Families given priority at national roundtable

The national roundtable on murdered and missing Indigenous women held in Ottawa Feb. 27 resulted in little concrete action, but it has still given hope to one long-time activist.

“For the first time in any incident that I’m aware of have the police, the government, the social services agencies, have anyone recognized the pain and suffering encountered by the families,” said Muriel Stanley Venne.

Stanley Venne attended the roundtable as the representative for the Metis Nation of Alberta. “The emphasis was totally on the families. They were given priority.”

Stanley Venne, founder of the Institute for the Advancement of Aboriginal Women, points out that from the poorly-run investigation into the brutal death of Cree student Helen Betty Osborne, killed in The Pas in 1971 with her murderer not convicted until 1987 when the case was re-opened, to the Pickton murders in British Columbia, Aboriginal women and their families have been treated with little respect or empathy.

“I was so optimistic to see the families recognized because, in my experience, … that hasn’t been there,” said Stanley Venne. “But what I’m not aware of is how is it going to move forward?”

Stanley Venne wants to ensure that the change in attitude toward victims and their families continues. She said there needs to be some way to measure the consistency in attitude change and the treatment of Indigenous families.

“It means nothing if this change is just for the meeting in Ottawa, then we go home and things are just the same,” she said.

The lack of an action plan has been one criticism following the conclusion of the national roundtable, which was attended by federal ministers Bernard Valcourt, minister of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development, and Kellie Leitch, minister for Status of Women, government delegates from all provinces and territories, along with representatives from a wide range of Aboriginal groups.

They agreed on a framework for prevention and awareness, policing and community safety initiatives. Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger said his province would host a meeting of police organizations and justice officials from across the country to discuss ways to address the problem of murdered and missing women. However, once more, the federal government refused to commit to a national inquiry.

The push for a national inquiry is now being endorsed by a second United Nations report in as many years.

On March 6, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, released a scathing report on the socio-economic, cultural and political factors impacting Aboriginal women in Canada, and said the lack of effective action taken to address these core issues, which lead to violence, constituted a “grave violation” of human rights for Aboriginal women and girls.

The committee also called for a national public inquiry  “which must be fully independent from the political process and  transparent” with the findings used to develop a national action plan.

Former UN Special Rapporteur James Anaya made that same call in his May 2014 report, in which he also said the Canadian government was not doing enough to improve the economic, living, and social conditions of Indigenous peoples, despite having mechanisms in place. Anaya had been in Canada the previous year on a whirlwind tour.

While he had not had a chance to read the CEDAW report, Anaya, who was in Edmonton in March, said, “In my report, I said that this (issue of murdered and missing Aboriginal women) was one of the most serious problems in Canada and it deserved heightened and more attention than the government at that time was giving to itÖ if a national inquiry has any chance of helping spur greater and more focused, more targeted, more effective action then it should be done. From everything I hear, a national inquiry would help in that way. Unless things have changed, I think that call should be heeded.”

Calls for national inquiries have also come from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (coalition of advocacy groups, Indigenous organizations, and family members) in January, while the Human Rights Watch raised its voice in January 2014, also calling for the creation of a system for greater accountability for Canadian police misconduct.

The night before the national roundtable, the Legal Strategy Coalition on Violence against Indigenous Women released an account of 58 studies, reports and inquiries outlining 700 recommendations, with only a handful of those recommendations having been implemented by any level of government.

A report from the RCMP released last year showed nearly 1,200 Aboriginal women went missing or were murdered in Canada between 1980 and 2012. Statistics Canada reports Aboriginal women and teenagers are 3.5 times more likely to experience violence than non-Aboriginal women and three times as likely to be victims of domestic violence.