Regional Advocacy

Members of the Ontario Regional Advocacy Team

Our Approach- Resolving (In)Access to Justice in Canada

Our advocacy focuses on supporting federally sentenced women and gender diverse people to understand and apply the law, and to work collaboratively with them to hear their needs and the issues they face, and amplify their voices, perspectives, and experiences to national audiences.

How we work

CAEFS’ supports many regional advocacy teams across the country! Each operates slightly differently, but all of our teams are organized by regions where there are federal penitentiaries designated for women: Atlantic, Quebec, Ontario, Prairies, and Pacific. Teams are comprised of staff and community-based volunteer advocates, and importantly- peer advocates, who are incarcerated people in prisons designated for women that receive training and ongoing support by CAEFS in a recognized employment position by the Correctional Service of Canada.

Regional advocacy teams make regular advocacy visits to the federal prison designated for women and/or psychiatric centre in their region. Each team aims to visit the prison in their region once a month, on average. In between visits, people incarcerated in prisons designated for women can connect with their team through regional toll-free advocacy phone lines

What we do

We work to ensure that people in prison have a robust understanding of the law, rights, and redress systems. We also work to promote healthy dialogue and productive conflict resolution between frontline staff and incarcerated people. 

 When advocacy teams go into the prisons, they meet with individuals, heads of peer-led committees, and living-unit representatives. Through these meetings they work alongside incarcerated people to develop mutual understandings of issues related to conditions of confinement and other key concerns facing the prison populations. Advocacy teams are especially attuned to human rights violations and strive to foster legal and rights-based literacy among imprisoned populations.  

 Regional advocates work closely with their incarcerated counterparts: peer advocates. The CAEFS peer advocate program trains and supports individuals in prison to fulfill many of the same functions as regional advocates. Part of this training is based on CAEFS’ widely circulated Human Rights in Action handbook, a rights-based resource designed to give federally incarcerated women and gender-diverse people the tools and resources to defend and advocate for their rights while they are in prison. After advocates meet with individuals and identify issues, they meet with the warden and other prison administrators to address issues.

Systemic Advocacy Letters

Following each advocacy visit and subsequent meeting with prison management, regional advocacy teams write systemic advocacy letters. These letters, and the concerns raised therein, created an evidentiary record of the conditions of confinement inside federal prisons designated for women and provide real-time access to the scope of issues in prisons designated for women to key policy-makers and stakeholders. The letters also inform CAEFS’ direction and systemic actions.  

 The letters are sent to the warden, the Office of the Correctional Investigator, the Canadian Human Rights Commission, the Citizen’s Advisory Committee, and key Senators. Systemic advocacy letters are shared with other stakeholders by request. Please email [email protected] to request access.  

Coming soon!