Subcommittee on International Human Rights Committee on May 4th, 2017

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Levitt]

Thank you, Mr. Drake.

We're going to move along to MP Duvall, please, for seven minutes.

[Scott Duvall, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Thank you, gentlemen, for coming this afternoon to bring this important information to us. It's very appreciated.

In my experience, human trafficking is international in nature. It's very seldom that networks are operating in a single country alone. You mentioned Bangladesh and Nepal in your opening remarks. Would you mind elaborating upon the international dimension of the sex trade? In particular, where do the victims usually end up?

[Robert McDougall]

I can give you only a partial analysis there.

As far as I'm aware, and I was the High Commissioner in Bangladesh a few years ago, the human smuggling trade out of Bangladesh is largely workers, not sex workers, and they are largely going into India, because the economy is much more vibrant in India. We're talking about millions of people illegally smuggled into India as workers.

The biggest example in Nepal is the one I gave, which was that when the economy collapsed after the 2015 earthquake, there was a major movement out of Nepal—not so much into India, although there are many Nepalese working in India, but through India to the Gulf states and the Middle East, again as workers.

In regard to your preliminary statement, although as I say the numbers are soft, our indications are that much of the labour-related human smuggling—indentured labour—in India is in fact internal. It has more than a billion people. It's such a big country that it in fact has its own internal human smuggling markets, which are very significant.

In general I would agree with you that most of the human smuggling we're looking at is international, but India is one of those places that are so big it's like they have their own climate: it has its own human smuggling network.

[Scott Duvall, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Thank you.

Is the Indian government aggressive on its penalties or deterrence measures? Does it have any place to reduce the trafficking? Are there aggressive penalties?

[David Drake]

Yes.

Again, your support staff can do more searches on this, but the Indians have very aggressive penalties in place. They have engaged on the issue for a whole series of the different parts of the human smuggling process.

[Scott Duvall, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Do we know what the drivers are for demand of these sexual services? Is it tourism? I know you mentioned that there was a lot of poverty, but where's the greatest demand coming from? Is it people coming in to visit, special events, or is it just anything?

[Robert McDougall]

If I can parrot the wise words that Mr. Drake just mumbled in my ear, it's not so much a pull factor as a push factor. It really is that you have people who are dirt poor. India is doing much better now than it was 20 years ago, even as an economy and a nation, but it still has an enormous population of extremely poor people who have enormous difficulty making ends meet.

In a sense, it's more a push that is driven by the supply factors than the demand. There's always demand for cheap labour and forced sexual services. Unfortunately, that's going to happen. That's prevalent everywhere. However, India's involvement is largely because it has such an enormous pool of really poor people who have very few other places to turn.

[Scott Duvall, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

For my last question, can you describe the forms of coercion that are used to keep the women and children in the sex trades? You've maybe already answered that by saying that it's just poverty.

[Robert McDougall]

I wouldn't belittle the fact that there are constraints, physical and otherwise, that force people to do things. I don't have details.

If you want, we can pursue that issue. I have never actually probed into that degree of detail on the subject.

[David Drake]

If I could add a bit more to that, again, the roots are in poverty—extreme poverty. In many cases, what you have is an indentured service of one sort of another. You have very poor parents, or in the case of children who have lost their parents, a family member essentially selling them into slavery. These are common issues at the lowest levels in India, and, of course, you have those who are prepared to take advantage of those situations.

Once again, the principal driver is poverty, and I think the Indians are very clear about that. At the same time, we need to recognize that there are those who will enable when the situation is provided.

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Levitt]

Thank you very much.

We'll now move to MP Tabbara.

[Marwan Tabbara, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll be splitting my time with Mr. Fragiskatos.

You mentioned in your opening statement that there are reports of around 20,000 women and children who were victims of human trafficking in 2016. That number rose 25%. A lot of these women and girls who are being trafficked are coming from Nepal and Bangladesh.

How does corruption affect the enforcement? I read in the briefings that there is a 77% acquittal rate. Again, how does the Indian government...and how can Canada help with this high rate of acquittal charges and help end corruption, so that we can find the root causes and bring these perpetrators to justice?

[Robert McDougall]

I'm sure this is a valid point. It's something to look into. I don't know the answer. To begin with, I'm not sure how that 77% would compare to, for example, dismissal rates in other countries. One of the problems you do have in this whole area, as I mentioned tangentially in my remarks, is it's very difficult getting witnesses to actually complain to set things off. There is coercion of the workers; there are people who are afraid of what will happen to their families back home. This is not just related to India, this is related to everything. I'm not sure; the 77% acquittal sounds bad, but I don't know how that compares to anybody else. I do have to say, it's not an area we've been involved in. Corruption is, as a whole, not limited to the areas of trafficking or sexual trafficking. It is a continual problem, not just in India but in a lot of places.

