My name is MaryAnn Wilhelm, my roots are Sagamok Anishnawbek.

I am the President of Bruce Grey

Owen Sound NDP and the Policy and Communications Director of the NDP Aboriginal Commission. On
our way it was pouring rain,it was like nature shed some of that weight I carried from the previous
meeting. When we got to Wiarton we came over the horizon and a rainbow appeared. I told Dawnais,
we follow that rainbow and we will find where we need to be.

Thank you, Miigwetch to Joyce Johnston for inviting me into the community to speak in regards to
Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women and thank you all for coming. I know there are people here
who are suffering losses not only for our women, but for our men and our children. This is a very huge
problem and in no way can I address it in depth and breathe, so I will segment my remarks to a few
points. First, I just wanted to say Gladys Radek cofounder of Walk4Justice was in town, unfortunately, I
couldnt woo her to come to Cape, because she had to return to Orillia.
Majority of Canadians embrace our diverse identity and reject racism, yet many will deny racism being
deeply rooted in Canada. They will deny its existence in our policing system, our court system, our
Childrens Aid Societies, medical system and even in our government system. There are those that have
never been touched by the legal system and find our courts faultless. They will deny the systems fault
lines where so many have fallen into. They believe that the fault of missing and murdered women is ours
to own; that they flat out deny there is a societal issue when it comes to our missing and murdered
aboriginal women. We only need to look at the barrage of victim blaming whenever an article in the
newspaper comes out with Aboriginal related content, the online perpetual assault to fault is relentless.
We also know that there are connections to missing and murdered to generational effects of residential
school. Still some deny that connection. Viewers will wash down the abuses and say that some
residential students had great experiences as those that would make up for the terrible neglect and
abuse pounded on our parents. Victim blaming, denying the colonial impacts and saying that Missing
and Murdered Aboriginals is not a societal issue is equal to washing down a cookie with milk laced with
a little bit of Drano, in short making it hard to swallow. The reality is that we have a deep rooted canker
thats perverting the sense of justice in our society. If we cannot get our elected leaders to acknowledge
the need to address this, we cannot come to terms and we cannot get closure.
Here locally, when provincial elections were happening this year, the topic of missing and murdered
aboriginal women was brought up. Conservative MPP Bill Walker said that we needed to be thinking of
all those abused. This is a dismissal/deflection of the seriousness of missing and murdered aboriginal
women but then again, this is in line with the Federal position of the Conservatives, there will be no
inquiry! They tout that they will provide direct action. Has anyone here felt any direct action yet to deal
with the gross high rate of our missing and murdered? Ive yet to hear or read from any community of
direct action to combat the issue of missing and murdered.
Since the reign of the Liberals in Ontario, shelters have been shuttered; across this province shelter
funds have been frozen leaving staff and board members to scramble to cover costs. Shelters are not
perfect, it has faults, but those shelters were like a stepping stone or a place to review what was
happening, a safe place to think, a temporary refuge. Without shelters locally, users are left to become
displaced twice, once from the home and second out of community and family. The need for shelters
applies to men, women and their children. To not have equitable shelters is to deny the reality for all
affected who get displaced. I know that stake holders always like to frame things in dollars and sense. I
would then suggest a study to be done to determine the real costs of families entering the court system,
rise of legal costs, police costs, prison costs, mental health costs, revolving door syndrome, and compare
that to the costs of less invasive measures such as providing shelter and homes to those needing it. A
safe place to think, a safe place to call home without any threats of eviction-- is a key to stopping a
revolving door syndrome and the start to a healthy mind. I know some of our missing are in those
shelters seeking refuge, seeking time to think, I know because I was one of the missing. I know that we
can build, I know there are dedicated volunteers willing and able to help. However, I also know that we
compete for donations, so then why cant our community think as a collective and focus their energies
on one project the way the Amish do when they barn raise? None of us want to see those abused
become homeless. While we are building, we have to address something that plagues this country and
that is victim blaming of aboriginals. We all need to do a mind shift to recognize part of the other
problem, that is stereotyping and racism which perpetuates hate and then victim blaming. The most
obvious example of this is just looking at our news and the online behavior of the masses.
In 2013, 15 year old Canadian, Rehtaeh Parsons, was raped by some boys and those photos of the rape
were distributed throughout her school. Like any rape victim, Rehtaeh was traumatized but for her, it
