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Results: 1 - 15 of 31
Bridget Perrier
View Bridget Perrier Profile
Bridget Perrier
2021-06-22 11:43
Aaniin.
First I'd like to acknowledge that I am standing here on the traditional territory of the Mississaugas of the New Credit, who fall under the Two Row Wampum Treaty.
I represent Sextrade101 and the many Anishinabe women and girls who are enslaved in prostitution and/or trafficked.
My name is Wasayakwe. My English name is Bridget Perrier. I was born in Thunder Bay, Ontario, and put up for adoption. I was adopted by a good family who tried to raise me the best way possible, but as I got older the effects of colonialism, intergenerational trauma and child sexual abuse made me a perfect candidate for prostitution.
I was lured and debased into prostitution at the age of 12 from a child welfare-run group home. I remained enslaved for 10 years in prostitution. I was sold to men who felt privileged to steal my innocence and invade my body. I was paraded like cattle in front of men who were able to purchase me, and the acts that I did were something no little girl should ever have to endure here in Canada, the land of the free.
Because of the men, I cannot have a child normally, because of trauma to my cervix. Still to this day I have nightmares, and sometimes I sleep with the lights on. My trauma is deep, and sometimes I feel as though I'm frozen—or even worse, I feel damaged and not worthy.
I was traded in legal establishments, street corners and strip clubs. I even had a few trips across the Great Lakes servicing ship men at the age of 13. The scariest thing that happened to me was, at 14 years of age, being held captive for a period of 43 hours and raped and tortured repeatedly by a sexual predator who preyed on exploited girls.
My exploiters made a lot of money and tried to break me, but I fought for my life. My first pimp was a woman who owned a legal brothel, where I was groomed to say that I was her niece or her daughter's friend, if the police ever asked. My second pimp was introduced to me when I was in Toronto. I was a prostitute for money. He was supposed to be a bodyguard, but that turned out to be one big lie. Both are out there still, doing the same thing to more little girls somewhere here in Canada.
After many years, I was able to exit prostitution and rebuild my life, and with that, my education became a tool. I was recognized for my tenacity and my strength, and I am now able to be an asset to my community and my people. I am a mother, grandmother, activist and warrior woman. Now my experiences may be sacrificial at times, but I am doing them for Canada's Anishinabe women and girls who are being bought and sold, who have disappeared or been murdered.
We must look at who is doing this. It is the men.
I have a letter. The birth mom of my oldest daughter was murdered by Robert Pickton, and my daughter asked me to read this to you.
Dear Senate,
My name is Angel Wolfe. My birth mom's name is Brenda Wolfe. My mom was murdered by Robert Pickton.
Her murder was one of the first six that he was charged with. I was six years old when she was murdered and nine years old when her jaw bone was found in a pig trough. I am one of the 98 orphans who were left behind because of that monster.
I do blame the Vancouver Police Department and the RCMP. I believe that Bills such as [PCEPA] will save vulnerable women like my mom. I'm sickened that my mom's death has been used to legitimize such indignity and sadness.
I'm also sickened by the term “the Pickton bill”. It's insulting and a slap in the face to the 98 orphans, and the organizations and the prosex work lobby movement should be really ashamed for speaking on behalf of the families who lost their loved ones.
I blame prostitution, addiction & mental Illness for my mother's death, and on behalf of the 98 orphans, we do not want our mothers' deaths to be the reason prostitution is legitimized.
I will make it my mission in life to carry her story and educate people about addictions, prostitution and the murdered and the missing.
Sincerely, Angel Wolfe
PCEPA will protect my daughters and granddaughters and other young native girls from predator sex buyers who have the nerve to solicit in public. Just last week, I was in Thunder Bay where buying vulnerable women is not on the agenda of their police department or MAG or any other organization.
If prostitution were such a healthy path, then why are the sex buyers not telling their wives, girlfriends and families that they use or have used sexual services from prostitutes?
