Mr. Speaker, I am honoured once again to convey my personal hope and New Democrats' hope that the national inquiry into the issue of murdered and missing indigenous women and girls is successful and does the work for the country for healing to end violence against indigenous women and girls forever and to root out its root causes. However, we need the inquiry to work well, and we need it to do its work. I ask these questions in that context.

Last month the United Nations committee to end discrimination against women expressed serious concerns with Canada's inquiry as it is now envisioned. It says it is not taking a human rights approach. It does not have the explicit mandate to review policing or look into unresolved cases. It says specifically that the committee is concerned about the lack of an explicit assurance of adequate support and protection provided to witnesses, and about the lack of sufficient co-operation with indigenous women's organizations in the process of establishing the inquiry.

When the United Nations committee weighs in like this, we should pay attention; and so in that constructive spirit, I would like to flag that those concerns cited by the United Nations fly very much with what we heard directly from the families of murdered and missing women and girls.

Right here on the front steps of the Hill at the Sisters in Spirit vigil on October 4, we heard the great frustration of the mothers of missing daughters in particular. One Algonquin women, Bridget Tolley, said:

We're back again. We want justice. We don't want to be here anymore. We shouldn't have to be here. We shouldn't have to beg for justice.

She has been fighting to pursue the case of her mother for 15 years.

Another Mohawk woman, Beverley Jacobs, former president of the Native Women's Association of Canada, said:

I'm tired of government. I'm tired of their words.

I want to see something done for families. Something that they can feel that something is being done and their own justice is being addressed.

I have heard this repeatedly from advocates for murdered and missing indigenous women. They feel that their voices were not heard in the formation of the inquiry and in its terms of reference. They felt frustrated as the opening date of the inquiry, September 1, passed without receiving any details of how they would be included. The inquiry only provided the loved ones of the murdered and missing with contact information just last week.

We have fantastic organizations that can identify the needs of those participating in the inquiry and can really help make a difference and make it work.

I ask the government this directly. Will it follow the United Nations recommendation that the government ensure support and protection to witnesses and strengthen the inclusive partnership with indigenous women's organizations and national and international human rights institutions and bodies during the conducting of the murdered and missing indigenous women's inquiry and its implementation process?

Sheila Malcolmson

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