QUESTION PERIOD — Indigenous Services
Gender-Based Violence
June 16, 2022
Honourable senators, my question is also for the government leader in the Senate.
On December 15, 2020, the Trudeau government announced $724.1 million to launch a comprehensive violence-prevention strategy. More than half of this funding was to support at least 38 new shelters and 50 transitional housing for First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples across the country, including on-reserve, in the North and in urban areas.
On Tuesday, The Globe and Mail reported that, as of May 31, none of this funding had been allocated. As well, out of the more than $700 million promised through the strategy, just $12.6 million had been spent on violence prevention, or less than 2% of the total amount announced a year and a half ago.
Leader, could you tell us why this program to support Indigenous women and girls has been such a failure?
Thank you for your question. I’m not familiar with the applications for funding nor the circumstances around the provision of funding. This government has done more in the interests of Indigenous women, men, children, families and communities than any other government in Canadian history.
I’ll certainly make inquiries about that, but I would add — because I’m in the mood to add a commentary, if I may — that it’s passing strange that this government can, literally on the same day, be criticized for shovelling money out the door much too fast and also for not taking the time when it announces funding requirements to make sure the funds are properly allocated to organizations that are properly prepared and organized to receive it. But I digress.
The NDP-Liberal government says it expects to provide an update on how this funding will be allocated sometime over the summer.
Leader, does your government have a timeline to begin construction on these new shelters and transition housing? Does the Trudeau government commit to having any of these shelters up and running, and serving communities, this year?
That’s a good, serious question. I don’t want my previous answer to, in any way, detract from the seriousness of the question and the importance of this issue of providing proper shelter for those for whom it was announced.
I will have to look into the issue and I will report back but, again, it is likely the case that the decisions about the shelters and the nature of shelters would be done in collaboration with the communities within which they would be found. I expect that would be part of the answer I come back with.
