'It's about time' to address cycle of sexual abuse in First Nations: B.C. frontline worker

A frontline worker helping Northern B.C. First Nations communities says focused action to deal with sexual abuse on reserves is long overdue.

"I think that for some of the reserves the stats of sexual assaults are much higher than we'd ever want to understand or know," Laurel Collins told CBC's Daybreak North host Robert Doane.

As a program coordinator with B.C.'s Justice Education Society, she travels to reserves across the province talking to Indigenous peoples about sexual abuse, exploitation and molestation.

• Cabinet ministers set to discuss sexual abuse on reserves, says Bellegarde
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Earlier this week, Assembly of First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde pledged to raise the issue with federal cabinet ministers following an investigation by The Canadian Press.

During their months-long probe, a number of leading Indigenous experts, including former Truth and Reconciliation chairman Murray Sinclair, flagged alarming levels of sexual abuse in some communities and links to the suicide crisis among Aboriginal youth.

A cycle of abuse

"There is a lot of sexual abuse that happened during that time [of residential schools], and many people did not process or deal with that trauma," she said.

"There is often two [end results] that come out of sexual assault ... either becoming re-victimized through relationships as you get older, or becoming a perpetrator, which is often the other end of it."

She says "quite often," sexual assault is committed by family members, creating a cycle of abuse.

Bellegarde has also highlighted the issue, pressuring First Nations leaders to address it at an annual meeting that began Tuesday in Gatineau, Quebec.

Barriers to healing

But along with the trauma of being abused or exploited sexually, Collins sees several barriers facing those trying to heal.

Among them, she says, is the stigma associated with coming forward, and the potential damage to a victim's family that comes with reporting the abuse, if it was carried out by a relative.

She says complex relationships between First Nations and the RCMP can also lead to hesitation to report abuse, meaning perpetrators can go unpunished.

Some of the organizations working to help victims overcome those barriers are the Community Against Sexual Exploitation of Youth, and the Northern Native Public Legal Education program 

Education desperately needed

The latter allows Collins to visit communities anywhere from 100 Mile House up to the Yukon border, and from the Alberta border west to Haida Gwaii.

She says in many places, the education gap about abuse is surprising.

"A lot of people don't really understand everything about sexual assault and exploitation: what are the effects of trauma? What does it look like? How do we heal?"

But she says education is only the beginning of the process.

Creating solutions

Collins believes funding is needed to expand outreach programs that work alongside the Indigenous communities that are struggling.

"We need to be bringing more services to the communities and [to work] in culturally appropriate manners with the communities to empower them and work on their healing process," she said.

​"Until people make those choices, the cycle can just keep going."

To hear the full interview, click on the audio labelled 'For some of the reserves, the stats of sexual assaults are probably much higher than we'd ever want to know'.

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