Sextrade101 believes that prostitution is not a choice, but it's lack of choice that keeps women and girls enslaved. We believe that everybody should be shown a viable way out of the sex trade and not be encouraged to stay in it. We believe in helping people understand the full price of life in prostitution before they become involved and in helping women get out alive with their minds, bodies, and spirits intact. We have all been collectively afraid, raped, beaten, sold, disregarded. Most of us were also children who were forgotten, neglected, abused, used, led astray, abandoned and not protected.
Sextrade101 members and advocates are current and former prostituted women. We have a huge concern with the criminalization of prostituted women and girls. We have seen that diversion programs for prostituted women and girls are not the only the solution for everyone. We also have seen that a lot of money has gone out for support services, but we're still in this kind of silo.
Some 85% of Sextrade101 advocates and members have experienced pimp violence. This is pretty far from the picture painted by the Supreme Court of Canada, which is that pimps are nice guys. These pimps and sex buyers are the problem. They're the ones who abuse and in some cases kill.
I supported my daughter throughout the missing women inquiry, and the outcome was this: Our mothers, sisters, and daughters are not born to be used and sold for men's sexual needs. We are not commodities.
Also, we want to talk about linguistics. There's nothing in the native language, in indigenous languages, that describes selling sex, so if it's not in our language, it's not for our women.
I applaud former minister MacKay for the creation of Bill C‑36, because he recognized the inherent dangers and abuses for those who are prostituted. That bill was a victory for survivors and those who are stuck in a vicious cycle of indignity and pain.
We need to look at the numbers, which show that 52% of human trafficking victims are native and that the average age of exploitation for a native girl is 12 years of age. Ninety-eight per cent of the women that Sextrade101 has worked with have said that they have wanted out at some point.
As a sex trade survivor, I thank you so much for giving me the honour of speaking on behalf of the survivors in Sextrade101 and all the Anishinabe survivors across Canada, whether they are still in or have exited.
What we're seeing now is the increase of girls using social media as a tool for their exploitation, only as sugar babies, as Trisha pointed out, there is now a niche for native girls. When I was in the game, we never said we were native, because we knew if we said we were native, we would be in trouble. We would be in trouble by being assaulted or whatever, so we hid our identities.
Just last week I had a young woman from northern Ontario sleeping on my couch because the treatment centre that we paid $20,000 for to get private drug and alcohol treatment took one look at her and said she wasn't fit for their program. We had nowhere to send her, and at that moment, after 15 years of injecting drugs, she just wanted.... She was done. We had to think outside the box and figure out something radically fast.
I've seen a lot of money going into this, and not a lot of action. We don't have a safe house for indigenous women here in Ontario. We have a lot of religious-run safe houses, and I'm sorry, it's not a fit for my girls, my indigenous girls. I always get emails. Every week I get this “Hi, Bridget, we feel that this survivor fits your criteria.” Why? It's because she's indigenous and she's opened her mouth and said what she feels is best for her.
I don't know where to put them. I don't know where to put them, and I'm putting my children at risk by having them in my home, but I can't send them anywhere else, so we have this girl right now who has had 15 hard-core years on the street. She survived an attempted murder. I can tell her story and sit here and say, “Holy cow, she's doing good.” We have her in a bush camp and she's off drugs, and that's a big accomplishment. I told her that in 35 days your brain will retrain itself.
We're in crisis. I was in Thunder Bay, and they're buying women left, right and centre. The Thunder Bay police don't want to be burdened with the issue of exploitation, and they don't even want to admit that there's human trafficking going on. The pretty native girls are being farmed to southern Ontario and trafficked along the Golden Horseshoe.
What I'm seeing now, and Trisha is saying this, is that we're burying our daughters. I'm seeing girls that I was out there in the trenches with, and now it's daughters. It's intergenerational. If we don't help them figure out their potential, we're creating room for the new generation. It's happening. I'm now seeing grandma, mom and grandchild. Let's add fuel with a pandemic and now an opioid crisis, and we have the perfect brewing pot for exploitation.
