Debates of Oct. 21st, 2009

Huntingdon Port of Entry

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

The time provided for the consideration of private members' business has now expired and the order is dropped to the bottom of the order of precedence on the order paper.

A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.

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

Madam Speaker, I thank the parliamentary secretary for taking time to further answer questions about the dramatic increase in the number of women accessing shelters in Canada.

On May 14, I asked the Minister of State for Status of Women what her government would do about the staggering increase in the number of women seeking shelters in our country. I would like to review some of the statistics that I mentioned in May and highlight some additional numbers that have come out since then. Unfortunately, things are now worse, not better across Canada.

Since May, in my home town of London, Ontario, the London Abused Women's Centre has seen a staggering 105% increase in service demands over last year. That is up from a 79% increase earlier this year. The director of the agency still managed to find a positive in the numbers and was pleased that at least women were seeking help.

This past May, Ottawa women's shelters released a report entitled “Hidden from Sight: A Look at the Prevalence of Violence Against Women in Ottawa”. The report showed the desperate state of many women in this city. It states:

Ottawa shelters are almost always full and frequently over their capacity. On average, most shelters report turning away 1-3 women daily as there are simply no beds available. In 2007, 3,281 requests for emergency shelter were turned away. Local shelters are forced to turn away 6 times more women than they are able to house. Most women requesting shelter space are fleeing a violent partner with their children. Almost 450 children were living in shelters in 2007 and many more were turned away.

In Calgary a women's emergency shelter help line had a 300% increase in calls.

According to Statistics Canada, nearly 200,000 women reported that they had been assaulted or sexually assaulted by a spouse in 2003.

Intimate partner violence can be found in every province, territory, city and community within Canada. Police reported over 38,000 incidents of intimate partner violence nationwide, representing approximately 15% of all violent incidents reported to police. Eighty-three per cent of victims of spousal abuse are women.

A YWCA policy paper, released in January of this year makes it clear that recessions, like the one that we are in now, hit women hard.

Women make up a disproportionate share of low income Canadians and are particularly vulnerable in any economic crisis. Women account for 70% of part-time employees and two-thirds of Canadians working for minimum wage. Income statistics show women of colour, aboriginal women and women with disabilities are even more at risk than other women.

The YWCA report makes it very clear:

When women flee abuse, they leave homes, networks and communities behind. Lack of affordable housing and the other multiple challenges make them vulnerable to the recurrence of violence. Studies show that economic downturns have the potential to escalate domestic violence as stresses mount on families.

Domestic violence not only has a physical and emotional effect on families but also costs Canadian taxpayers. According to the United Nations, in Canada, a 1995 study estimated the annual direct costs of violence against women to be $684 million for the criminal justice system, $187 million for police and $294 million for the cost of counselling and training, totalling more than $1 billion a year.

The minister is hiding behind her action plan. There is no action plan. We need responsibility from the government.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary for Status of Women]

Madam Speaker, violence against women is unacceptable in all communities across Canada, yet it remains a serious problem.

Our government committed to eliminate it, and to provide assistance and solutions to people affected by this violence. In order to achieve those goals, our government is maintaining its support of the family violence initiative or FVI, a horizontal collaboration involving 15 departments and partner organizations.

The long-term goal of the FVI is to reduce the occurrence of family violence in Canada and to promote partnerships with the provinces, territories and non-governmental organizations. The Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics produces an annual report entitled Family Violence in Canada: A Statistical Profile, which provides the most current data on the nature and extent of family violence in Canada.

Our government is taking action to address the problem of violence against women and children. For example, the shelter enhancement program provides assistance to shelters and transition homes for victims of family violence, including those in first nations communities. In 2007, our government announced $52 million in funding over four years to fund programs and services, to provide support to victims of crime, and to intervene regarding a number of new problems that affect these victims.

Our government also supports a broad range of programs through Status of Women Canada's women's program. This program provides funding to community groups fighting to end violence against women across Canada.

In 2007-08 alone, the women's program approved funding for 91 projects to fight violence, representing an investment of $19,212,012 over three years. The following year, 39 projects were approved and another $5,334,017 invested over three years. Here are some examples of the projects that received funding.

In Victoria, a project is helping women and girls who are victims of sexual exploitation escape situations that expose them to violence and poverty.

