Photo: Cheryl Gallant, MP with PACT-Ottawa (Persons Against the Crime of Trafficking in Humans) Committee members at an awareness initiative for Truckers at the Antrim Truck Stop in Arnprior. The TruckSTOP campaign is a human trafficking awareness initiative that provides truck drivers with information on signs they can look for to identify situations of human trafficking.
Ottawa, Ontario – Cheryl Gallant, MP Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke –today called on constituents to celebrate International Women’s Week and International Women’s Day. “International Women’s Day is March 8th. Canada’s 2013 theme is Working Together: Engaging Men to End Violence against Women. This year’s International Women’s Week theme is asking men to become part of the solution and speak out to end violence against women and girls” stated Cheryl Gallant, MP.
“Our Federal Government is committed to eliminating violence against women and girls,” MP Gallant added. “Our government has been working with communities to improve safety and security of women – funding hundreds of projects across Canada to end violence against women and girls. I encourage everyone in Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke to celebrate the women in our community this International Women’s Week and to work together, with women, to prevent violence against women and girls in all its forms, wherever it occurs.”
The Conservative Government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper is committed to supporting projects that yield concrete results for women and girls in Canada, while strengthening families and communities. For example, we have supported projects that address (so-called) honour-based violence and encourage men and boys in those communities to be part of the solution. Through Status of Women Canada, the government’s support for community-based projects has nearly doubled since 2006-2007, from $10.8 million to close to $19 million, its highest level ever. Since 2007, more than $57 million in funding has been approved for projects that seek to address violence against women and girls.
Actions taken to end violence against women and girls include launching a comprehensive National Action Plan to Combat Human Trafficking to ensure the safety and security of women and girls across Canada who are being targeted for sexual exploitation by violent traffickers; and we have developed a five year national strategy aimed at enhancing the response of law enforcement and the justice system to cases of missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls and supporting culturally appropriate victim service, and we have tabled legislation to give aboriginal women equal rights and access to their matrimonial property.
International Women’s Week takes place this year from March 3 to 9, with International Women’s Day on March 8.