Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Family violence in the NWT is recognized as a problem, but do we really do enough to address it? Violence against women in the NWT is nine times greater than the national average. Several years ago the local YWCA developed and ran a project to look at ways to develop approaches and programs for addressing violence against women. It was a three-year project “to develop and pilot safety options for women fleeing violence in NWT communities without a local RCMP detachment.” That project proved very successful and it provided great insight into the environment in the NWT within which violence against women occurs. A report was prepared at the end of the three-year project and it is titled “Safety in Small Communities,” and I’d like to share some of the findings from that report with you.
First, and perhaps most importantly, in the NWT we have an environment of fear and oppression around family violence. Family violence is still kept secret. There’s rampant fear to talk about it in small communities. There’s a lack of trusted supports for women, people they can talk to and be supported by.
Second, there’s a huge need in small communities for healing activities and greater supports, especially for women in communities where there is no RCMP presence and no informal supports from their peers. There must be an increase in capacity to effectively provide women with safety in their community. As well, women and families must be empowered to work to help their community become safe. These very valuable learnings are too many to mention. I’ve only highlighted a few of them today.
To conclude, I want to say that empowering people is a lengthy process that must be sustained over a long period of time and it requires funding to do so. We need to engage the skills of northern women to address the safety needs of their peers, and it requires funding to do so. Women in small communities need ongoing support to move forward, and that means funding.
Many organizations have come together to create a coalition, a Coalition Against Family Violence, and the GNWT is a partner in that coalition. The recent budget address did little to highlight and recognize the work that needs to be done to assist the coalition and improve the safety of women and families in our communities.
I will have some questions for the Minister of Justice at the appropriate time. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.
