Status of Women Committee on May 28th, 2026

[The Chair, Conservative, Dominique Vien]

I call this meeting to order.

Good afternoon, colleagues. I'm happy to see you again.

Welcome to meeting number 40 of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted by the committee on Thursday, April 23, 2026, the committee is resuming its study of women's shelters and transitional housing.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application.

To ensure an orderly meeting, I would like to make a few comments for witnesses and members.

Please wait until I recognize you by name before speaking. For those participating by video conference, please click on the microphone icon to activate your mike. Please mute yourself when you are not speaking. For those in the room, if you wish to speak, please raise your hand. For those on Zoom, please use the “raise hand” function, which is at the bottom of the screen.

For interpretation for those on Zoom, you have the choice, at the bottom of your screen, of floor, English or French. For those in the room, you can use the earpiece and select the desired channel. I would like to remind the witnesses that committee members may ask questions in French or English. If you need interpretation, please take a moment now to prepare your earpiece and select the desired channel. That way, we'll save a few seconds if you have to speak.

I remind you that all comments by members and witnesses should be addressed through the chair. Of course, I won't interrupt the flow if there's a good exchange. I'll let things run their course.

Before we welcome our witnesses, I would like to provide a trigger warning. We will be discussing topics related to gender-based violence, which may be a trigger for people who have had similar experiences. If any participants feel distressed or need assistance, I invite them to inform the clerk, Ms. Miller. For all witnesses and members, it's important to recognize that these are and remain difficult discussions. Therefore, we will try to be compassionate in our conversations.

I would now like to welcome the witnesses for this first hour.

First, we have Rachelle Walker, executive director of the Muskoka Women's Advocacy Group.

Second, we have Marie McGregor Pitawanakwat, chair of the National Indigenous Women's Housing Network.

Finally, we have Laisa Audlaluk‑Watsko, interim board chair of Pauktuutit Inuit Women of Canada.

We are now ready for the opening remarks.

Ms. Walker, the floor is yours for five minutes. Thank you.

[Rachelle Walker, Executive Director, Muskoka Women's Advocacy Group]

Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the committee.

My name is Rachelle Walker, and I'm the executive director of the Muskoka Women's Advocacy Group. We operate two emergency gender-based violence shelters. We're located in the district municipality of Muskoka, which spans a massive area of almost 6,500 square kilometres.

Our region is a collection of small towns, communities and rural areas. In communities like ours, the barriers abuse survivors face are stark. We have little public transit, patchy cell service, regular hydro outages and a lack of options normally found in larger urban areas. Many shelters across Canada regularly face frustration around the lack of safe and affordable housing choices for survivors. As highlighted by the Women's Shelters Canada study, shelters are often operating above their funded capacity. Frontline staff must extend stays repeatedly simply because there's nowhere feasible for women to go. Shelters end up in overflow positions because the housing system is broken.

Transitional housing is a solid bridge for women, but it can't fix a broken market on its own, and we need more of it. Our agency manages a transitional housing program or second stage, as is sometimes called, with 10 rent-geared-to-income units. This program provides many supports for survivors, but one key component that is impossible to replace is time. Urgency is not empowerment. Women enter our emergency shelters with valid concerns about the unknown but also with relief, and then soon they are overwhelmed because they need to start looking for housing yesterday.

Our housing program offers up to two years' stay. It gives women some breathing room to regain independence, secure employment and safely rebuild their lives, and it works. In the past three years, our transitional program has housed 34 women and their children. In 2023 two women reported that they were returning to their abusers after leaving the program. The other 32 did not, but when women leave shelter or second stage, they encounter a brutal for-profit housing market.

Transitional housing is a vital lifeline, and it allows women time to steady themselves and to strengthen their community, family and friend relationships which have normally been broken by an isolating abuser. They tend to generate real and safe options in that time even when those options aren't perfect. Transitional housing could become a dead end if the federal government doesn't invest heavily in long-term affordable housing stock and what's needed to support it.

If the federal government wants to work toward ending the cycle of violence and poverty, I have two recommendations.

