SENATORS’ STATEMENTS — 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence
December 10, 2020
Honourable senators, today, December 10, is International Human Rights Day, and the last day of the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence. These 16 days are an opportunity for all of us to renew our commitment to end gender-based violence.
In 2019, UN Women reported that 243 million women and girls were abused by their intimate partners. In Canada, a woman is killed by her partner every six days, and on any given night, close to 5,000 women and girls are in transition houses.
In 2020, with increased unemployment, sudden lockdowns and restricted movement due to the pandemic, there has been a rise in gender-based violence. Not only are women experiencing more violence at home, they are having greater difficulty accessing support services and shelters. This is known as the “Shadow Pandemic.” Unfortunately, there will be no vaccine developed to eradicate it.
Over the summer, Senator Boyer, Senator Boniface and I engaged law students from the University of Ottawa. They conducted research relating to the impacts of the pandemic on transition houses and community resources and their ability to serve their clients — women and their children.
Some of the key findings include that, initially, reporting of abuse went down. However, the incidents being reported were of more severe violence.
Social distancing and public health directives for shelters meant that they had to reduce the capacity of their already limited beds.
Shelters rely heavily on fundraising and corporate donations, and the pandemic significantly impacted their ability to raise funds and stretched their limited finances greatly.
Indigenous women have been disproportionately impacted. Accessing shelters was already difficult for them as some do not have culturally appropriate services, while Indigenous-only shelters are scarce and often a long distance from rural communities. For example, in New Brunswick there is only one Indigenous shelter, which means some women would have to travel up to four hours to access it.
Finally, the shelter employees, mostly women, are greatly impacted. They are being paid modest wages to do difficult work with limited resources. This has been made worse by the pandemic, where many had to deal with chronic understaffing due to issues such as self-isolation protocols, increased child care duties and uncertainty about possible exposure to the virus. Of course, all of this impacts their mental health.
The research data reaffirmed our failed attempt at ending violence against women and girls and provided us with reasons to seriously consider next steps to address these findings. One strategy might be to open an inquiry in the Senate on this issue.
We must not abandon women and their children at this time when they need us most. Let’s recommit to ending gender-based violence. We were all asked to stay at home during this pandemic and to be safe, but not all of us who stayed home were safe. Thank you.