Community leaders possess unique legislative and regulatory powers to create safer environments and systematically prevent gender and sex-based violence at the local level. By shifting from reactive enforcement to proactive structural design, tribal governments can dismantle systemic risks. Accordingly, the contents of this workshop are formulated with a view to concomitantly achieving sustainable development targets for gender equality.
Background
The Indian Act has enforced a historic context of social and economic exclusion, resulting in disproportionate hardships and lower levels of physical and emotional well-being in First Nations communities across the country. Within this historical landscape, violence, suicide, and self-inflicted harms remain pervasively high.
Recognizing that violence against women and girls is a complex issue involving biopsychosocial and spiritual factors, and is deeply influenced by societal values, attitudes, and practices, our goal is to provide participants with a dedicated forum and framework. This space allows participants to share their unique experiences, collect and analyze this knowledge, and develop legal and regulatory tools to prevent and respond to violence against women and girls in both the home and the community.
This recognition event enables participants to acquire practical knowledge of enforceable gender equality legislation, empowering them to eliminate discrimination and violence against women and girls by amending or creating new laws and regulations via the exercise of inherent and legislative powers to secure their rights to life, socio-economic security, and self-determination.
Self-determination serves as the foundational concept that empowers participants to navigate systemic adversity, dismantle enduring hardships, and transform complex structural challenges into lasting, life-changing pathways to healing, autonomy, and the complete eradication of gender-based discrimination and violence.
Opportunity
While federal and provincial Crown governments have made significant progress in enacting legislation to address violence against women, numerous gaps and challenges remain, particularly for Indigenous women. Community leaders play an active role in preventing violence against women and girls by exercising their legislative and regulatory powers over local matters to create safer environments.
By shifting from reactive enforcement to proactive structural design, Tribal and First Nations Governments can dismantle systemic risks. With this said, the time has come to intensify efforts to eliminate all forms of gender and sex-based violence, to prevent and protect women and girls, to investigate and punish perpetrators, and to provide protection to complainants and survivors of such violence.
Purpose
The purpose of this one-to-two-day workshop is to elevate standards for preventing violence against women and girls. Participants will analyze community-level legislative approaches, assess lessons learned, and identify best practices in legal reform. Ultimately, the workshop aims to design a model framework for community-based legislation targeting violence against women and girls.
The contents of this workshop are formulated with a view to concomitantly achieving sustainable development targets for gender equality, as established under the UN Sustainable Development Goal 5, more particularly targets 5.1, 5.2 and 5c, which read as follow:
Global frameworks like Sustainable Development Goal 5 establish vital benchmarks for ending discrimination and violence against women, girls, and gender-diverse individuals. However, UN targets rely heavily on high-level, centralized national data. For this reason, our workshop objectives incorporate federal frameworks like PIPEDA and community-led models like the OCAP® principles.
Expected Outcomes
This initiative will empower Tribal and First Nations Governments, along with their stakeholders, to strengthen existing laws and develop new legislative measures toward eradicating violence against women and girls. Furthermore, it will establish a benchmark for sharing best practices in strict alignment with PIPEDA and the OCAP® principles, ensuring data is integrated into Indigenous-owned databases for strategic, targeted use.
When drafting local laws and regulations, integrating PIPEDA's privacy standards alongside the cultural authority of OCAP® provides the ethical, practical, and legal framework required to transition toward true self-determination and data sovereignty.
Workshop Objectives
Intuitive, forward-thinking and caring leaders create opportunities for positive transformations in people, places and power structures. By the conclusion of this workshop, participants will be equipped to:
This carefully crafted event provides leaders, executives and community members with a safe, impartial, and completely confidential forum in which to build engaging and effective tools for eradicating violence against women and girls. By incorporating jurisdictional reform, community-led enforcement, and data sovereignty, this workshop directly operationalizes self-determination to protect vulnerable community members.
Audience: All levels of Government, Tribal and First Nations Governments.
Availability: This special Talks for All Recognition Event is available anytime from March 11th, 2027. Should you wish to hold this workshop in advance, please let us know by email along with your preferred selection of dates.
Language: This workshop is open to all communities in both English and French. If a community prefers to use an Indigenous or other native language, interpretation or translation services can be arranged.
Duration: 1- or 2- Day Work Session—Including breakout and interactive sessions.
Post-Session Consultations: Optional and at your discretion.
Overview of Costs
Honorarium: $1890 CAD per day.
The above costs do not include conference or meeting room rental expenses, expert or technical services fees; including printing, communication, conferencing or audio-visual expenditures, and business travel or lodging expenses normally required for the preparation and delivery of conferences or workshops to participants. Federal or provincial taxes may apply.
Cancellation Timeline and Fees:
30+ Days Notice: Full refund minus a $150 administration fee.
15 to 29 Days Notice: 50% refund, or a 75% credit toward a future workshop.
14 Days or Fewer Notice: Non-refundable. No credits will be issued.
Workshop Proposal
Upholding the Sacred_Workshop Proposal_FY2026-27.pdf
Sample 2-Day Agenda