Evidence of meeting #34 for Justice and Human Rights in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was c-36.
A video is available from Parliament.
Executive Director, Maggie's: The Toronto Sex Workers Action Project
These are things that sex workers need.
Conservative
Bob Dechert Conservative Mississauga—Erindale, ON
Excuse me, Ms. McDonald, if I might. I'm trying to ask you a question. Do you see merit in the continuation of prostitution in Canada. Just answer yes or no.
Executive Director, Maggie's: The Toronto Sex Workers Action Project
No. I can answer how I want to do that, sir.
Actually, yes. When prostitution is between two or more consenting adults, I feel those consenting adults should have the ability to decide for themselves what they want to be doing.
Conservative
Bob Dechert Conservative Mississauga—Erindale, ON
Okay. I take your point.
Minister Swan, I want to thank you for being here. I think it's important you're here. As a provincial attorney general you're one of the individuals that is going to have to make this new legislation work if and when it's passed and becomes law.
You mentioned in your opening statement that you believe that most sex workers are exploited, and you feel that criminalizing the purchase of sex will reduce the exploitation. Did I get that correct?
Minister of Justice and Attorney General, Government of Manitoba
That's right.
Conservative
Bob Dechert Conservative Mississauga—Erindale, ON
My friends in the federal NDP will correct me if I'm wrong, but they seem to be saying—I heard Mr. Scott say this to the CBC earlier today—that they do not believe in the criminalization of the purchase of sex, that they oppose it because they believe it will make the—
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
I have a point of order, Mr. Chair. Sitting right beside me there is a witness who said I didn't say that.
Conservative
Bob Dechert Conservative Mississauga—Erindale, ON
So maybe they do. Perhaps they will clarify. If I got it wrong, I apologize. I believe I heard them say they oppose Bill C-36 because they believe that criminalizing the purchase of sex will make the practice of the sex industry more dangerous.
Do you believe that? Do you agree with that statement?
Minister of Justice and Attorney General, Government of Manitoba
Let me talk a little about our current practice in Manitoba. If you're a buyer of sex and you get picked up by the police and you're charged under the current provisions of the Criminal Code, you have two options. You can follow the criminal option. You can show up in court, in which case you may get a very small fine. You may get an absolute discharge, but you're going to court in front of...well, it's an open court. Or you can go to the john school run by the Salvation Army, where men can learn about the real dynamics of what this is all about and hear not just from the police and just health workers, but also from those with experience in the industry who will tell them what their lives have been like.
We also had a little additional feature whereby if you're a john in Manitoba who gets caught, you get to clean up back lanes in my neighbourhood and see what it's like when condoms and syringes are lying around.
I would like to continue having john school. We may have a wider pool of people taking that program. That is a restorative justice practice. That is a way to educate people, and I hope we never see somebody again in the justice system. We think that if men understand the dynamics of prostitution, the great majority of them will change their attitudes, and I believe we can change behaviour. And that's....
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Mike Wallace
Thank you for those questions and answers.
Now we go to Mr. Scott of the New Democratic Party.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I have a couple of questions for Ms. McDonald and Ms. Gallant from Maggie's. These are prompted by similar questions from Mr. Dechert who doesn't seem to be able to get his mind around the perspective of at least a substantial percentage of current sex workers. You said in your presentation that the users of Maggie's services unanimously reject this bill. You talked about consultations.
I'm wondering if you could elaborate a bit more on that, because I think we are seeing a fair degree of ships passing in the night, people not fully understanding how it could ever be that the sex workers you work with and for would have that point of view.
Executive Director, Maggie's: The Toronto Sex Workers Action Project
Absolutely. As I said, we work with many street-involved sex workers. We have a drop-in centre where people can come in and get some food, and pick up safer sex and safer drug-use supplies.
People were wondering what was going on with this legislation, and we thought a great idea would be to have an education workshop explaining what the legislation is about. We told them we were going to be coming here as witnesses, and we said, “We want to hear from you about what you think. How do you think this will impact you in your everyday life as current street-based sex workers?”
They were very worried. They did not see this as protecting them whatsoever, because, when you're criminalized, it's very difficult to access police services. As Monica said in her testimony, because she was criminalized she felt unable to contact police when she was quite brutally sexually assaulted.
When I'm suggesting decriminalization as an alternative, what I want to say is that I'm looking at prostitution pragmatically. I'm saying that it exists in our world today. It's been in existence for many thousands of years, if not more. It's not going to end immediately, and that's certainly the case we see in Sweden, where this so-called Nordic model comes from.