When a prostituted indigenous woman is murdered, we see what happens. It's the Cindy Gladues and everything.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that we're in crisis here, and especially in northern Ontario. I'm only in northern Ontario for one week out of the month. I go to Thunder Bay. That's my job. Nobody knows where to go, and the people who are providing frontline help are putting themselves in harm's way to help women exit. If we just had a place to send them, like a one-stop shop, it would be so much easier.
What we're trying to do at Sextrade101 is mentor them. We don't have core funding like that. We have to get funding through another organization, but to this day, our recidivism rate back into prostitution is only at 4%. Obviously we're doing something right.
With that, I'll say meegwetch, and I'm up for questions.
Thank you.
View Rachel Blaney Profile
NDP (BC)
Thank you, Chair, and I want to thank all of you for your testimony. I think the history of indigenous women being trafficked is Canadian history that goes so far back. I think of my granny, who was in residential school and at 16 got married off to a carpenter in the community who was significantly older than she was. I remember hearing that story and thinking, “That explains some things.”
I want to thank you all for telling that story, and for also understanding how systemic it is in our system.
My first question is going to come to you, Karen. You talked about the government cutting money while you're being asked to do even more. I heard testimony from everyone about the lack of resources and not knowing where to put people who are trying to escape trafficking.
I wonder if I could come to you first, Karen, and then I will come to you, Madame Gobert, because I haven't heard from you yet. I would love to have you answer that question, and then I'll continue on.
Karen Pictou
View Karen Pictou Profile
Karen Pictou
2021-06-22 12:29
Certainly.
Shortly after I began this role just a little over three years ago, we received $100,000 per year for a three-year period through our national umbrella organization, NWAC, as federal core funding. However, leading up to the end of that agreement, there still is no decision being made, so now we are faced with the fact that if we do not get money into our bank account from federal core funding, we will lose a large portion of the capacity that we currently have at the Nova Scotia Native Women's Association.
We have secured long-term provincial core funding. However, that only pays for our rent and the salary of our core staff, which would be three individuals. It certainly is by no means enough [Technical difficulty—Editor] this work.
I might also mention that the only other thing that is keeping us afloat at the moment is the short-term funding that we've received from WAGE for a couple of different projects. Part of the problem here is that although the project proposal-based funding continues to keep us in a state of survival, when we're in a state of survival, we cannot look at those long-term goals. How do we plan five to 10 years out if we don't even know if we'll have funding to exist then or if we'll have the programs and services that we need to support? We need 100%.
For the Jane Paul centre, we have received five years of funding from the Department of Justice, so we have three years left. That is in the amount of $150,000, which does not even pay salaries. It literally pays the rent, utilities and insurance to keep the doors open.
We need a commitment from Canada that these programs and services and the organizations delivering them are important and deserve an investment of sustainability, because we know this issue is not going to go away overnight. Simply put....
I guess I'll just leave it there. Thanks.
Janet Gobert
View Janet Gobert Profile
Janet Gobert
2021-06-22 12:31
I can't speak from personal experience, but as a community initiatives coordinator in dealing with this group of women, housing was definitely an issue.
Approximately a year ago at the friendship centre, we opened a men's shelter. However, we've seen a transition happen with the client base that was accessing it. Right now, we're in the beginning steps of transitioning it into a women's shelter for those who have been affected by human trafficking.
As Karen said, funding is definitely an issue right now. We are using funds that we have received from head office for the fourth round of COVID funding. Yes, we do have short-term funding from WAGE as well, but I guess our issue is that when we look at transitioning this to a women's shelter, we're looking at little blocks of funding, so right now we would only be looking at operating for a one-year period.
Is it absolutely necessary that we have long-term funding? Yes, it is. We cannot offer service without keeping these women safe, so without having that shelter for these women, our work is pointless.
View Rachel Blaney Profile
NDP (BC)
Thank you for that.
Ms. Perrier, you talked about people having to stay in your house because there's nowhere to send them. I'm curious as to whether you could talk about the concern you have around a limit of resources and not having a place to send folks so that they are safe.