First, look past capital grants. Building structures is only part of the solution. The federal government needs to consider earmarking substantial transfer payments of core operational funding for both emergency shelters and transitional housing. Without operational dollars, we can't pay staff to provide the necessary support to survivors. We can't cover the increasing costs of utilities or make needed repairs.

Second, funding has to take geography into consideration. A survivor's safety shouldn't be determined by where she lives in Canada. We need targeted dollars to expand infrastructure like basic and reliable transportation. For Muskoka, that means transit reaching our geographic edges and beyond, so women aren't forced to choose between isolation or returning to danger.

Financial stress is awful, but to an extent, financial stress can be managed. Living in violence can't. If we want survivors to manage the systemic housing gaps that follow them, of course we need to invest in capital projects but also in minor capital strategies and in the operational needs of shelters, transitional housing and affordable long-term housing.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dominique Vien]

Thank you so much, Ms. Walker.

Ms. McGregor, you have five minutes.

[Marie McGregor Pitawanakwat, Chair, National Indigenous Women's Housing Network]

Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Marie McGregor Pitawanakwat. I serve as chair of the National Indigenous Women's Housing Network and co-chair of the Women's National Housing and Homelessness Network.

I am grateful to be able to provide comments today. I have a presentation. I will try to be as brief as possible with it. It is to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. It's a brief discussion of the role and capacity of women's shelters and transitional housing. I have five issues to briefly state, a “what will happen” statement if the issues are not addressed and five recommendations to match the issues.

The first issue is the matter of staffing at violence against women shelters. The staffing numbers tell part of the story. For example, there are 3,546 full-time workers, 1,076 part-time workers and 1,682 casual or part-time relief staff at women's shelters and transition homes. The question is this: Are these numbers adequate for the number of clients being served? In addition, some of the staffing and human resources issues facing shelters and transition homes include staff fatigue, high turnover and recruitment challenges.

The second issue has to do with aging infrastructure. A national survey in 2025 asked 618 violence against women shelter staff to participate, and 317 responded. When asked about the condition of buildings and infrastructure, 45% of the respondents indicated that major repairs were needed, with costs of more than $40,000. When asked about minor repairs, survey respondents indicated that 31% of shelter buildings needed minor repairs at a cost of less than $40,000. It was also stated that many buildings were created before accessibility standards were imposed, which required retrofitting to comply with regulations.

The third issue is the housing crisis and deep affordability issues. These are reflected in shelters and transition homes having to turn away survivors after reaching capacity. Survivors are also staying longer in emergency shelters, transition homes and second-stage shelters. This means beds and units are not as available to new survivors as they were formerly, since survivors are staying there longer.

The next issue is fundraising. This one is vital: “The need to raise funds for core operational costs...is nearly universal.” Fundraising is conducted to cover the following: renovations, 71%; technology, 51%; transportation, 50%; office administration, 44%; salaries, 47%; safety and security, 36%; utilities, 31%; and rent or mortgage, 19%. This is from the Hoogendam and Maduakolam study of 2026.

The next issue is what I'd call multi-faceted needs. For instance, emergency shelters and transition homes are working with clients who present multi-faceted needs. Some clients have histories of sexual exploitation, trafficking, forced marriage and family violence. Clients include indigenous women; clients living in rural, remote, northern and isolated communities; immigrant women; 2SLGBTQIA+ individuals; women involved in sex work; and survivors of human trafficking. In addition, technology-facilitated gender-based violence shows up as tracking, hacking and harassment of clients. This work requires increasingly specialized, trauma-informed and culturally safe approaches.

I turn now to what will happen if not enough is done.

The view of clients and shelter workers has to change—

[The Chair, Conservative, Dominique Vien]

Ms. McGregor Pitawanakwat, I have to interrupt you, as your five minutes are up. Thank you. You will have the opportunity to come back to what you didn't have time to say.

I now give the floor to Ms. Audlaluk‑Watsko.

The floor is yours for five minutes. Thank you.

[Laisa Audlaluk-Watsko, Interim Board Chair, Pauktuutit Inuit Women of Canada]

Thank you, everyone. Unnusakkut, good afternoon, Chair and members of the committee. Thank you for this invitation.

