44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 7, 2022 02:00PM
- Dec/7/22 9:10:35 p.m.
- Watch
Mr. Speaker, I would like to acknowledge that the land on which we gather is the unceded, unsurrendered territory of the Algonquin and Anishinabe people.
Land acknowledgements are not intended to simply check a box or even state a fact. They are meant to set the tone with pre-colonial respect and recognition. I wish to pay homage to matrilineal societies that thrived in Wabanaki territory, like where I am from, where women decided who the chiefs were, who the speakers were, held them accountable and could remove them, and democracy was by consensus. Women were revered as life givers and two-spirited peoples were held in high regard for their strength and gender fluidity.
Tonight I am grateful for this essential take-note debate to further bring awareness to the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls and two-spirited peoples. However, I am devastated that as time passes, we continue to lose mothers, sisters, aunties, daughters, cousins and friends. It feels as though we cannot move beyond this point of awareness to action.
Through you, Mr. Speaker, to this House, to our government and to people watching at home, I say, no more. When will this stop?
Reconciliation is indeed a process. It is a journey, but the time it takes to heal wounds and to build bridges cannot mean more bright lights will be snuffed out as we iron out the details. It cannot mean that we will continue to stand idly by while families go without answers. It cannot mean that we refuse to do all we can to bring these women home.
Our discussion this evening was spurred by the latest loss of life of four important sacred women with value, with purpose, whose deaths must not be in vain: Rebecca Contois, 24 years old; Marcedes Myran, 26 years old; Morgan Beatrice Harris, 39 years old; and Buffalo Woman. Our goal tonight is to honour them by demanding action and accountability.
I want to acknowledge the strength and the incredible courage it took for Cambria Harris of Long Plain First Nation in Treaty 1 territory, the daughter of Morgan Harris, for her powerful speech delivered just outside these doors. She spoke truth to power and rightfully called out our collective inaction and indifference. Her plea to bring her mother home must be honoured. We must commit to deliver justice for those whose lives have been cut short.
I have mentioned many times in this House that I was an educator before coming here. I worked with indigenous students whose leadership and activism inspired me to fight for a better future where these discussions will no longer be needed. I remember clearly a time in 2010 when awareness in MMIWG had just started to grow. A viral campaign occurred and my students participated by taking photos with signs that said, “Am I next?” I love those students like they are my own children and it was gut-wrenching to think that we could lose them. Unfortunately, many of them know someone who has been murdered or who has gone missing. Imagine having to carry the weight of that reality around.
We know the statistics. Indigenous women make up 16% of all female homicide victims, 11% of missing women, even though indigenous peoples make up 4.3% of the population of Canada. According to the inquiry's report, they are 12 times more likely to go missing or be murdered. They are not numbers. They are human beings.
It is important to note that the current public data on MMIWG oversimplifies and under-represents the scale of the issue. It still demonstrates a complex and pervasive pattern of violence against indigenous women and girls who are often targeted because of their gender and indigenous identity. Violence against indigenous women and girls is systemic and a national crisis that requires urgent, informed and collaborative action.
The Sisters in Spirit initiative highlighted various systemic issues, including the impunity of many of the perpetrators. Their study found that nearly half of the cases involving indigenous women and girls remain unsolved and no charges were laid in about 40% of the cases.
It is now recognized that the high risk of violence experienced by indigenous women and girls stems in large part from a failure of police and others in the criminal justice system to adequately respond to or provide for the needs of indigenous women and girls and we see history repeating itself.
More than 2,380 people participated in the national inquiry. Expert witnesses, elders and knowledge keepers, frontline workers and officials provided testimony. The truths shared tell the story or, more accurately, thousands of stories of acts of genocide against first nations, Inuit and Métis women, girls and 2SLGBTQQIA+ people. Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation. It is intended, rather, to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of life, of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves.
As stated in the executive summary of the inquiry's final report:
The objectives of a plan of genocide would include actions aimed at the “disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and even the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups.”
Sadly, we have met that threshold.
As the inquiry's final report explains, “the steps to end and redress this genocide must be no less monumental than the combination of systems and actions that has worked to maintain colonial violence for generations.”
The calls for justice are based on a solid foundation of evidence and law. A human rights based approach is critical in efforts to bring about the paradigm shift required in Canada's relationship with indigenous peoples, particularly indigenous women and girls.
Exposure to violence must be seen as a systemic violation of the rights to gender equality and non-discrimination, requiring broad structural changes, such as policing practices or judicial restructuring, instead of as a symptom of service gaps requiring temporary solutions.
Families and survivors consistently refer to four general ways their experiences were rooted in colonialism across first nations, Métis and Inuit perspectives, as well as from the perspective of 2SLGBTQIA people. These four pathways that maintain colonial violence are historical, multi-generational and intergenerational trauma; social and economic marginalization; the maintaining of the status quo and institutional lack of will; and the ignoring of the agency and expertise of indigenous women, girls and 2SLGBTQQIA people.
Justice for missing and murdered indigenous women and girls is justice for all women, and this work is critical for any hope of reconciliation. Women are the ones leading the collective healing required to move forward. We need to tackle the disease that is poisoning our society, namely misogyny, racism, white supremacy and colonialism.
We all have a responsibility to do better, to end this cycle of suffering and to heal. Until the root cause of hate is truly addressed, the tree of reconciliation will never grow.
1202 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Dec/7/22 10:23:58 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Chair, I want to be quite frank. We have heard a lot of discussion today, and for indigenous people, whether it was yesterday or tomorrow, their lives will largely remain the same, and I am angry because of that. I am upset and angry that we have to have this discussion in this place constantly, and that the lives of indigenous women, girls and two-spirit people continue to be ignored constantly. I am angry about that, but I also know that, when an indigenous person like myself gets loud, people stop listening.
I want to be as clear as possible. We cannot continue to wait, but there is a long history here. This did not happen overnight. Colonialism, racism and, to be frank, misogyny are the reasons we are here today. Indigenous women are not the problem. Colonialism and violence against these women are the problem.
Can the member speak about the root cause of the tragic losses of indigenous women, girls and two-spirit folks that is so deeply rooted in our history here in Canada?
179 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- Dec/7/22 10:25:19 p.m.
- Watch
Madam Chair, I have to say that there is no question in my mind that it is colonialism that is the root cause of this. There is no question that governments and the successive governments allow for the genocide to continue, which is also the ongoing problem of the situation.
When everybody in the House got up to say that they hear the families, they see them and hear them, well then, I ask them to take action. Words are cheap, but lives are not cheap, and the lives of these indigenous women and girls and two-spirited people matter.
They matter very much, and we need to honour them. We need to honour them from this perspective as well: They are the very first people who were the owners of this land, and we are their guests on their land. We need to honour them and respect them and take action. We do not need more words.
158 words
All Topics
- Hear!
- Rabble!
- add
- star_border
- share
- menumenu
- notificationsnotifications
- home
- mailmail
- searchsearch
