Status of Women committee  Thank you very much. First of all, I would like to thank the committee for inviting us to participate in this survey. It's very important for us. I'm here today presenting in the capacity of executive director of the Shield of Athena Family Services, as well as for the Allian

Status of Women committee  I did.

Status of Women committee  Thank you very much.

Status of Women committee  A few years ago, we established a special service with the three shelters that already existed in Laval. It's a special collaboration. When these shelters send us women, we arrange a meeting with one of what we call our cultural intermediaries. These intermediaries are interprete

Status of Women committee  I did do the top three, but I have others. Some of them are really peripheral, but I thought they were important. One comment—and I say this with a lot of belief—is that after nearly 30 years of working in this area of violence against women, I have also seen the impact that pre

Status of Women committee  The idea of paid leave is good. It's a wonderful idea, but many of the women we work with who present within our network, in Laval in general as well in Montreal, come from various communities where little English or French is spoken. The idea of course of financial dependence is

Status of Women committee  Exactly.

Status of Women committee  The option of choice is not there. Most of the time when we hear or when we read about, or when we put on the television, we find out about the issue of conjugal violence because we have the door of entry which is language, either French or English. Imagine when you live a situ

Status of Women committee  At the Shield of Athena, we've always worked with the communities as well as the victims. We've found that when we work with the communities, we take a more inclusive approach and we educate more people on what violence against women is, particularly conjugal violence, what the c

Status of Women committee  We're very lucky in that we began with the external services. Not all women want to go to shelters. It took us 13 years to make our shelter, but during that time, we always had the external. A lot of women would rather go to an external service than uproot themselves and go to a

Finance committee  Thank you. Good afternoon, members of the Standing Committee on Finance and other guests. My name is Melpa Kamateros. Thank you for this opportunity. I'm very honoured to be able to share some thoughts on the needs of women victims of conjugal violence during this COVID-19 pan

Finance committee  I'll be alternating between the French and English, but I think for the purposes of this presentation, I will keep it in English. This is fine.

Finance committee  Okay. To make it simple, I've gone to the English.

Finance committee  I'm very happy to have the presence of my colleague from London, regarding the issues of conjugal violence and the ways in which COVID has affected women. The Shield of Athena was established in 1991. We have a network of services that include two day centres and an emergency sh

Finance committee  I have to say—and I just referred to my colleague, Ms. Walker—this is the confusion that exists currently at the governmental level. We have a network of services that include two centres and a shelter. Our shelter got the emergency funding. Our centres did not. This is, I would