The approach I take to prostitution is pragmatic, not based on moral kinds of grounds where it's “Oh, icky, I don't like that”. No, this happens, and yes, for some people it sucks. But what are the best ways to reach out to those people to help them?
I was saying what the purpose of the Prostitution Reform Act of New Zealand was. That legislation has a provision for review after three to five years built into it. After five years, a study conducted by the public health department of New Zealand found that on the whole, the PRA had been effective in achieving its purpose. They found that the sex industry had not increased in size, and many of the social evils predicted by some who opposed decriminalization had not actually come to be.
Outreach and Community Support Worker, Maggie's: The Toronto Sex Workers Action Project
Could I just add to that a little bit, too, Craig?
Because we're hearing a lot about this $20 million going into various kinds of john schools and diversion programs, etc., I want to put on the record—just to reiterate the testimony of Monica Forrester, who was raped while she was on a diversion program and could not access police support—that what we're talking about here is a system that still continues to criminalize sex workers. You cannot criminalize the purchase of sex without criminalizing the sale of sex.
We've had a number of comments that advertising would be protected. That's not what we're hearing from the Pivot Legal Society and the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, who have pointed out that the legislation criminalizes any third party that advertises sex worker services. So I fail to see how you can advertise without a third party. So, that's for indoor workers.
But outdoor workers are still telling us, “I could not call the police in this situation. The police will not be a support service to me, as someone who faces...”. We're talking about sex workers like Monica and others who are the most vulnerable. They're telling us that these programs will not protect them from violence and sexual harm and HIV and AIDS and, in fact, they will have the opposite impact.
I would like to say that this bill will cause harm. This bill will lead to beaten, raped, and murdered sex workers, and an increase in HIV and AIDS, and we'll be back when that happens because we will consider this Parliament partially responsible for those outcomes for the sex worker community.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Thank you.
I just wanted to make one last point. I have only 30 seconds, and perhaps Minister Swan could comment.
One of the central things about the Nordic model is, let's call it, the “social democratic policy environment” within which it's situated. Equal life chances are much more emphasized in a country like Sweden, so the supply end is handled more at that stage, and access to services help at the exit end. And I would add—although it's not so clear in Sweden—that if you're looking at New Zealand, you're looking at the middle ground where the safety, health, and labour protections are put in.
I wonder if you could just reiterate for everybody that $20 million is going to come nowhere close to dealing with, let's call it, the “social democratic policy environment” that's needed.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Mike Wallace
Thank you for that.
Our next questioner is Ms. Ambler from the Conservative Party.
Conservative
Stella Ambler Conservative Mississauga South, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you, to all of our witnesses, for being here today. We very much appreciate your time and testimony.
When I told friends, family, and constituents that I was coming here this week to sit on this committee about this new legislation, a couple of people, not very many but a handful, commented, you're not going to change this. You're not going to stop prostitution. It's been around forever. It's oldest or second oldest profession, whatever the saying is.
Conservative
Stella Ambler Conservative Mississauga South, ON
Oh, you're the second. All right, the oldest profession.
I'm heartened by the testimony and the beliefs of organizations and people in this world who work with prostitutes and who believe it is possible to build a world without prostitution. That should be our goal.
I want to ask the women who have lived this, Natasha and Rose, do think this should be the goal of legislation, to eradicate prostitution, and if not fully eradicate, at least substantially reduce, the amount of prostitution in this country?
Representative, Sex Trafficking Survivors United
Yes, certainly. We should aim to end all forms of violence in this country, and prostitution is just another form of violence.
We have child abuse. We have domestic violence. We have all these various forms of violence. We don't just succumb. We don't just accept these forms of violence and find legislation that can help make it easier for them to be less abused. We aim to, and our laws are designed to, end these forms of abuse and reduce these forms of violence.
Do I believe that abuse is ever going to go away? Maybe not, but we don't give up. We don't give up for the people who are being harmed by it.
Conservative
Stella Ambler Conservative Mississauga South, ON
Thank you.
Ms. McDonald, I can see you shaking your head. I have a feeling that it's because you don't see prostitution as abuse. I want to thank you for what you do. I understand that you want to reduce the harm and want to help. I know you consider this pragmatically and look at it in this way, and I appreciate that.
I'd like to ask you, though, in addition to counselling women in the sex trade on how to do it more safely and on how to protect themselves, do you also counsel them to eventually get out? Is that your end goal, as well?