Bridget Perrier
View Bridget Perrier Profile
Bridget Perrier
2021-06-22 12:33
There's a lot of money. I'm seeing millions of dollars for initiatives, but nobody has opened up an on-site, three-siloed safe space for women. I can't send these women to battered women's shelters, because first of all, they're putting the other women at risk. Cross-contamination happens, and I don't think that's where healing begins. We need to have our individualized area and treatment centres.
To be really truthful—and I'm here to speak the truth—it's a big cash cow. Human trafficking is the new thing, and people are eloquently writing proposals, getting millions of dollars and doing nothing. A prime picture is Thunder Bay, as well as Toronto. In Ontario, we have nowhere to send indigenous women who are exiting the sex trade unless I farm them out to Manitoba, but they're at capacity too. Therefore, we have nowhere for them.
View Gary Vidal Profile
CPC (SK)
Thank you.
I want to pursue a little bit of what I heard from Grand Chief Settee.
Grand Chief, you talked about the rates in northern and remote areas compared to urban centres. As a member of Parliament who serves a very northern and remote riding, I'm very curious to drill into that a little bit. I'm not going to pretend that I understand much of this, so this is an education for me to understand some of the things going on in my own riding. I'm going to assume that northern Manitoba, maybe, is not that different from northern Saskatchewan where I'm from.
If you would take a few minutes and expand on your comments about the rates in northern and remote communities compared to more urban centres....
Also, you talked about the points of critical intervention, and I was really intrigued by your comments there. I want you to flesh that out. I want to give you some time just to talk about that a little bit more, if that's fair.
Garrison Settee
View Garrison Settee Profile
Garrison Settee
2021-06-15 11:27
One of the things that I've always spoken about is the very different demographics that we live with in northern Manitoba. It's very different from southern Manitoba. In Manitoba, we have 15 isolated communities, and 85% of each community is unemployed, so there's poverty and a lack of resources to help women and victims of domestic violence. The services are just not there. Women tend to gravitate to urban centres, and that creates greater problems because they cannot access employment. They cannot access adequate housing or shelter, and they become victims of a cycle that has been perpetuated by a lack of resources and a lack of adequate support for them.
I always say that women's shelters are a must in every first nation. People running from domestic violence turn to urban centres. They turn to other communities, and they are led down a path of victimization everywhere they go. It's a sad state. We're living in a country that's prosperous. This situation should not even be in existence, but it is. It's a reality we live in from day to day.
View Sylvie Bérubé Profile
BQ (QC)
Grand Chief Settee, you mentioned earlier that, in northern Manitoba, there is a city triangle where human trafficking takes place. You talked about the need for support for the police, for infrastructure and for secure housing.
Do you have any other recommendations to deal with this trafficking?
Garrison Settee
View Garrison Settee Profile
Garrison Settee
2021-06-15 11:45
One of the things I would like to see is the ability to have infrastructure in first nations for the protection of women, even in the urban centres. They need to have access to a safe place. If they don't have access to a safe place, they will go out on the street. They'll be on the streets and they'll be very vulnerable out there with nobody looking after them. We need to really emphasize that.
In my tenure as grand chief, we have seen so much happening to women, girls and 2SLGBTQQIA+ people. The biggest need we have right now is to have those safe places. I advocate that every first nation should have a women's shelter.
View Lenore Zann Profile
Lib. (NS)
Thank you so much, Adam. Thank you for being so generous and for thinking of my time as well.
I want to say thank you to the witnesses. I know this is a difficult topic, but it's very, very important.
I want to highlight some of the things that Ms. Blaney mentioned, which are totally what I agree with. It is about misogyny. It is about patriarchy. It is about the inequality for women in society and the complete disdain and contempt that some men have towards women and girls. It needs to stop now. The more femicides we hear about, the more angry, really, I become. I know that these can all be averted if people are educated to believe that we are all equal, that you can have your emotions and be upset about something, but it doesn't mean you can kill somebody or try to control somebody else. This is all about control and domination. These are all colonial attitudes and actions anyway. By and large, I believe most women have been affected by this, our first nations people in particular, and I'm so, so, so sorry.
