Committee
Consult the user guide
For assistance, please contact us
Consult the user guide
For assistance, please contact us
Add search criteria
Results: 1 - 6 of 6
View Mylène Freeman Profile
NDP (QC)
Following from that, do off-reserve aboriginal women work, can they work, do they want to work in developing these plans? What supports and funding opportunities would be available to help them develop these initiatives?
Diane Redsky
View Diane Redsky Profile
Diane Redsky
2014-02-06 18:13
Already from our work in going across the country in our work specifically on trafficking, there are lots.... Almost in every large city in Canada, the women are starting to gather, starting at the grassroots level to come together to identify the solutions. I really think it's about all of us being the funding partners, and some decision-making and opportunity to provide support so that we step up as well in supporting those local coalitions, organizations, and women's organizations doing the work.
Part of what we've done through the national task force is as we've been going along fact-finding in the last year, we have also been grant-making. When we're grant-making, we're grant-making in partnership with government. There are natural synergies and opportunities for the private sector and for government to come together to really build a strong circle around the women who are working really hard at trying to raise awareness and address the systems and rebuild their families and communities from the inside out.
Jeffrey Cyr
View Jeffrey Cyr Profile
Jeffrey Cyr
2013-12-05 19:11
Madam Chair, distinguished members of the Status of Women special committee, thank you for the opportunity to present to you on this very serious issue.
I wish to acknowledge first the traditional lands of the Algonquin nation where we are meeting today.
My name is Jeff Cyr. I'm a Métis from Manitoba and the executive director of the National Association of Friendship Centres.
Just for your knowledge, the National Association of Friendship Centres is a national aboriginal organization comprised of 119 urban-based aboriginal service organizations and seven provincial and territorial associations located form coast to coast to coast in Canada.
We've been providing community-based services on the front line for over 60 years in Canada, and are part of the social fabric of this country. As to the topic of this committee this evening, it's all front-line work, from our perspective.
The work of this special committee is very important to the friendship centre movement. Many of the documented cases of missing and murdered indigenous women in Canada have links to urban areas. Furthermore, these women and girls are members of our communities, so we are compelled to speak out. We are compelled to seek change.
What I really want to speak to you about today is action. I believe we should focus on making demonstrable change on the ground in the lives of aboriginal people on a societal level. This issue of murdered and missing women and violence against women and girls is fundamentally a Canadian problem. It is not an aboriginal problem. It has often been cast as such. These are the most vulnerable elements of our society.
I have long stated that complex issues are not solved in isolation, are not solved by one single actor—not my organization, nor police forces, nor the government can do this alone. It is through shared goals, collective action, and leadership that we can effect change. This is our challenge.
The Native Women's Association of Canada's Sisters In Spirit database shows that of the cases they documented to 2010, 70% disappeared from urban areas, and 60% of those who were murdered were murdered in urban areas. The National Association of Friendship Centres believes this is a broad societal problem, one that requires action on all levels to ensure that indigenous women and girls are safe.
Research into this complex issue has been undertaken by the Native Women's Association of Canada, Manitoba's aboriginal justice inquiry, the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry in British Columbia, and others. The research has revealed the higher vulnerability of aboriginal women and girls to violence.
In 2009, as a response, at our annual general meeting of the National Association of Friendship Centres, the membership passed a resolution and conducted an organization-wide study on poverty and social exclusion. I'll draw the connection for you in a minute.
Some of the findings of the research are that 94% of respondents agreed that social exclusion is an issue with our clients: that's 94%. Of the respondents, 58% say that social exclusion is a major factor in creating poverty. The study identified that the main reasons for the social exclusion of urban aboriginal people include racism, prejudice, stereotyping, poor education and literacy, poverty and unemployment, lack of government policies and programs for urban aboriginal people, and an unwillingness of governments to include urban aboriginal people in their policies.
The key messages from this study that friendship centres want all governments to know are that poverty and social exclusion among the urban aboriginal population in Canada are very serious issues that impact many thousands of children, youth, and single families in their daily lives; and that the impacts of poverty and social exclusion are having devastating impacts on health, social education, economic well-being, and the future lives of Canadian urban aboriginal people. Furthermore, poverty and social exclusion are linked to violence in our communities.
Sadly, indigenous women and girls are among the most vulnerable in Canadian society. For those of us who provide services to them, we know that there are serious systemic barriers and challenges that our communities face. We know that historical trauma, social exclusion, and systemic racism only begin to paint a picture of vulnerable communities and the obstacles they face in achieving safety.
The NAFC has done some work in this area. Our New Journeys website is designed to provide information directly to aboriginal peoples, and particularly to first nations women, who need this information for their transitions from the reserve or remote communities to a city. The website lists thousands of service organizations and agencies. It also contains transitional planning guides for women, students, and families.
However, in order to address these issues, we believe that widespread systemic action and change are needed. We must focus on integrative approaches to collective action. Innovative approaches and widespread systemic action are needed in areas of policing, education, social services, public health, and others to ensure that we provide effective support for our most vulnerable populations.
An example that I find enlightening in providing hope on how we do things within our communities is the hub model that was developed in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, led by the chief of police there. This is an example of interlinking service providers to decrease crime rates—and there's evidence that it works. Using short-term case-work teams made up of a spectrum of human services personnel is a way of acknowledging that violence and crime prevention is a community responsibility. They have found success in ways that would not have been possible without an integrated approach. It was not about money but about an integrated approach.