Support services to combat family violence are being provided to aboriginal and immigrant women in Edmonton.

A national on-line counselling service will be set up.

An intervention program in the Montreal region will focus on girls who are victims of sexual abuse.

A project in New Brunswick is helping women recover from the effects of dating violence.

Our government is also concerned about the disproportionately high incidence of violence affecting aboriginal women and girls. That is why we gave the Sisters in Spirit initiative $5 million in funding for the 2005-2010 period and signed a partnership with the Native Women's Association of Canada. The Sisters in Spirit initiative is attacking the roots of racial and sexual violence against aboriginal women.

In March 2008, to help fight violence against aboriginal women and children, our government announced five new shelters in five provinces.

Our government cares about women—

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

The hon. member for London—Fanshawe.

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

Madam Speaker, the parliamentary secretary certainly has high praise for her minister and her government, but the truth of the matter is that her party and the minister responsible for the status of women have been ignoring and continue to ignore the challenges faced by women in this country.

I would ask, where is the affordable child care? Where is the affordable housing for women needing to escape violence? Where is pay equity? They destroyed pay equity. It is no more. This country has a system now in place where men get 100¢ dollars and women get 70¢ dollars. It is simply not acceptable.

All of this was made crystal clear just this month. This is Women's History Month and the minister has chosen to focus on women in winter sports. Celebrating our athletes is important, but the violence, the poverty and the lack of equality that women face is simply horrendous, and the government needs to respond.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Madam Speaker, our government unequivocally supports the renewed mandate of the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women.

As I was saying earlier, our government has invested over $24 million in three years. The NDP has always voted against the measures to help women in Canada escape the violence they are suffering. The NDP has always voted against the measures put in place by Canada and by our government. I have no lessons to learn from that hon. member.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Madam Speaker, I rise to follow-up on a question that I raised in the House on May 13 of this year concerning the search and rescue facilities available in Newfoundland and Labrador.

The question was raised in the wake of a Cougar helicopter crash off the east coast of Newfoundland on March 12, 2009, with the loss of 17 lives. This took place while all three of the Department of National Defence search and rescue helicopters stationed at Gander were in Nova Scotia at the time on training.

It was also raised following a decision by the Department of National Defence to send the search and rescue 444 Squadron stationed in Goose Bay, Labrador to Cold Lake, Alberta for six weeks training, leaving the Labrador residents very concerned. They were worried about their situation because of the ice conditions at that time of the year.

This only compounded the public perception in Newfoundland and Labrador that the Department of National Defence was not providing first-rate service, and was failing to understand and meet the search and rescue needs of the Newfoundland and Labrador offshore fishery and oil and gas industry and, in the case of Labrador, address the vulnerability of the residents to the ice conditions in the break-up months of May and June.

I am glad to say that decision on Labrador was reversed a couple of days after I raised the question in the House on May 13. I was very glad to see that happen two days later. Of course, the government did not say why it did it, but I hope that it was because it listened to what I had to say and certainly listened to what the residents of Labrador had to say about their concerns.

In terms of search and rescue capability, particularly in St. John's, there was a Cougar helicopter that provided back-up service to do the search and rescue because of the presence of the helicopters in Nova Scotia. Major McGuire of search and rescue indicated that it took an extra hour for the Cormorants to get to the site because of their distance from it, but there was supposedly a standby Cougar helicopter available to go.

In fact, it was the first responder. However, it was a helicopter station at St. John's that was not configured for search and rescue purposes. The first thing that the crew had to do was take the passenger seats out of the helicopter, install rescue gear, and do that configuration before they could take off to conduct the mission. It was obviously not on standby.

I referred my question to the royal commission back in 1984. It made a significant recommendation in the wake of the Ocean Ranger disaster, which claimed 84 lives. The recommendation stated:

That there be required a full-time search and rescue dedicated helicopter, provided by either government or industry, fully equipped to search and rescue standards, at the airport nearest to the ongoing offshore drilling operations, and that it be readily available with a trained crew able to perform all aspects of the rescue.

That recommendation has never been implemented. The evidence of that is very clear considering what happened on March 12 of this year, when there were no Cormorants available. There was no fully equipped, full-time dedicated helicopter available for this purpose. We believe that the government has failed in its obligations to the people who are working offshore and need the kind of—

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

Order. The hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence]

Mr. Speaker, the member for St. John's East has asked for clarification of the availability of search and rescue assets in Newfoundland and Labrador. It is my pleasure to provide him with that additional clarification.

