Statement: NEW Federal Funding to End Gender-Based Violence
July 2026
YWCA Toronto welcomes the federal government's recent announcement of $607.4 million in funding to advance the next phase of the 10-year National Action Plan to End Gender-based Violence.
While this commitment is significant, the rates and complexity of gender-based violence (GBV) and intimate partner violence (IPV) have escalated sharply since the plan was first introduced in 2022.
As a frontline service provider, YWCA Toronto sees the impacts that gender-based and intimate partner violence has on individuals, families, and communities every day. Preventing violence and supporting survivors requires robust structural investments. Affordable housing, accessible childcare, and a stabilized workforce are critical, lifesaving infrastructure. Emergency shelters for women escaping violence exist to provide immediate safety and facilitate the transition to longer-term housing. This model has broken down. As rates of GBV and IPV have reached epidemic levels across the country, and the housing and cost-of-living crisis worsens, shelter and housing providers like YWCA Toronto are struggling to meet service demand. Decades of underinvestment in housing and shelter infrastructure have created unsustainable pressures on the housing and shelter continuum. High market rents are forcing more people to rely on social and affordable housing, while long waitlists leave many without clear pathways out of the shelter system. In turn, people remain in shelters longer than necessary, reducing available shelter capacity and forcing service providers to routinely turn away survivors of violence. Combined with chronic underfunding across the housing continuum, emergency shelters are routinely forced to operate beyond their capacity. There is only so much we can stretch. On any given day in Canada, nearly 1,000 survivors are regrettably turned away from emergency shelter.
Access to childcare is equally central to safety. For many survivors, the lack of affordable childcare is a primary barrier to escaping an abusive home. Securing childcare alleviates an immense financial burden, enables employment, and provides the economic independence required to leave a violent environment.
For women and gender diverse individuals fleeing violence, shelters, affordable housing, and accessible childcare are critical, lifesaving infrastructure. Failing to adequately invest in these and other wraparound social supports for people fleeing violence is a life-threatening issue for women and gender diverse individuals, and their children. Without sustainable, permanent funding for this vital infrastructure, the crisis of gender-based and intimate partner violence will only persist.
Furthermore, maximizing the impact of this new funding depends entirely on the efficiency and structure of its distribution. To meet urgent needs on the ground, we need swift, coordinated intergovernmental transfers that avoid administrative delays. True sectoral stability also requires moving beyond one-time grants toward predictable, permanent operational funding. This must include dedicated resources for workforce equity and competitive compensation, ensuring that the frontline professionals sustaining this critical infrastructure are fully supported. With this newly announced funding, YWCA Toronto strongly urges the federal government and Ontario government to commit to a holistic approach to ending GBV and IPV. One that acknowledges the intersections of housing affordability and access to childcare in supporting women and gender diverse individuals to live lives free from violence.
The National Action Plan offers a foundation for meaningful change. Ensuring survivors have access to the support they need, when they need it, must remain at the forefront of every implementation and funding decision.
MEDIA
Sami Pritchard, Director of Advocacy and Communications, YWCA Toronto
437.286.9627 | spritchard@ywcatoronto.org