Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the remarkable, extremely talented, passionate, and hard-working member of Parliament for Timmins—James Bay.
While I am happy to rise and join in the debate today, I am quite disheartened that this debate even has to take place. I am certain I am not alone in that opinion. I am trying to be mindful of that as a I choose my words today.
This is an issue that has been left to percolate on the back burner of Canadian politics for far too long and in a way that many Canadians are not proud of. The sad story of Tina Fontaine has brought it to the boiling point, and it is clear that the time has come to treat the pattern of missing and murdered indigenous women as something more than a string of crimes, which the government bull-headedly insists is all we are dealing with.
As Canadians, we are coming to terms with what happened to Tina Fontaine. The family and community of Sonya Cywink were holding a vigil in her memory in her hometown, which is Whitefish River First Nation on Birch Island. On that same day they also held a vigil in London.
As MP, I was invited to attend and honoured to participate in that emotionally charged event in Whitefish River First Nation. We heard how on August 30, 1994, Sonya, who was living in London at the time, was found murdered at a historical aboriginal site in Elgin County and how nearly 20 years later Sonya's family, friends, and community still have no answers. As people began to share their stories, others spoke of their experiences with missing friends and relatives, and it became clear that, sadly, Sonya's case is not unique. We know there are close to 1,200 indigenous families across this country who share this experience, who have daughters, mothers, sisters, aunts, cousins, or friends who are missing or have been murdered.
If we want to contrast the government's inaction with that of the people who are living through this nightmare, we should consider how just last week the residents of Winnipeg have taken to dragging the Red River themselves. The government's response was a big fat zero. It blamed it on crime and left it at that. How can it claim to be taking any real action to address violence against women in this country when it refuses to conduct an inquiry into the close to 1,200 missing and murdered indigenous women in Canada? The refusal amounts to acceptance, and when we consider that along with the Conservatives' record on equity rights for women, the pattern borders on ideological. In fact, since its election in 2006, the Conservative government has made it more difficult for women in this country. One of its first courses of action was to remove the word “equality” from the funding mandate of Status of Women Canada's women's program. While the word “equality” was eventually restored, its essence was lost.
Additionally, the funding structure was changed, making it impossible for Status of Women Canada to fund the work of organizations when it relates to advocacy, lobbying, or general research on women's rights. At the time, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women expressed concern about the impact of these changes, particularly on access to services by aboriginal and rural women.
We know that the government will claim it is doing something about this, but as others have mentioned today, it is all smoke and mirrors with the current government. While it has some funding for the initial research on missing and murdered indigenous women, it has turned around and cut funding to the second phase of the project, the one dedicated toward action. Organizations are still waiting to hear if projects dedicated toward violence prevention will be funded. How is that for a mixed message?
Today, in 2014, indigenous women in this country are five to seven times more likely to die from violence than any other women. What is wrong with this story? Why is there not any action from the Conservative government?
Why is the government not listening to the families who have lost their daughters, mothers, sisters and friends? Why is it not listening to aboriginal groups, such as the Native Women's Association of Canada and the Assembly of First Nations, or aboriginal leaders such as the chiefs, the grand chiefs and even the national chief? Why is it not listening to the public or organizations such as Human Rights Watch?
Why is the Conservative government not willing to listen to all those voices and why is it refusing to call for a national public inquiry into missing and murdered aboriginal women? It does not matter where these women came from—British Columbia, Winnipeg or northern Ontario—they were taken from our homes and our streets. They disappeared, and justice has not been served, for them or for their families.
Each missing or murdered indigenous woman is a tragedy that could have been avoided. This is an issue that must be addressed, and the fact that the number of indigenous women who go missing or are murdered continues to rise is proof that the partial measures taken to date are not sufficient to address a tragedy of this scope or complexity.
This past spring, the RCMP reported that between 1980 and 2012, there have been 1,181 homicides and unresolved missing persons cases involving indigenous women. To put that into perspective, if we were to stand in the House each day and read out the name of a different missing or murdered indigenous woman, we would not get through the entire list until November 2017.
While my NDP colleague from Vancouver East began work on this issue almost a decade ago, since 2010 the federal NDP along with many other civil society groups have stated that a national inquiry is the crucial next step, and we have been pushing the Conservative government to agree. A national public commission is the necessary next step in addressing this tragedy.
I stand here today with my colleagues, committing that an NDP government would take immediate action. We commit that, on our first day in office, the NDP would begin consulting first nations, women's groups, and other stakeholders on terms of reference for a national inquiry and that, within 100 days in office, an NDP government would establish a public inquiry under Part I of the Inquiries Act.
While indigenous women make up only 4.3% of Canada's female population, 16% of all women killed in Canada are indigenous. Further to that, while murder rates are falling for non-indigenous women across the country, they have remained virtually unchanged for indigenous women. Only a full public inquiry that is properly resourced and involves indigenous peoples at every step will lead to real solutions.
We need to understand what happened and determine what we need to do as a country to end violence against indigenous women and address the systemic issues that have made indigenous women more susceptible to violence. Yet instead of taking responsibility and being part of the solution, the Conservative government continues to make excuses and evasions. Provinces, territories, first nations, indigenous women's groups, communities, and experts from all backgrounds agree an inquiry is needed.
We have Canadian consensus, but the Conservatives are just too stubborn to listen. We need comprehensive solutions that go beyond the government and police. We need to hear from families, communities, provinces, and territories along with other experts. We need a comprehensive and inclusive national inquiry into the hundreds of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls. That is how we finally end this intergenerational tragedy.
Enough is enough. The time to act is now. For far too many, this is an issue of life and death. It is up to us to take leadership and to commit to bringing justice to these families, to these women, to these communities, and to this country. We will not give up until a national inquiry is called and no indigenous woman lives in fear in Canada.
We are very passionate about this because our colleagues are very passionate about this on all sides of the House, except that on the other side Conservatives choose not to act. Earlier tonight we had one member of Parliament, the member for Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, who said we do not want to line lawyers' pockets with dollars. They feel that what they are doing is enough, but we look at the hundreds of millions of dollars just this past year that they have used to fight on first nations' issues, on their treaty rights, on the issue with respect to Cindy Blackstock, who is fighting for children, on St. Anne's, and on refusing to provide information. The Conservatives are wasting money. Instead, they could better be investing in a national inquiry for missing and murdered indigenous women.