YWCA leaders urge Ontario to declare intimate partner violence an epidemic

Women fleeing violence and living in shelters often need to wait around three years for permanent, affordable housing — whereas it once took around three months, says YWCA Hamilton chief executive officer Medora Uppal. 

Uppal described the change she's seen over recent decades to the Ontario Legislature's Standing Committee on Justice Policy on Wednesday, in a bid to ask the province to declare an epidemic of intimate partner violence.

The increased wait time for housing is evidence of how supports across the province are "typically underfunded or unfunded" and struggling to meet the demand that has come with an increase in violence against women and gender-diverse people. 

"There are those who [leave violent homes] and realize there is nowhere to go," she said.

"Shelter staff are overworked and underpaid and put in a position to repeatedly turn away women and children in crisis — brutal work which is taking a toll on all of us."

Justice committee studying new bill

Uppal, joined by YWCA leaders from Niagara Region and Toronto, was speaking at the committee's hearings on Bill 173, the Intimate Partner Violence Epidemic Act, 2024.

After its introduction in March, the bill – introduced by four New Democratic Party MPPs – has passed second reading and is now at the committee for consideration and further study.

"We urge the government to pass Bill 173 immediately," Uppal told committee members via video conference. 

"Intimate partner violence (IPV) was a shadow pandemic during the worst of COVID-19 and IPV continues to be a public health crisis."

She said agencies working in this realm must often make do with a patchwork of one-time grants and private donations, which makes long-term planning a challenge, particularly around staffing.

"We are not funded to meet the needs of survivors and we spend way too much time and resources fundraising and struggling to fill gaps," she said.

Agencies also need more funding to raise staff salaries and benefits to combat high turnover and recruitment challenges, Uppal said.

The Hamilton YWCA has a 75 per cent turnover rate in frontline emergency housing workers between 2022 and 2023, she said. 

"Having anyone at two years now is considered long-term employment." 

Uppal and her colleagues — Niagara executive director Elisabeth Zimmermann and Toronto CEO Heather McGregor — all said gender-based violence and women's economic independence are linked, noting many woman stay in abusive homes.

They fear "poverty, homelessness, shame and further marginalization if they leave," Uppal said.

"If there is one thing to come out of his process, let it be that no one is a victim of femicide because she was forced to choose abuse over homelessness." 

They also recommended that the government invest in assault prevention and use longstanding community roundtables to inform programs and funding allocations.

Nearly 100 municipalities have declared epidemic

MPP Kristyn Wong-Tam (Toronto Centre) was one of the supporters of the bill, alongside NDP caucus colleagues Peggy Sattler (London West), Lisa Gretzky (Windsor West) and Jill Andrew (Toronto-St. Paul's).

Ontario's Progressive Conservative government said in April it will support the bill, reversing its opposition to the idea [that there is an epidemic], previously arguing violence is not an infectious or communicable disease.

Premier Doug Ford requested the justice committee do an "in-depth study on all of the aspects with respect to intimate partner violence — both the current programs that are available, some of the root causes of it and how we can do better in the province of Ontario," said Government House Leader Paul Calandra in the legislature in April.

The NDP says nearly 100 municipalities in the province have already declared intimate partner violence an epidemic.

Hamilton did so last August, after members of the Woman Abuse Working Group (WAWG) presented statistics to councillors showing Hamilton police received 12,514 domestic violence or intimate partner violence calls in 2022, while violence-against-women crisis support lines in the city received 7,660 calls that year. WAWG members said they hoped a declaration would prompt further action.

Mantha 'shouldn't be welcome back' to committee

Wednesday's justice committee meeting began with a different matter, however.

Wong-Tam called for the removal of committee member Michael Mantha, a former NDP MP who was recently ousted from caucus after an arbitrator's report found he sexually harassed and assaulted an employee. 

"He certainly shouldn't be welcome back to this committee," they said. "It would also be a very distracting and destructive presence, given what this committee does."

Committee clerk Thushitha Kobikrishna clarified that the earliest Mantha could be removed would be when the house resumes sitting on Oct. 21.

Wong-Tam said they're hoping Mantha would resign from the committee, and also as MPP. They'll be calling for his resignation, they said.