In the submission to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, the Native Women's Association of Canada stated that some of the recurring themes that contribute to the recruitment of indigenous women in trafficking include—we've talked about them today—precarious housing and poor living conditions; high rates of unemployment, unstable employment and low working wages; lack of access to social and economic resources and programs; prior exposure to human trafficking and sex trade from a young age, through family or friends; and family violence and the impacts of colonization, such as residential school experience and intergenerational trauma.
So tell us about “nothing about us without us”. What are the first steps we need to take to make sure we can crack down on this terrible practice of human trafficking? Putting a price—a price—on a woman's life is disgusting.
Ms. Blaney and Ms. Anderson, would you like to comment?
Ian Kenney
View Ian Kenney Profile
Ian Kenney
2021-06-01 12:33
It's Ian Kenney here. I'll start, and I'll be brief to allow my colleagues to share a few remarks.
I am Ian Kenney, acting director general of the social policy and programs branch at Indigenous Services Canada. Thank you very much for the opportunity to provide remarks here today. I will speak with you about ISC's family violence prevention program.
This program is a fundamental part of the department's mandate of providing health and social services to promote the safety and well-being of families in indigenous communities. The program contributes to the efforts to ultimately eliminate all forms of violence. It also plays a role in fulfilling the minister's commitment to grow and maintain Canada's network of shelters that serve individuals who are fleeing domestic violence and/or sexual exploitation.
The family violence prevention program supports the operation of a network of 46 shelters that serve indigenous communities across the country. These shelters provide emergency support and a vital place of refuge for indigenous women, children and 2SLGBTQQIA+ people fleeing instances of violence, including sexual exploitation and human trafficking.
The program also supports the delivery of indigenous family violence prevention projects, both on and off reserve, in priority areas that include human trafficking and sexual exploitation.
Recently, the Government of Canada announced $44.8 million to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation over five years to build 10 new shelters in first nations communities on reserve and two in the territories. ISC will be investing an additional $40.8 million in operational funding for these new shelters over the next five years and $10.2 million annually thereafter. This will bring the number of shelters in ISC's network to 58.
Furthermore, the fall economic statement committed $724.1 million to launch a comprehensive violence prevention strategy to expand access to a continuum of culturally relevant supports for indigenous women, children and 2SLGBTQQIA+ people facing gender-based violence. This strategy will support new shelters and transitional or second-stage housing for first nations, Inuit and Métis people across the country, including on reserve, in the north and in urban areas.
I might also add that this includes the construction and operation of new emergency shelters for Inuit women and children across Inuit Nunangat, as well as in urban centres. These new investments will be jointly delivered by ISC and CMHC.
Thank you.
View Marc Miller Profile
Lib. (QC)
Good evening. Ulaakut.
I'm speaking to you this evening from the traditional territory of the Algonquin people here in Ottawa.
Mr. Chair and members of the committee, I'm pleased to join you today, at least virtually, alongside my colleagues Minister Bennett and Minister Vandal. I also want to note the presence of Christiane Fox, deputy minister; Valerie Gideon, associate deputy minister; and Dr. Tom Wong, chief medical officer of public health, first nations and Inuit health branch.
Members, as of October 26, we are aware of 362 active cases of COVID-19 in first nations communities. Since the beginning of this pandemic, we've recorded 1,254 confirmed cases in first nations communities, with 877 recoveries and, tragically, 15 deaths. This number of active cases represents the highest number of active cases to date. In addition, I can report 28 confirmed positive cases of COVID-19 among Inuit in Nunavik, Quebec, and all have recovered.
In recent days and weeks, there has been an alarming rise in the number of active COVID-19 cases across the country, including in indigenous communities. We took a number of measures to support indigenous communities at the onset of this pandemic, and as we face the second wave of this pandemic, we are taking stock of what we've learned and applying those lessons rapidly.
We know that when local indigenous leadership is given the necessary resources, they are best placed to successfully respond to a crisis with immediate, innovative and proactive measures to ensure the safety of their members. The low case numbers experienced by first nations communities in the first wave was evidence of this. What is clear now, however, is that the second wave has impacted indigenous communities much harder than the first.