was all too much, in the end she hung herself in her bathroom. No charges were initially laid, that is until
the uproar resonated across the country. Newspapers head lined her demise, provided details of how
kind she was giving a description that would imprint a 3D image in our minds, a young girl who was
passionate, an artist who loved animals, cared for others, a girl who loved and was loved, and a girl
whose life was short lived. This news repeated over and over, splashed on headlines of every paper
across the country. The outpouring of sympathy, sense of wanting justice was pervasive and intense in
comments by viewers online. People didnt write things to blame Rehtaeh for attending a party, they
didnt fault the parents, and they didnt focus on any potential faults judgment or character. When it
comes to our missing and murdered aboriginal women; in the online forums, the masses say the
opposite of our women and girls. There is a tendency to immediately fault the victims or their parents.
Viewers were seeking cracks in character thereby diminishing where the faults should lie which is upon
the abusers or murderers.
Now I want to give you something to think about in relation to the publics reaction about Missing and
Murdered Aboriginal Women, Native Womens Association, Ms. Parsons and Loretta Sanders. Rehtaeh
received almost 500k signatures for a national inquiry; Native Womens Association had been working to
collect signatures too but received a mere 23k last year. It was not until the murder of 26 year old
Loretta Saunders that there seemed to be a wakeup call of Canadians. Loretta was a student at St.
Mary's University in Halifax and was writing her honors thesis on the hundreds of missing and murdered
Aboriginal women in Canada. She was murdered by two of her roommates. Lorettas petition for an
inquiry drew up about 400k signatures. For a moment I felt like a sense of awakening had happened for
Canadians, but then Loretta was a fair skinned blue eyed Inuk. So one needs to question was it really a
mass wake-up call of Canadians? I dont know, but to think that Native Womens Association was
standing up and calling for inquiry for over 1000 missing and murdered aboriginal women-- it makes one
wonder what motivated the mass to react so strongly to these two individuals and not that of over 1000
missing and murdered aboriginal women. It implores us to study this- it implores us to call an inquiry so
that we can develop a framework to guide us. Without an inquiry, there is no framework to build from.
I want to remind people that we are not talking of "just" 1181 aboriginal women, but a proportional
equivalency of 35,000 Canadian women. If 35,000 Canadian women were missing and murdered --overly
represented, Canadians would have pitch forks and be flocking to Parliament demanding justice,
demanding an inquiry. It would be headline news not only in Canada but across the world.
Over 1000 missing and murdered aboriginal women across this county, Opposition parties call for an
inquiry, even the United Nations Indigenous Rapporteur Anaya James called for an inquiry. Yet the
Conservative government doesnt think that an inquiry for over 1000 missing and murdered is
necessary, but wait, under the Conservative leadership in Nova Scotia they agreed to an inquiry for Ms.
Parsons! Something is wrong with that picture, its crooked and we must right that picture and within
100 days of being in government the NDP will get that inquiry.
In the meantime, we need to continue our work within our communities to raise awareness. We need
to teach our youth, or women and men to recognize danger, to learn to travel safer, to be ready to
protect oneself.
We have much to fight for and to be proud of. We are building a solid foundation based on love,
kindness, generosity, forgiveness and understanding, something that did not happen for most Aboriginal
residential students across this country. We work with what have. We are working to rebuild and I see
that happening across this country. I see our students graduating, I see our parents coming to peace
with their dark legacy, I see young parents working at studying to be great parents, progress is
happening, its not in leaps and bounds, but its there and I refuse to make apologies for the pace, after
all, in terms of adjustment of a nation-- its like those abuses happened yesterday.
Healing, recovery takes time. I am proud to know that Aboriginals and their allies are gathering across
this country - united in pushing for an inquiry. That inquiry will be the beginning of a framework into
understanding the overrepresentation of Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women; it will help us
understand where the system is flawed and provide us the tools on how we can correct that.
We all have much to be proud of and we have much to keep fighting for. The NDP are not there to
stand in our way, they are there to stand side by side-- together we will rebuild. Within 100 days of
government, the NDP is committed to having in place an inquiry into Missing and Murdered Aboriginal
Women.
I want to say Miigwetch to everyone who took the time to gather here to support the goal of a national
inquiry. Lets challenge those reactions of the nation and continue to challenge our leaders to provide
an inquiry. If the government can provide an inquiry to one person, they should provide it to over 1000k
missing and murdered aboriginal women. Lets keep our eyes and ears open to keep our children, our
men and women safe.