Survivor of gender-based violence appointed to task force in Newfoundland and Labrador

Domestic abuse survivor Georgina McGrath has been added to Newfoundland and Labrador's gender-based violence task force. Garrett Barry reports.

ST. JOHN’S - It’s been more than a decade since Georgina McGrath told her story for the first time — that she was a victim of domestic abuse in Labrador City, N.L.

That moment over a decade ago — a Facebook post marking a year since what she calls “her last beating” — is when McGrath decided she’d no longer wanted to define herself as a victim. She’d become a survivor.

“I didn’t want it to define me,” McGrath says. “I went public on Facebook, taking a big chance because not everybody talks about getting a beating.”

More then a decade after that last assault — and even amidst all the love and support from her family, in her new home on Newfoundland’s Burin Peninsula — terrifying memories still creep in.

“I actually still sleep with the window open at my house,” she said. “Because I can still feel his hands around my neck sometimes.”

“Never goes away,” McGrath says.

McGrath is dedicated to moving forward. She’s been working with Senator Fabian Manning on bill S-242 that would have the Minister for Women and Gender Equality post reports every two years on government action against intimate partner violence.

That bill was introduced into the House of Commons last week in Ottawa, after passing through the Senate.

The same day, it was also announced that she has been added to a new task force to tackle gender-based violence in the province, now that Newfoundland and Labrador’s provincial government has declared it an epidemic.

“I really do think that it will change some things,” she said. “In order for change to happen, then we have to make changes. I want to see changes in the justice department, the police force, the health department, education.”

Her addition to the panel is a small victory for advocates and non-profit groups in the province, who’ve been advocating for voices of survivors to reach the highest levels of government.

“All of these departments need to come together so we can build a co-ordinated strategic plan that is rooted in action,” said Stacey Hoffe, the executive director of the Mokami Status of Women Council in Happy Valley—Goose Bay.

“I feel confident that having community and survivors at the table, that that will make progress with that.”

Gender-based violence declared an epidemic

N.L. became the latest province to declare gender-based violence or intimate partner violence an epidemic, following Nova Scotia in 2024 and New Brunswick in June 2025.

While Hoffe said the group is waiting for a terms of reference document to be brought forward, they’ve already met privately again with Lela Evans, Newfoundland and Labrador’s Minister of Women and Gender Equality.

Kylee Nunn, a program manager with the Elizabeth Fry Society of Mainland Nova Scotia, said the declaration in 2024 was an important moment.

Now, she said, Newfoundland and Labrador will have an opportunity to capitalize on some of the attention the declaration will bring and try to engage new people on the topic.

“Nurses, police, firefighters… bus drivers, people interact with gender-based violence all the time. And those folks need education and understanding and language to talk about these issues,” she said.

“We talk about these issues all the time, and we have a way of speaking about it that often is difficult for others to connect with or understand.”

Since the epidemic was declared in September 2024, Nunn said there’s been improvement in the fight against intimate partner violence — but also, she believes, a concerning rise in extremist attitudes among teenagers and youth.

“I think we really need to look at the ways that sexism and misogyny are still very pervasive in society and setting us back.”

McGrath has spent years working on her bill — dubbed Georgina’s Law. An earlier version of the bill spent months in debate and senate committee hearings only to be discarded when then-prime minister Justin Trudeau, prorogued parliament upon his resignation in January 2025.

McGrath says the work has been worth it.

“It’s incredible when a victim reaches out to me and thanks me, that they’ve gotten out or they’ve gotten resources,” she said. “That’s what makes it worthwhile.”