Advocate calls for action after Sask. releases review of intimate partner violence deaths

An expert says Saskatchewan needs to take action after the release of its second-ever review on intimate partner violence (IPV) deaths.

This review, released on Thursday, looks at incidents of IPV that ended in deaths from 2015 to 2020. It specifically looked at 31 cases encompassing 34 homicides and four related suicides.

The report was meant to uncover systemic issues and provide recommendations to prevent future tragedies. It was prepared by three multidisciplinary case review teams alongside family members and loved ones of victims, according to the report.

“We need to stop simply labelling this a complex issue and get to work. There are real issues in this province with alcohol, poverty, views on gender roles, and a lack of proactive solutions addressing root causes,” a member of the case review team said in the report.

The report called IPV a “deeply pervasive issue.”

The review outlines common factors in many cases, such as perpetrators’ histories of childhood abuse, substance abuse and poverty.

It also addresses how many victims tried to reach out for help before their deaths, but faced barriers.

Eighty-two per cent of perpetrators in the cases were male and 83 per cent of the victims were women, according to the report.

There was also an overrepresentation of Indigenous people, with 57 per cent of all adult victims identified as Indigenous.

Fifty per cent of the cases happened in rural locations, 32 per cent in urban, 10 per cent in the Northern Saskatchewan Administration District and eight per cent on First Nations.

Read the full report here: 

Recommendations

The report’s recommendations focus on six areas:

Education and awareness.
Intervention for perpetrators.
Victim-centred approaches.
Legislation and policy.
Services in rural and northern areas.
Infrastructure development.

Jo-Anne Dusel, executive director at the Provincial Association of Transition Houses and Services of Saskatchewan (PATHS), said the recommendations are “really good,” but have been made by advocates or survivors in the past.

“All of these recommendations are very near to my heart,” She said.

Dusel said she’s often asked why Saskatchewan has such high rates of IPV and points to what other jurisdictions are doing to combat it.

“Frankly Ontario started doing domestic violence death reviews over 20 years ago and they’ve been implementing their recommendations that came from that.”

This is the second such review done in Saskatchewan, with the previous one released in 2018.

Dusel said that compared to the 2018 report, this one includes more focus on how to deal with perpetrators to prevent further violence.

“If we really want to change the rates and stop the violence from happening in the first place, we need to intervene with people who are at risk of using violence or are using violence in relationships.”

The review says 64 per cent of the perpetrators and victims were involved in a high-conflict break up or separation. It also states 82 per cent of perpetrators were under financial stress or unemployed, 64 per cent had misogynistic attitudes and 73 per cent were depressed, in the opinion of family and friends.

Recommendations are only as good as actions that come afterward, Dusel said.

“If there’s one piece missing in this process, it’s using these recommendations and the recommendations from the previous report to develop a specific action plan to address intimate partner and family violence in Saskatchewan.”

Dusel said an action plan has targets, goals, timelines and evaluations to monitor the progress.

Province on recommendations

The review highlights some of the actions the government has taken since 2018.

According to the document, the province has added numerous programs and made legislative changes.

An example is The Victims of Interpersonal Violence Amendment Act, which allows renters to end fixed-term tenancy agreements with 28 days notice with no penalties if they are victims of IPV.

Another changed in legislation now allows people experiencing IPV to take 10 days off of work, with paid leave for five of those days.

“With this second report, we see that these recommendations are largely aligned with some of the work that we’re already doing, which is encouraging, but certainly recognizing that there is more work to be done,” said Minister of Justice and Attorney General Tim McLeod at the Saskatchewan Legislature on Thursday.

Asked if the government would follow all the recommendations, the minister stopped short of giving a blanket commitment.

“These aren’t exactly checklists that you can just say, yes, this one is done,” McLeod said.

“These are evolving and constantly being monitored, so we’ll continue to follow the recommendations and look at developing policies and initiating responses that are consistent with the recommendations, always being aware that until we can say that domestic violence has been eliminated from Saskatchewan, there will always be work to do.”