The National Post is reporting today that the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry has been beset by sexism and inappropriate workplace conduct.  Commissioner Oppal has issued a statement saying the Commission has appointed a lawyer to conduct an investigation.

The article cites five former staffers and contains the following:

All of the former employees who spoke to the National Post requested that their names not be published, citing concern for their future employment prospects. “I’ve been made aware that my speaking [out] could end my career,” said one”….

A lawyer contracted to assist the commission says the inquiry “is replicating conditions that allowed women to go missing for so long: Lack of resources, dismissive attitudes, a failure to listen to the community. The commission has become a manifestation of the forces it was intended to study…. It’s like time travel. [There is] sexism, dismissiveness about discrimination. In the context, it’s completely abhorrent.”

Another lawyer who worked for the commission agrees, adding that aboriginal representation at the inquiry amounts to “tokenism. It’s nothing else but that. Everything that Robyn Gervais said was true,” the lawyer added. “I was silenced. It was the most degrading, humiliating, devastating, disgusting thing. It was like being treated like a survival sex-trade worker.”

……

 This is appalling news.  I hope the persons in question find the courage to step forward in a forum in which they can be immunized them from any possible retaliation.