Feminist Solidarity

Women’s Social and Economic Rights

Women’s enjoyment of their social and economic rights is essential to their enjoyment of every other right, including the right to live free from violence. FAFIA is centrally concerned about women’s enjoyment of their rights to adequate incomes, housing, food and health.

Feminist COVID-19 recovery plan

The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated the existing inequalities of Canadian women. FAFIA has urged the Government of Canada to implement a feminist COVID-19 recovery plan that would acknowledge the structural inequalities within Canadian society and proactively engage in creative, sustainable policy change, while centering women. On October 13, 2020, in response to the Government of Canada’s Throne Speech focused on COVID-19 recovery, FAFIA released a Briefing Note supporting key commitments in the Throne Speech, like the creation of a Task Force to guide the creation of the National Action Plan on Women and the Economy, an effective national childcare strategy, and the implementation of a National Action Plan to respond to the National Inquiry on MMWIG.

Housing and Homelessness Human Rights Claims

FAFIA supports the human rights claims of the Women’s Housing and Homelessness Network that have been referred for hearing to the National Housing Council. This human rights-claiming and hearing procedure under the National Housing Strategy Act is new and ground-breaking for the realization of women’s economic and social rights.

Solidarity with Indigenous Women

Over the past fifteen years FAFIA has worked in solidarity with Indigenous women to advance Indigenous women’s rights in Canada, including Indigenous women’s right to live free from sex and racial discrimination and violence. Some of these initiatives include:

Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG)

FAFIA, working in collaboration with the Native Women’s Association of Canada, was instrumental in persuading the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) to investigate Canada’s responses to the crisis of murders and disappearances of Indigenous women and girls. The CEDAW and IACHR reports issued in 2014 and 2015 brought international and public attention to the ongoing human rights violations, leading to the appointment of the National Inquiry on Missing and Murdered Women and Girls as one of the first acts of the Trudeau government in 2016. FAFIA, with partners Canada Without Poverty and Dr. Pamela Palmater, was granted standing at the Inquiry and made written submissions. FAFIA continues to push for the implementation of the recommendations of the MMIWG Inquiry and to hold Canada accountable for its failure to act effectively.

Indian Act Sex Discrimination

FAFIA supports and is a member of the Indian Act Sex Discrimination Working Group. For more than a decade, this Working Group has been in the forefront of advocacy to bring an end, finally, to the sex discrimination in the Indian Act. Since 1876, the Indian Act has denied First Nations women and their descendants eligibility for ‘Indian’1 status, and eligibility to transmit Indian status, on the same

footing as their male counterparts. It has, through legal definition, forced First Nations women and their descendants into the non-Indigenous population, denying them identity, belonging, and programs and services. The sex discrimination has harmed generations of First Nations women and their children; it has also diminished the numbers, and strength, of First Nations communities.

The Indian Act Sex Discrimination Working Group includes the leading First Nations women activists who have been the plaintiffs in cases challenging Indian Act sex discrimination over a fifty-year period; Canada’s top legal experts on Indian Act sex discrimination; two of Canada’s largest First Nations women’s organizations – the Ontario Native Women’s Association and the Quebec Native Women’s Association – and the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs, and FAFIA. This group of experts and advocates spearheaded the 2017 amendment to Bill S-3, which restored eligibility for status to an estimated 250,000 First Nations women and their descendants.2

However, in order for those women and their descendants to enjoy the benefits of their status, they must be registered. And registration – already a too difficult, troublesome, and lengthy process – must be simplified and sped up for the women and their descendants who have waited so long for their rights to be recognized. The Senate Committee on Indigenous Peoples issued a comprehensive report on the problems in Indian Act registration in June 2022 – Make It Stop! Ending Discrimination in Indian Act Registration. FAFIA and the Indian Act Sex Discrimination Working Group provided extensive evidence to the Senate Committee.

In 2022, the Government of Canada tabled Bill C-38, another narrow amendment to the Indian Act that does not eliminate the sex discrimination. FAFIA supports the provisions in Bill C-38 which will cure the sex discrimination that is caused by the automatic of loss of status for the wives and children of men who “enfranchised,” but deplores the introduction of another amendment to the Indian Act that fails to finally remove the sex discrimination. (See Briefing Note on Bill C-38). Bill C-38 will be reviewed by the House of Commons Committee on Indian and Northern Affairs in 2024.