My name is Laisa Audlaluk-Watsko. I'm here on behalf of Pauktuutit Inuit Women of Canada, the national representative organization for Inuit across this country. Since 1984, our mandate has been to advocate for systemic change to improve the social, cultural and economic well-being of Inuit women. Housing and shelters have been central to that work for decades.

I want to begin with a simple statement for Inuit women: The issues before this committee are not policy questions. They are a human rights emergency. The lack of safe, affordable and culturally appropriate housing is a crisis rooted in forced settlement, one that places Inuit women in danger every day.

The numbers from our own research are stark: 52.9% of Inuit in Inuit Nunangat live in overcrowded housing, and 32.7% live in homes requiring major repairs. Inuit women are six times more likely than non-indigenous women to live in unsuitable housing. Approximately 59% of Inuit communities have no emergency shelter, which means that many Inuit women fleeing violence have nowhere safe to go, and 62% of urban Inuit women surveyed by Pauktuutit had avoided going to a shelter due to feeling unsafe or facing discriminatory treatment.

Overcrowding is not just a housing problem; it is a violence problem. When there are no alternatives, Inuit women are forced into dangerous situations. The link between housing insecurity and gender-based violence is a daily reality in our communities. The crisis also exists outside of Inuit Nunangat. As more Inuit move to cities, the lived realities of urban Inuit require equal attention from this committee.

At Pauktuutit, we have spent decades collecting evidence and building solutions. We co-developed and co-chaired, with the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation and Indigenous Services Canada, the shelters initiative for indigenous women and children. This was a proven Inuit-led model, with representatives reviewing and selecting projects. As of 2025, 12 Inuit-led shelter transitional housing projects have been approved, including an emergency shelter and transitions home in Puvirnituq, Nunavik.

We are also leading a national housing and shelters research and advocacy initiative examining lived experiences across the full housing continuum. Our finding is clear: Housing insecurity is more than an infrastructure problem; it is a systems failure requiring federal policy reform.

Despite this progress, I must be honest with this committee. When asked to rate how well current federal housing policies meet Inuit women's needs, on a scale of one to five, Pauktuutit rates this current system at two. Why? There are four core failures. There is no stable multi-year funding for Inuit women's shelter organizations. The affordability benchmark in the national housing strategy, which is 30% of regional income, is meaningless in communities where the cost of living is 40% to 100% higher than in southern Canada. Funding cycles are short and competitive, and the administrative burden undermines the ability of Inuit organizations to plan and deliver sustained solutions. Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami has identified a need for $3.04 billion over 10 years, just to bring Inuit core housing needs to the Canadian average. However, federal budgets do not come close to meeting this need.

The committee is asking what support measures are needed. Pauktuutit’s answers are to, one, establish a dedicated Inuit women's housing and shelter fund. A distinctions-based federally administered funding stream must be co-developed with Inuit women's organizations. It requires multi-year operational support and an investment that reflects northern construction realities.

Two, permanently fund—

[The Chair, Conservative, Dominique Vien]

I'm sorry to interrupt you, Ms. Audlaluk‑Watsko, but your speaking time is up. I would also like to inform you that a technician will contact you to check your connection, which is considered weak.

We will now begin our first round of discussions.

Mrs. Goodridge, you have the floor.

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here, and thanks for the work you guys do in serving vulnerable women.

I want to quickly give you a shout-out, Ms. Audlaluk-Watsko. Your photography is stunning—like, truly stunning.

If you haven't checked it out, I would recommend that everybody look at it. It's nothing to do with this, but it gives a very good demonstration of some of the housing challenges faced by the Nunavummiut.

Thank you for sharing that piece and that beautiful art.

Ms. Walker, I was chatting with Scott Aitchison, one of my colleagues, earlier today. He was telling me that before he was the mayor of Huntsville and before he was the member of Parliament for Parry Sound—Muskoka, he led the fundraising for Chrysalis, your transitional housing in Huntsville. He said he did it in collaboration with one of your predecessors, because they saw the need. They understood the importance of transitional housing as a community. They decided to just do something about it and not wait for the Government of Ontario or any other level of government to step up. They just did it.

You spoke about transitional housing. Can you speak about what the importance is of transitional housing and how it serves people?

