Status of Women Committee on May 4th, 2023

[Kathleen Douglass]

It should be right in the curriculum, starting from....

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

In very gentle words.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you.

Madam Chair, do I have more time?

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

You have 10 seconds, probably just to wrap it up.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Does anybody else have a last comment on that?

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thanks so much.

We're going to move over to Andréanne Larouche for six minutes.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I thank the witnesses for being here in person this afternoon to participate in the study, which isn't always easy. We've heard poignant testimony about the way victims are treated. We had the opportunity to get out in the field and visit organizations as part of the committee's mandate, and it's always chilling.

I'd like to start by highlighting that tomorrow is May 5. It's Red Dress Day. We will reflect on violence inflicted on missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. This study leads us to a striking conclusion: women are affected disproportionately, but Indigenous women are affected even more. That's an aberration in 2023.

I'll turn to you first, Ms. Pyoli York. You yourself mentioned Red Dress Day. There were recommendations, reports and calls for action, specifically as part of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls.

Could you talk about some calls for action or recommendations we're already aware of, but require political will to implement?

[Tiffany Pyoli York]

Thank you very much.

We can look at all of the stats from StatsCan and the information we receive through our studies and all of the data, but I would say that 90% of the victims and survivors have been of indigenous descent, so I would challenge the numbers we have in our data, and I would challenge each and every person—not only members of Parliament, but anyone who is watching this or listening to this—to take those calls to action seriously. They're all important, every single one of them.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Indeed, there's over 200. It's pretty striking. We now have to determine which ones can be implemented.

Ms. Douglass, you talked about awareness campaigns on social media, but we know the federal government is also working on a bill to fight violence and hate online, as well as all abuses that happen on the web.

What's important to include in the bill and our recommendations? What would help fight both human trafficking and online recruitment?

Furthermore, during the pandemic, it migrated a lot to the internet. Do you have recommendations for a potential bill that could help victims?

[Kathleen Douglass]

Thank you very much for that.

One of the things we discovered was that young people listen to young people. It's fine for us to have grey hair, because we know everything, but the reality is that they listen to each other. Social media is their language. We must talk about human trafficking in their language, which is social media. It's TikTok and Instagram and all of the other programs they use and whatever will be coming in the next couple of years.

When we visited the airport, I think it was, we saw right in one of the bathroom stalls a big thing about human trafficking. That's great to see, but it's very benign. It's a passive approach.

What we need is to actually have some campaigns that address the challenges—what to look for and how to be careful, like not listening to the person who's love bombing you at the beginning and then turning to become your pimp. We really need to talk to them in their language, to be active in a social media campaign and to actually start instilling the fact that this is not just, “Oh, it could happen to somebody else.” This happens to our daughters, nieces and granddaughters. This happens in our own backyards. We need to help parents understand what the signs are. From everything we have studied and learned—and, again, we are not the experts and we rely on our experts to give us the information—we know that parents never believe it could happen to their children. We need to educate parents in campaigns to understand the signs and symptoms.

We need to educate the youth, who are the prime targets, to really understand what trafficking is. It is not just a nice boyfriend who's running into problems because he has somebody after him. We need to get to them actively in their own language.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

You're entirely right.

In airports, there is the #NotInMyCity campaign to show that it's not acceptable. However, that doesn't solve all the problems, as you pointed out.

You also talked about education. Prevention and help for victims are both necessary. There's a great deal of work to do to identify cases of human trafficking and better coordinate various relevant departments.

Mr. Flynn, I will raise the subject with you during my last round.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thanks so much. We'll get back to that.

Lindsay, you have the floor now for six minutes.

[Lindsay Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you so much to all of the witnesses for coming here today.

I want to build upon what my colleague was just talking about. My colleague actually usually sits on this committee; I'm visiting once again. I used to sit on this committee. I miss it.

