Provincial governments are responsible for social services in Canada. There are many significant and critical issues that men deal with in today's society; most notably, male suicide (4:1 vs women, 8:1 vs women during separation and divorce, 12:1 for men over 65 during separation and divorce); male homelessness (70-80% of the homeless population yet proportionally less than 50% of the available beds); fentanyl crisis (80% male); domestic violence (26% male deaths, yet not even one transition house in BC); and children losing their fathers are some of the most pertinent ones.

All of these are issues worth addressing from a male perspective, but the one that sticks out for me is the domestic violence picture. Currently the provincial government spends almost $200M annually on over 50 transition houses and programs for women fleeing domestic violence. We certainly applaud this spending and believe it is money well spent. However, compare that to spending on men's programs and/or male transition houses (none) and we see a huge disparity. Until recently, we knew that domestic violence was affecting men in many negative ways, but we didn't have cold hard local statistics. We now have a report from the BC Coroner's Office that says from 2004-2014, 26% of domestic violence deaths in this province are male (see attachment). In our discussions with the Solicitor General's Office over the last 6 months, there was some reluctant acknowledgement that there needed to be more resources for men, and possibly some proportionality in funding for resources. However, they have cited that there are no funding streams set up to deal with this need. Really? Is that the true impediment to supporting the creation of more resources for fathers, men, and boys? And if so, then why haven't they set up any funding streams?

We submitted a proposal to the Solicitor General's Office last year for adequate funding for the Men's Centre in Nanaimo, a transition house for men fleeing domestic violence in an appropriate geographical location, and the establishment of an additional 4 Men's Centres in key population areas around the province. The proposal was for $5M, which represents just 2.5% of funding for women fleeing domestic violence, and far below the proportional 26% suggested by the BC Coroner's Report.