Indigenous communities are recognizing the role they play and are taking action. Two friendship centre programs in particular address violence against aboriginal women. One is the moose hide campaign. This is where men wear a small patch of moose hide to symbolize their commitment to stand up against violence towards aboriginal women and children. I am wearing one tonight. To quote my colleague in British Columbia, Paul Lacerte:
We need to speak up and take positive action, and we need to support each other as Aboriginal men in our healing journey.
Another program is Taking Care of Each Other's Spirit. This is a campaign undertaken by the Ontario Federation of Indian Friendship Centres to address the abuse of women in aboriginal communities across Ontario. The tools provide communities with a road map for an action plan to end violence against aboriginal women, while providing resources for aboriginal women who may be experiencing violence or who are at risk.
I am amongst a distinguished panel here today, so I want to keep my remarks brief and allow the committee time to do its work. I wanted to leave with some parting thoughts on the way forward. First, I believe we need to articulate a set of shared goals at a community, regional, and national level.
Second, we need to set aside perceived areas of influence and jurisdiction—that's within cities, within provinces, and within communities—and build a model of collective action that empowers community action. The Prince Albert hub model may provide some key insights as to how we can do this. It isn't about the money; its about the effort.
Last, we need to show leadership. We need to use our collective clout, power, and influence to move communities, to move governments, and to allow for new forms of integrated action.
Thank you very much.
View Cathy McLeod Profile
CPC (BC)
Thank you, Madam Chair.
I think as we all come to these meetings we reflect on some of the reasons we're here. I certainly want to note that today is the one-year anniversary of the very tragic murder of 16-year-old CJ Fowler in Kamloops.
That murder has not been solved as of yet. I look at the pictures in the newspaper today of this beautiful girl with a pink hoodie, and know the very violent end she met. I think our hearts are all wanting to work towards solutions, and it's really coming up with the solutions of how we can get to where we need to be. It was December 5 one year ago, so today is a difficult day for her family especially. You look at the pictures, and it's very tragic.
This leads me to the fact that this was in an urban setting. It was a girl visiting from a more remote community. Mr. Cyr indicated that a lot of this is happening in the urban settings. One of the things I've noticed about friendship centres is their incredible ability to do so much with so little. Certainly when I look at the interior friendship centre I see the breadth of what they do.
As the friendship centre, as the person responsible, how do you see your organizations fitting into tackling this problem? You talked earlier about the different levels—the national level, the community level—at which we need to tackle it. Could you talk a little bit about your organization at these different levels?
Jeffrey Cyr
View Jeffrey Cyr Profile
Jeffrey Cyr
2013-12-05 19:53
Sure. I'll try to be brief, conscious of the time here.
Friendship centres, like first nations, operate on all three levels: a national body, regional bodies, and community-driven bodies. Communities actually create friendship centres. We don't create them. They're created by the communities they're in.
At the national level, while I can participate with my colleagues here at this table, and with you in Ottawa, and around the country, on national goal-setting and those issues that we discussed before, I think real action—a real interaction—will happen at the community level. That's where you find the heart and soul of friendship centres. They're in the communities.
They have partnerships. They know who the community players are. They know who the vulnerable people are and how they can be helped. It's an interaction between police forces, social services, other human services organizations, and education, as you heard in the panel before ours. They all have to come together collectively, which is why I described the Prince Albert hub model as a collective approach that looks at where interventions occur and how people can work together.
While our organization can have impact and effect at each level, real change is going to need the communities to be empowered to do that. National governments and provincial governments empower those communities.
Shawn A-in-chut Atleo
View Shawn A-in-chut Atleo Profile
Shawn A-in-chut Atleo
2013-12-05 19:56
Thank you.
We know that the family is going through a ceremony tonight. Charlene and I were with the family up home, where they come from, in the Gitanmaax area just outside of Terrace. This is the reason for the need for this to be such a coordinated effort: the ebb and flow of our peoples between communities, between the urban and the rural settings.
They had asked us a year ago today to be there. I want to acknowledge Matilda and Glen, who are going through that ceremony for their late daughter CJ. We were with them the day they went in to identify the body. It was a year ago today.
To see the incredible array of challenges these people face, including the deep poverty, the issues with child welfare, with education, where we are making every effort to make shifts, changes, and improvements, and with the coordination between jurisdictions on things like policing, and yes, even the efforts in having coroners appreciate, recognize, and support the incredible challenges that first nations face, it's the full spectrum.
This is where we find ourselves and our organizations. In this case, it is Charlene in particular who I hold in such high regard, because she often is the first line of contact with these families on our behalf. Because the structures aren't necessarily there. The Native Women's Association and so many others are doing everything they can. This is where we can't compel you enough to understand the opportunity that you have to gravitate as forcefully, as respectfully, but as strongly as possible to this issue, knowing that we have another family going through ceremony tonight, reliving what happened a year ago.
That is but one of so many experiences that we can draw from—all the more reason why we want to see and encourage you to consider such a strong move.
We wanted to honour the memory of the late CJ. We were in the room with her parents when this moment occurred. We know that they are in ceremony, and we know that if the opportunity gave rise to it this evening, they wanted us to share it. You prompted it. I want to recognize and thank you for doing that.
We're talking about real people right across this entire country, and absolutely this is emotional, so we emote. This is not just an intellectual conversation that is happening, and it should be an emotional one for the country, to say that we have a shared obligation.... Then let's get into having these action plans developed that include questions such as shelters. I was at the Canadian Centre for Child Protection yesterday. I was so moved, impressed, and excited by that work about what's happening to children right now in families and communities. I want to see us move into the space where we talk about the protection of families and children immediately. This is the leadership role that you can play.
On the specific question of shelters, Charlene—
Results: 1 - 6 of 6

Export As: XML CSV RSS

For more data options, please see Open Data