[Marwan Tabbara, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

How can we dismantle some of these trafficking hubs that are coming from Nepal and Bangladesh?

[Robert McDougall]

You have to decide what you want to do. The workers who come in from Bangladesh, for example, are filling a need in India. They're there because there are jobs there to be done. They're being taken advantage of by the people who employ them and by the organizers of the mass movements. We're not talking about individuals going across; we're talking about organized movements of indentured labourers who are getting underpaid when they get to India but are still getting paid more than they would be getting paid at home. It becomes a very complicated issue, morally.

[Marwan Tabbara, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

I'll pass it on to you.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you very much.

Thank you for being here today.

My sense is that as a middle power, Canada's options, I won't say are limited, but are certainly circumscribed as far as what we can do. I want to point to two areas. I, as a member of the foreign affairs committee, have travelled to Guatemala and Colombia, to Ukraine, and to other areas. Mr. Levitt is also on that committee. We've seen Canadian development assistance executed on the ground that is having a concrete and positive impact on people's lives in the realm of agriculture and legal aid. I bring those two areas up not because they're the only areas that we could focus on—obviously, there's much more to our development policy than that—but as far as the problem of human trafficking is concerned. There is a plethora of articles that this committee has looked at in preparation for this study. They look at the problems that farmers are having in India: the debt, for example, they find themselves in; the drought right now in southern India that is quite bad, that is forcing folks into a situation of poverty. These problems are leading them to, in many cases, unfortunately make the decision that their children are going to be trafficked.

I noticed that in your statement you outlined a number of areas that we're helping within India. A few of those focus on food security and agriculture in general terms. I wonder if you could point to that and perhaps make the link that this is an area where, indirectly, there is support available for combatting human trafficking. Also, and Mr. Tabbara touched on it, as far as the punitive aspect of the matter is concerned, I wonder if you can look at whether or not Canada has made support available now or in the past when it comes to legal aid programs within India. Obviously there are concerned advocates there who want to take this issue forward, even though public attitudes might not be where one would hope at the moment. There are always human rights advocates who are pushing issues forward no matter the circumstances. I wonder if legal aid might be an area to look at.

[Robert McDougall]

I think the general answer to your first question is, it's a matter of priorities and having too many things we could be doing to help and not being able to help all of them. There's no question that human trafficking is a really bad problem and that the sex trafficking end of it is a particularly poignant and appalling part of that larger problem. Our aid priorities have not focused strictly on that. They could. As a general observation we have to choose what we focus on. In India, we have not focused very much specifically on human trafficking. I would say it's a larger problem; it's not just an Indian problem. I think it would be something we'd have to look at as a broader thesis. In that regard, if I can speak personally, I would say it's a great study that you're setting out here. I look forward very much to learning from your results, frankly.

To follow up on your second question, the legal aid, I'm not aware of anything we've done on legal aid, but I will follow up on that question and get back to you on that specific issue.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

No problem. The question comes from a recognition that, first of all, as I say, Canada is a middle power. What we can do is limited on that basis, but there's also a recognition of the fact that trafficking, whether it's in India or elsewhere, is really a symptom of a much larger set of problems, problems in the plural sense. Let me emphasize that.

If Canada can continue to help in certain areas, in agriculture, for example—I mentioned legal aid, and there are other examples—then we can help indirectly this problem of human trafficking rather than channel all resources into one particular area, which, if it's a symptom of a problem, I'm not sure that is the most effective way to carry out our aid policy.

[Robert McDougall]

It's a sure point. I think we can say that there are certain areas we are focusing on, to follow your lead in your earlier point. We are able to move over on it. Women's and children's rights and sexual and other violence, domestic violence, is an area in which we are focusing a lot of our efforts in India, as elsewhere. As you suggested, these are areas that could very easily be linked up very much with the human trafficking aspect.

As for agriculture and other things, I think that is the link behind that link, which is that, in virtually all of our programs now, gender and particularly women's and children's rights, there is a requirement in our development program to say what effect will this have on women and children. In a more general sense, that's happened.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Michael Levitt]

Thank you. For the final question, we're going to move to MP Anderson.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

I have a question, gentlemen. You talk about the Indian government recognizing that there are thousands, 20,000 or whatever, people trafficked. Outside estimates put it at millions. Does the the Canadian government have any position on that? What's the Canadian government's official position on the number of people who are being trafficked in India, or do you not have a position?

[Robert McDougall]

We don't have a position. We don't have an independent data source; therefore, having a position on the number would not make sense.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Okay, so the only really specific thing that I think we can find from your presentation today is that you talked about a Canadian fund for local initiatives supporting a local project to increase coordination and capacity to address human trafficking in the state of Maharashtra. I'm wondering, prior to coming here, did you check into that project, and can you tell us how successful it has been, and what has been done there? It was specifically geared towards trafficking issues. Do you have any information on that? What happened? What results did you get out of that?