As in the first wave, we've put together and put into place...and ensured that the health and safety of indigenous peoples is my and the Government of Canada's utmost priority.
As the pandemic continues and continues to evolve, we are making sure to prioritize sustainable access to mental health services and continue to support indigenous communities. As such, we have invested new funding of $82.5 million, in addition to the $425 million in existing funding annually for community-based services that address the mental wellness needs of indigenous peoples.
These services comply with public health measures available, and, because of the pandemic, with many telehealth or virtual options, such as the Hope for Wellness Help Line.
We continue to work in partnership with indigenous organizations and communities to support the adaptation of mental health resources and services managed by indigenous communities, and will continue to do so throughout the pandemic and beyond it.
To support the unique challenges faced by indigenous businesses and economies, on June 11, we announced $117 million, plus a $16 million stimulus development fund to support the indigenous tourism industry. This funding builds on the $306.8 million previously announced to help indigenous small and medium-sized businesses.
The Government of Canada is also helping elementary and high school students by providing $112 million to support a safe return to first nations schools on reserve, in addition to the $2 billion being provided to the provinces and territories. And we are working to ensure the security and well-being of indigenous women and children by supporting and expanding a network of family violence prevention shelters for first nations communities across the country, and in the territories.
We continue to promote public health and safety measures and have, in collaboration with provincial and territorial governments, been actively evaluating and acquiring approved point-of-care tests to meet the needs of indigenous communities, especially those in rural, remote and isolated areas.
As of October 19, 70 GeneXpert instruments had been deployed to enable access to rapid point-of-care testing by indigenous communities across the country.
I'd like to take a moment to thank the health professionals, in particular Indigenous Services Canada nurses, who are supporting indigenous communities across the country by providing quality and culturally appropriate care, testing, contact tracing, prevention and treatment during this pandemic.
I would be remiss if I did not mention an emergency in Neskantaga that has been front and centre in the last few days. The recent shutdown of Neskantaga's water distribution system is indeed alarming. My officials are working directly with the leadership of Neskantaga First Nation, alongside partners such as Nishnawbe Aski Nation and Matawa First Nations Management, to mitigate the situation and ensure that the community has the support they need until water can be fully restored. Yesterday, Indigenous Services Canada's lead engineer accompanied the Matawa technical team to inspect the community's water infrastructure and continue water sampling.
Funding will be provided for immediate repairs as necessary, and efforts have been redoubled to address the issues with the distribution system and to support the community's new water system to completion. This funding is in addition to the recent $4 million of funding increase towards the project that aims to lift the long-term boil water advisory in that community, bringing the total investment to over $16.4 million. The construction of the community's water treatment plant is in its final stages, and we are optimistic that it will be up and running soon. We will continue to work with the community leadership to find immediate and long-term solutions to this health emergency.
With that, I look forward to taking your questions.
Meegwetch. Nakurmiik. Marsi cho.
View Mumilaaq Qaqqaq Profile
NDP (NU)
View Mumilaaq Qaqqaq Profile
2020-06-16 18:00
I can give you a list to make sure that we are including everyone.
Pauktuutit has requested $20 million to support five shelters across Inuit Nunangat and in Ottawa. In recent announcements, we have not heard of this inclusion. While we know that women in the north are three times more likely to experience violence, over 70% of communities in Inuit Nunavut do not have safe spaces.
The delay in the response to the MMIWG report is nothing but disappointing. When will the federal government assist in providing the much-needed safe spaces for Inuit women and girls?
View Marc Miller Profile
Lib. (QC)
Thank you.
The member might have noted the undertaking of the government a couple of weeks ago to invest $50 million into women's shelters and sexual assault centres across Canada to help with their capacity over the long term. This is something that does not exclude Nunavut.
This is funding—let me be clear about this—that works with CMHC to deliver that to the institutions and representatives that will administer it, and I have had successive talks with Pauktuutit. This does not exclude their other ask, which is in relation to shelters across Inuit Nunangat, but this can be a partial answer to that request. I am encouraged by the discussions we had, but they will be ongoing as to their capital needs, and we are obviously dedicated to making sure that—
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