The official opposition at Montreal city hall urges the administration of Valérie Plante to do more in terms of support for women victims of domestic violence, after a year 2021 marked by a significant number of feminicides.
A year ago, in March 2021, the elected officials of the Montreal city council adopted a motion from the Ensemble Montreal party presenting “an action plan” to support women who are victims of domestic violence. In particular, it asked the City to set up a free transportation service to emergency shelters in the city and to offer free moving and temporary storage services to victims of domestic violence fleeing a violent household.
Since then, at least 17 women have lost their lives at the hands of a violent spouse or ex-spouse in 2021, up from eight the year before, and the City has yet to implement the demands listed in this motion, deplores Ensemble Montréal. The party will therefore return to the charge during the meeting of the municipal council on March 21 to present a similar motion again. It also calls for the setting in motion of two communication campaigns aimed respectively at informing female victims of domestic violence and people “having violent behaviour” of the resources available in Montreal to come to their aid.
“We really had a very dark year [en matière de violence conjugale dans la province]. And despite this very heavy year, nothing has been put in place from our action plan which was proposed and adopted” in March 2021, launched at Homework the author of this motion and elected member of Ensemble Montréal, Stéphanie Valenzuela. In an interview, the municipal councilor underlines in particular that the municipality of Saint-Colomban, in the Laurentians, has undertaken in 2019 to set up a free transport system for women victims of domestic violence. A free adapted transportation service for women with disabilities fleeing a violent spouse to go to shelters has also been offered in Laval since last year.
“We see that other cities are adopting these measures. I don’t see why the city of Montreal, which is Quebec’s metropolis, will say no to measures that will really help the victims,” insists Ms. Valenzuela, who hopes that the City will “finally” see the importance of “putting these measures in place”. The elected official, however, welcomes the creation last month in the metropolis of a crisis unit for domestic violence, in collaboration with the Police Department of the City of Montreal and the community sector.
Lack of places
Joined by The duty Thursday, the president of the Alliance of second-stage shelters for women and children who are victims of domestic violence, Sabrina Lemeltier, welcomed the demands of Ensemble Montréal included in this motion. A real “action plan” to counter domestic violence must, however, go further, according to her, by attacking the glaring lack of resources to welcome women who are victims of it. Among shelters members of the alliance in Montreal, the rate of refusal of eligible applications is 75%, she indicates.
“The main concern in Montreal is the lack of places. The refusal rate of women [dans les maisons d’hébergement] is phenomenal,” she says. Since the money released by both Quebec and Ottawa is not yet sufficient to meet the needs in the metropolis in this area, Ms. Lemeltier is asking the City to contribute financially to the needs of organizations wishing to open up new resources there. In an interview, she also mentioned the possibility that the City could ease the tax burden on organizations that operate shelters in Montreal and reduce the costs associated with building permits for this type of project. “It can be considerable sums for organizations,” she says.
“In Montreal, we have a high rate of domestic violence. We need to have measures to match that,” concludes Ms. Lemeltier.
At the time these lines were written, the cabinet of the mayoress of Montreal, Valérie Plante, had not commented on this motion.