Let me first say that the Canadian Forces finite search and rescue assets are carefully managed and strategically located across the country. Our men and women in uniform, in co-operation with other government agencies, including the RCMP and Coast Guard, as well as the provinces and territories are on duty 24/7, 365 days a year.

This is a no-fail mission for the Canadian Forces and they treat it that way. Over the many years that we have been providing that service, they have saved literally thousands of lives. It is always a tragedy when life is lost.

They are prepared to respond to incidents wherever and whenever they occur in Canada and our territorial waters. Their location is based upon experience and studies that determine where search and rescue incidents are concentrated, and where the need is greatest.

The Canadian Forces conducted comprehensive studies in 2003 and 2005 on the location of search and rescue assets. Those studies are based on the assessment of historical patterns and data, and they represent the most accurate information to date on basing our assets and reaffirmed that they are optimally positioned to respond to search and rescue incidents.

They also showed that regionally Gander has the best weather conditions, making it the most effective basing location. St. John's has three times the number of fog days as Gander.

The Canadian Forces routinely evaluates the processes and capacities following search and rescue responses and incidents to ensure that our resources and personnel are best suited to the meet the needs of Canadians.

As far as the current positioning of search and rescue assets goes, Gander is centrally located in Newfoundland and Labrador, which allows the CF to provide an even search and rescue coverage throughout the region.

I want to take a moment to talk about the specific situation that the member for St. John's East referred to in his original question in May.

A portion of the combat support squadron from Goose Bay was temporarily deployed to Canadian Forces Base Wainwright for six weeks. The combat support squadron at Goose Bay is principally established to support flying operations at the base and on the range. Its search and rescue role is secondary to this role, and therefore the deployment had no impact on primary search and rescue responses.

The Canadian Forces has finite resources. The Ocean Ranger incident led to an inquiry which led to some recommendations, and one of those recommendations has been fulfilled by the positioning of Cougar helicopters on a 24/7 basis. The fact of the configuration did not delay, for any length of time, the launching of that helicopter. In fact, the helicopter was on site 52 minutes after the initial mayday call. That is a pretty good response.

To position extra resources in St. John's would require assets we just do not have, and they would not be based optimally as all of our experience has shown.

I am going to conclude by saying that Canada has one of the best search and rescue systems in the world. It is made possible by the ability of the Canadian Forces and its search and rescue partners to effectively coordinate all available assets and bring them to bear on an incident.

I hope this information has helped the member better understand the effective and efficient use of finite search and rescue assets which are maintained throughout the country, and that includes Eastern Quebec, Southern Baffin Island and throughout the region of Newfoundland and Labrador.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Madam Speaker, the resources are only finite because the government has not seen fit to respond to the need and to the recommendations of the Ocean Ranger commission 25 years ago when the level of activity in the oil and gas offshore was minimal compared to today when we have in excess of 600 people offshore 24/7 on 3-week rotations where they are working 12 hours a day, rotating back and forth on a permanent basis.

It is at least 600 people, and sometimes many more than that. Plus there are vessels going back and forth, helicopters doing the travel and all of the need and the risk that is there.

We are not talking about the number of incidents because we hope there will not be any incidents. It should be based on the risk that is present because of the dangers associated with this particular activity. Cost should not be a factor. We do need to see that this recommendation be followed completely, not the way it is being followed now.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Madam Speaker, my hon. colleagues simply will not take the truth for an answer.

The fact is it was responded to. That is why the Cougar helicopter is there, on station. We cannot have an airplane hovering over a crash site before it happens.

The fact is, tragic as it certainly was, that crash was not survivable. Having a Cormorant in St. John's would not have changed the outcome of that incident at all.

While we are talking about finite assets, yes, they are finite and, yes, money is an issue and, yes, that member and his party have voted against every measure to increase assets to the Canadian Forces and to provide better service by the Canadian Forces to the people of Canada. He should not talk to us about finite assets when his party votes against them every time we bring them up.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly the House now stands adjourned until tomorrow at 10 a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).

(The House adjourned at 7:28 p.m.)