that need to come together in order to implement a joint task force.

I can tell you that the numbers that you requested are posted on the annual report on the public website for the Winnipeg Police Board, and a lot of those numbers are present and open to the public.

As for my thoughts on that integrated unit, absolutely we're going to work with triaging cases on a day-to-day basis, based on risk assessment and triage, and that's how we put the resources into place.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

If you could please submit to the committee exactly what I requested, that would be very helpful. I'm looking forward to hearing if there will be an annual report just for the sake of accountability and transparency, just so that the public knows what's going on as we try to build up a more positive relationship, a more trusting relationship—certainly with the indigenous community.

Thank you.

[Sgt Andrea Scott]

Absolutely.

As I said, one is published in the annual report of the Winnipeg Police Board.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Awesome.

Thank you so much. I'd really like to thank the witnesses for coming and joining us for the second panel. It's really helping us put our report together.

As Leah said, Andrea, if you could just send that information to us, that would be wonderful. I know that our clerk will be working with you to ensure that we can get that into our materials. That's excellent.

Oh, yes, we have Anna Roberts.

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

I don't know if this is a point of order, but I needed to get your attention.

I just want to say that the analysts, the clerk, the interpreters we had last week all deserve a round of applause.

[Voices]

Hear, hear!

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

Sorry; I don't know if that's a point of order.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

That is an excellent point of order. I look at Leah and Joy. You saw how crazy we were last week, but really, you're right. I'm looking at some tired faces, because you guys have worked so darned hard.

Thank you so much to the FEWO team for making it such an incredible, impactful study and being able to get there on the ground and doing that work.

Anna, thank you very much for bringing this up. You're the best.

We'll be meeting once again on Thursday at 3:30.

Do I have a motion to adjourn? Marc's happy about that.

Great. We are adjourned.