She put forward a motion in the House. It was adopted, and it was calling for the Red Dress Alert system. It would be very much like the Amber Alerts to help track better and, I think, talk about that disaggregated data that Mr. Flynn was asking for.

Can some of you talk about the importance of that Red Dress Alert system?

I don't know what order you want to go in.

[Tiffany Pyoli York]

I can definitely speak to that.

I think, as we have all seen, the Amber Alert system has worked. We have it for a reason. As a country, we've adopted it for a reason, because it works.

There are huge numbers of missing and murdered indigenous girls and women. With that Red Dress Alert, people's names may not end up on this ribbon. Those are people who maybe are going to make it home and be survivors.

[Lindsay Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Do you think it could be part of that public education awareness you're talking about?

[Tiffany Pyoli York]

Yes, absolutely.

I think if we bombard our kids, as Kathleen said, that's where our focus needs to be. The average age of entry into trafficking is 13 years old. I want you all to think about a 13-year-old in your life. Think about yourself as a 13-year-old. That is not what a 13-year-old should be worrying about.

Something we're really good at in Sudbury is that education piece. All of our kids in grades 7 to 12, in high schools and elementary schools, are getting the same streamlined messaging and empowerment that this is something that affects not only every single school board but every single student, school and teacher, and everyone in our communities.

When we have that same language and education and we really approach it as not just keeping yourself safe but also keeping the ones you love and care about safe as well, it really resonates with the kids. It really resonates with youth: “Maybe it's not going to happen to me, but I know enough to keep my friends safe.” That's something that really seems to resonate and work with the youth.

Whatever the method is, we will definitely go with the stuff that works.

[Lindsay Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

I don't know if anybody else wants to pop in there.

[Derrick Flynn]

One of the things I have noticed, to reiterate what Tiffany said, is that identifying the different types of grooming and the stages of human trafficking is so critical. Most people don't identify themselves as being trafficked until after they are out.

I have had conversations with so many people who have said, “That would never happen to my kids. It's not in my backyard. It's not in my school.” Then you sit with a 13-year-old girl, and she will say, “They were doing that to my friend. Is that what that was?”

It's having those generic conversations that are genuine. They will come forward and say, “Wow, that's what that was? That was happening to my friend.” It's critical.

[Lindsay Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

One of the things that concern me, of course, is that we have seen a consistent defunding of women's shelters—we talk about that abuse—both provincially and federally.

Can you talk about how that's going to impact the organizations you work in specifically?

[Tiffany Pyoli York]

Every day in the victim services office in Sudbury, we get a call for a case of intimate partner violence, domestic violence or human trafficking. Often either the shelter beds are full, or a human trafficking victim doesn't fit their mandate or their policies and procedures, or they are too high-risk—they cause an increase in security risk for other people staying in the shelter. What happens is that our victims and survivors of human trafficking are going to a low-barrier shelter instead of a domestic violence or intimate partner violence or human trafficking shelter, and that's only going to get worse.

[Lindsay Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

One of the cuts that were felt, I think, in the community.... You were talking about access to resources and about legal resources being available to victims. Legal aid is a huge part of that. There were some attempts by the federal government to bridge that.

Maybe each organization could talk about the impact that increasing the legal aid envelope at both levels of government would have for the people you serve.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

This is a very important question, but we have only 30 seconds, so if you want to get started on it, it would be great. Then we can add the extra at the end.

[Melissa Marchand]

I was just going to say that as part of Zonta, as Kathleen mentioned, we have over $100,000 worth of funding available towards transitional housing for women and female-identifying persons. They are able to stay there for upwards of months at a time, depending on how long it takes for the case to be brought to where it needs to be to be resolved.

In terms of funding, this is very minimal on the spectrum of where it should and could be.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

That's perfect. We're going to carry on.

We're now going to go to our second round. It will be five minutes, five minutes, two and a half, and two and a half.

We will start with Eric Melillo for five minutes.

[Eric Melillo, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

I would like to offer you the opportunity to finish your thought on that last question, if you want.