[Rachelle Walker]

Sure. As I said earlier, transitional housing is about giving women time. When women come into the shelter, it's traumatizing. They are uprooting themselves. They're uprooting their children. It's scary. It's an unknown thing. By the time they go into transitional housing from our shelters, they're well acquainted with the staff. They realize that the building is very secure. Our transitional housing is attached to our Huntsville shelter. While they're there, we do have staff they can access for support during their stays.

They're not doing everything on their own for the first time. Quite often we have women who have never even opened a bank account before. Someone can help guide them through those kinds of things. All the little daily things you take for granted when you live alone are new for these women, in a lot of cases. They might also have been made to feel, because of the abuse, that they're stupid and they can't do it. We are there to provide support, a roof over their heads and help, in the ways that we can.

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Thank you for that.

One piece you talked about, and that I really appreciated, was taking geography into consideration. I think that's one of the things the Government of Canada is especially bad at. I'm the member of Parliament for Fort McMurray—Cold Lake. I represent 142,000 square kilometres covering most of northern Alberta. It's an immensely large territory. It has a variety of different communities, from large cities like Fort McMurray and Cold Lake down to tiny little indigenous communities and everything in between. The needs do not necessarily get served. Someone decides, well, if you go an hour away, there is a shelter, or if you go three hours away, there is a shelter, so that should be good enough.

I'm wondering if all three of you women could talk about the importance of having supports close to home so that people have the support network that they already have while they are finding ways out of abuse.

Perhaps Ms. McGregor Pitawanakwat can start.

[Marie McGregor Pitawanakwat]

I think the isolation of many rural and remote communities is an important consideration, especially when a lot of the communities cannot be accessed unless you fly in or travel in by boat when the water's open. There needs to be some kind of consideration for shelter services for those kinds of communities.

I know that a group called the Rural Development Network in Alberta is working on these kinds of things. They've been very progressive, with sort of grassroots thinking about consulting with people regarding what they need in terms of shelters, second-stage homes and transition homes. I think that's very useful. Connection with them would be very valuable, I think.

Yes, those in remote areas need to have shelters and services as well.

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Ms. Walker, please go ahead.

[Rachelle Walker]

On remaining in the community, when we are at capacity or over capacity, we will often refer women to other shelters in our region. Parry Sound is one that's a bit closer to us. It's the same with the Orillia shelter.

Women don't want to leave their areas. They have family and friends established here. They are familiar with the layout of the major towns around here or the area they're from. They might have kids who are in school. They might have a job, and they might not have transportation to get to that job. If a woman is from Bracebridge and she wants to stay in the Bracebridge shelter and we don't have room, going to Huntsville isn't even really an option as far as public transit. There is some public transit here, but it's not at all like an urban centre.

It's really destabilizing for women to leave their communities.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dominique Vien]

Thank you very much, Mrs. Goodridge. That will be the final word for this first turn.

Good morning, Ms. Gladu. You have the floor.

[Marilyn Gladu, Liberal, Sarnia—Lambton—Bkejwanong, ON]

Thank you to all of the witnesses for being here today. I'm very interested in what you have to say.

I'll start my questions on the topic of the rural reality for shelters and transitional housing. I'm trying to understand how big the gaps are in the various areas. I'll go to each of you, starting with Ms. Walker.

[Rachelle Walker]

As far as housing goes, when it comes to Muskoka and market rent, one of the issues we face here as women accessing housing is that a lot of independent landlords—when I say that, I mean people who have a granny flat or a room in their home to rent out—tend to prefer to use that as an Airbnb situation instead of renting it out long term to someone. That takes places that our women could potentially rent off the market. That leaves fewer units to rent at inflated prices.

I was looking at rentals around here not too long ago. In Gravenhurst, there was a $900 room in a basement for rent. It was fully furnished and had no window, so there was no proper egress. When I first moved here in 2014, I had an 800-square-foot apartment with windows on the second floor, lots of room and lots of light. It was clean and beautiful. That is quite a change over the past 12 years. It's quite something. That's huge.

As I've mentioned, transportation is also huge for women here.

[Marilyn Gladu, Liberal, Sarnia—Lambton—Bkejwanong, ON]

Very good.

