CAEFS' supports the training model that was developed by Aboriginal women and implemented with and for the first set of staff who worked at the Okimaw Ohci Healing Lodge. We believe that all CSC staff who work with women prisoners would undoubtedly benefit from participation in such a training program. Moreover, as Madam Justice Arbour and the CSC's own Task Force on Segregation revealed most recently, too many staff violate prisoners' rights and entitlements out of ignorance not malice. As such. we believe that all staff should receive initial and ongoing . professional training regarding relevant legislation and policy, particularly the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Canadian Human Rights Code and the Corrections and Conditional Release Act, appropriate interpersonal communication skills, personal relationships and conflict resolution skills.

We do not feel that women should ever have to deal with male Primary Workers in their living units. Indeed, we believe that there is no question that the law supports the notion that women should not be forced to have men working in their living units. In addition, we already know that there have been abuses of current protocols and policies regarding men entering the living units of women prisoners. We are also aware, as were the Cross Gender Monitors, that most women refuse to officially report these incidents for fear of reprisal. In addition, the very closed nature of CSC and the intransigence of CSC to address problems which arise internally, create significant concern for CAEFS regarding the ability of women to access assistance, much less justice, when such transgressions occur.

It is clear to those of us who work in and around the women's prisons, that women are increasingly fearful of making complaints or filing grievances regarding the behaviour of CSC staff within the prisons where they reside. Women describe overt and subtle threats as the primary reasons for their reluctance to avail themselves of the legitimate and legislated complaint and grievance mechanisms available to them.

Typically, women who are currently housed in the regional prisons for women and/or the Okimaw Ohci Healing Lodge will indicate that they are fearful, based on clear or implied threats from staff that if they choose to pursue grievances, it may be an indication that they are either unhappy or otherwise not suited to the regional prisons. A corollary of such comments, is the assertion/threat that if women are unhappy in the regional prisons or the Lodge, then they do have the option of moving to one of the segregated maximum security units in the men's prisons.

The converse is true for those women who are imprisoned in the segregated maximum security units in men's prisons. They typically report that the are discouraged from pursuing complaints and/or grievances by staff who remind them that in order to achieve medium security status and therefore the potential to apply for a transfer to one of the regional prisons or the Okimaw Ohci Healing Lodge, women need to demonstrate that they wish to "get along" and demonstrate that their priority is to work towards their eventual integration into the regional prisons.

In addition, women frequently relate examples to us of situations where, when they have pursued a complaint or a grievance, they are generally confronted by the staff involved, and "encouraged" to engage in a "mediation" process rather than pursue the complaint or grievance. Women report feeling intense pressure to withdraw any written documentation at this stage. In addition, although we frequently report matters to the Office of the Correctional Investigator and they undertake thorough investigations, whom are also often discouraged from pursuing complaints with that office.