Seven years on, only 2 of 231 Indigenous justice calls fulfilled

Seven years after the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls concluded, advocates say the pace of change has been painfully slow. The Congress of Aboriginal Peoples marked the anniversary of the inquiry's final report on June 3, noting that only two of the 231 Calls for Justice have been completed.

Bridget Tolley, an advocate based in Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg reserve in Quebec, remembers the aftermath of her mother Gladys's death in October 2001, when a Sûreté du Québec police car struck and killed her. "The police told me to go home. Nobody was able to see my mother except the police, and the police that killed her," Tolley says. "It was very traumatizing for me when I found this all out in her report."

Indigenous women face disproportionate violence: they are four times more likely than non-Indigenous women to be victims of violence, according to the Assembly of the First Nations. Indigenous women represent 16 per cent of all female homicide victims in Canada and 11 per cent of missing women, despite making up only 4.3 per cent of the population.

The Congress is pushing for governments to prioritize specific calls, including expanding access to safe, affordable, culturally relevant housing in Indigenous communities and establishing a national Indigenous and human rights ombudsperson to monitor accountability. National Chief Brendan Moore said the inquiry's findings cannot become "another report sitting on a shelf." The calls for action began at the grassroots level through Sisters in Spirit vigils led by survivors and advocates, Cora McGuire-Cyrette, CEO of the Ontario Native Women's Association, noted.