Laisa, I think you can talk a bit about the budget that put some funding toward the national action plan to end gender-based violence. How is the funding that the government's providing helping in your area to address the needs of women there?

[Laisa Audlaluk-Watsko]

We mainly look for funding in and around that by applying directly to those base programs. It is still a little bit rare to get into them because it's so limited, but they're starting. We're only getting familiarized with those areas because it's so limited with that gender-based one.

Otherwise, I will have to come back to that question after I get someone in-house to answer better on the funding.

[Marilyn Gladu, Liberal, Sarnia—Lambton—Bkejwanong, ON]

Okay. You can send it to the clerk when you get the answer.

Marie McGregor, I want to ask you about how big the gap is that you see in this transitional housing space. I also want to give you some time to finish the five recommendations that you wanted to make.

[Marie McGregor Pitawanakwat]

Thank you for that.

Yes, there is a gap. When you think about a territory the size of.... Think about 49 communities in northern Ontario. Many of those are fly-in, and many of those are accessible only when the river ice has broken. Some of those are accessible only by winter roads. That tells you how difficult transportation is.

The other challenge to that is that building and construction materials need to be trucked in over the ice roads during the winter or shipped in by barge when the waters are open. All of that compounds the cost of building materials. A couple of years ago, I heard an estimate that the cost for an ordinary three-bedroom bungalow in the far north was $700,000. It wasn't a fancy or big house by any means. It was just a plain, ordinary, little three-bedroom bungalow for $700,000. That was three years ago. With the rates of inflation the way they are, who knows what that number is now. What's happening is that housing affordability is beyond the reach of many people, in particular women.

One of the questions you want to ask yourself when you're working with this is, what do we need? It's not, what do we want? "What do we want" tells you that you should have a three-car garage and a swimming pool. “What do we need” tells you this: Can I have a door that locks at night? Can I be warm when I wake up the next morning? Can I have a window to look out of? Is there a place I can cook, wash and sit and enjoy my book?

The big question is the difference between need and want. As I drive around here in the south, I see so many examples of want, want, want, and the destruction of natural resources just because of want. It's heartbreaking.

I'm sorry. I wish I had a better answer, but there it is.

[Marilyn Gladu, Liberal, Sarnia—Lambton—Bkejwanong, ON]

No, it's okay. It's a fine answer. I'm just running out of time.

Could you send your five recommendations to the clerk, so that the committee can look at them when we're putting together our own recommendations?

Thank you so much. I think I'm just about at the end of my time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dominique Vien]

Thank you very much, Ms. Gladu.

Ms. Larouche, you have six minutes.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Good afternoon.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I'd like to thank the three witnesses for joining us today. Clearly, five minutes for an opening statement is not much time. They seem to have a great deal to say on this issue, which particularly affects communities.

Ms. Audlaluk‑Watsko, at the end of your remarks, you only had time to make one formal recommendation, which concerned separate funding, and then you had to stop. I'm giving you the opportunity to continue—if you have further recommendations to share with us—and to finish what you wanted to say.

[Laisa Audlaluk-Watsko]

Thank you, everyone. I have three more points.

Number two is to permanently fund the shelter initiative for Inuit women and children. It is a proven, Inuit-led model. It must be scaled and permanently sustained, and not be subject to funding renewals.

Number three is to serve urban Inuit. Shelter strategies must address the growing population of Inuit living in cities. They face discrimination, cultural isolation and an absence of Inuit-specific services.

Number four is to establish accountability mechanisms. Canada has commitments under the national housing strategy, the Inuit-Crown partnership committee and the national action plan to end gender-based violence. This committee should recommend binding implementation timelines, public reporting and outcome targets developed with Inuit women's organizations.

In closing, the 2019 National Housing Strategy Act identifies housing as a fundamental human right. Pauktuutit asks this committees to ensure that the right is operationalized—not just acknowledged—for Inuit women, girls and gender-diverse Inuit.

Qujannamiik. Thank you.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you very much.

I may have the opportunity to revisit certain points with you a bit later.

Ms. McGregor Pitawanakwat, do indigenous women living off-reserve find themselves in grey areas with limited access to services?