Thank you very much, honourable members and guests. I very much appreciate the opportunity to present from the perspective of a police service. When I speak of police service, I'm talking particularly about the Calgary Police Service.
I want to start by providing a bit of context of what we face. I'll start with a story that relates to a mother who was raising, in her words, a beautiful intelligent daughter, who in elementary school was brilliant. She was a star of elementary school because when you're smart and pretty everybody loves you. Then, as she got into junior high school, being smart wasn't as cool, and by the time she hit high school she was beautiful but being smart got you no points.
In late high school, she went to a party—and this did not happen in Calgary but it ended in Calgary—and somebody offered her a joint. It's harmless, right? You hear about it all the time. She didn't know it was laced with crystal meth. She became addicted to crystal meth. She wound up working for an organized outlaw motorcycle gang in a downtown west coast city, where she was abused and working the streets and addicted. If you would have asked her, she would have said that she chose this life. It's what she wants.
Now, the mother tried to get assistance from other agencies, and she was told that when she hits rock bottom, she will come home; don't worry about it.
I would ask any parent in this room if you'd be prepared to accept that and let her continue to do that until she hits rock bottom. The sad part about this story from this perspective, from the starting point, is being the police service of jurisdiction where that mom, that family, comes to you and says they need help. “We need to extract our daughter from this. We know she's addicted. She knows she's being manipulated. She comes from a good family.” The police service of jurisdiction and the agencies involved in that area say you just have to wait until she hits rock bottom. Well, I come from a jurisdiction where I don't believe you have to succumb to that and wait for that.
The mother and some of her friends had to take extraordinary measures to remove her from the situation and deliver her to a place in Calgary where they have addictions treatment. I'll finish the story at the end of my presentation here.
The Calgary Police Service believes that Canada's public policy should be the complete abolition of prostitution, and passing Bill C-36 is required in order for us to reach this goal. It is our firm position that the purchasing of sexual services from an adult should be a criminal offence for the following reasons.
Research shows that many prostitutes were the victims of exploitation as children and youth, are currently the victims of exploitation, or are otherwise vulnerable to exploitation because of drug dependency, FASD, emotional problems or mental illness, or economic disadvantage. Prostitution, therefore, is not simply the delivery of sexual services for money or other consideration, but it is instead sexual exploitation.
There's a need to discourage sex tourism. We need to reduce the number of prostitutes and associated harms, reduce the demand for the sale of sexual services, detect and eliminate the human trafficking of persons, reduce the risk of violence and homicides, and address the overrepresentation of aboriginal women and children in prostitution. We need to eliminate the commodification of persons for sex, reduce and eliminate negative community impacts, reduce gender bias in our society, which is really important, and discourage that it's acceptable or normal to solicit the service of a prostitute.
Research and our working knowledge of the sex trade tells us that regardless of what regime, model, or laws are implemented, those who sell sex are exposed to violence, exploitation, degradation, and unpreventable harm. Sex trade workers are overrepresented by aboriginal people and youth, the mentally ill, and those suffering from addictions. The only safeguard for those trapped in the sex trade is removal and support.
We acknowledge that all efforts must be taken to not further victimize those trapped in the sex trade through criminal charges. Instead, apprehension powers should be used to remove sex trade workers from oppressive situations and connect them to counselling and support services. Canada should develop a national strategy to first reduce and ultimately eliminate prostitution.
Support services should aim to improve the lives of sex trade workers through initiatives that focus on prevention, education, intervention, and exit. To aid in the aim of this national strategy, law enforcement requires legislative authority to interdict and intervene in attempts to reduce the inherent harms associated with the sex trade, and to address the resultant community harm.
The legal regime in Canada should not discourage any prostitute who has been the victim of human trafficking, assault, sexual assault, robbery or other offences to be able to come forward and report the offence to police, or otherwise seek assistance, intervention, protection, or exit. In fact, in a report commissioned by the Home Office in the U.K. called “Shifting Sands: A Comparison of Prostitution Regimes Across Nine Countries”, the authors note, and I quote here:
We also found little strong evidence that different prostitution regimes affect willingness to report assaults. It seems more likely that enhanced reporting is the outcome of local climates of trust built between women who sell sex and state agencies/individuals/services.
I would also like to address the issue of community impact. Communities are negatively impacted by prostitution. These harms include a reduced perception of safety within communities; an increased perception of social disorder; public nuisances such as condoms and needles in public parks, parking lots, and sidewalks; increased noise and vehicle traffic; public sex; the unwanted sexual proposition of citizens; and public health concerns. Criminal law prohibitions will continue to be needed to control and reduce these harms. This is the experience of almost 40 years in policing, where we are, unfortunately, the ones who have to deal with the issue of strolls when they're in places that are frequented by the public.
Economically benefiting from prostitution, other than for those reasons mentioned in Bill C-36, should be a criminal offence. In order to meet the concerns expressed by the Supreme Court and others respecting the need to eliminate or reduce the exploitation of persons and to enhance the safety of prostitutes, Canada should work with provinces, municipalities, and social agencies to develop a national strategy to reduce and abolish prostitution and improve the lives of those affected through initiatives that focus on prevention, education, intervention, and exit.
Here I have to say that the $20 million, over five years, is woefully inadequate. If you were to bring that down to a provincial level, Alberta has roughly 10% of the population, or a little more, in Canada. This would mean that for a province like Alberta that would be $40,000 a year for the five years. If you divide that into Edmonton in the north and Calgary in the south, and the other jurisdictions, a place like Calgary, with a population of 1.25 million people, would be dealing with the social aspect of it with the addition of about $125,000 a year. It's woefully inadequate. If there's a commitment to deal with this in an effective way, then I think we have to look at the exit strategies and adequately resource them.
I want to say that over 40 years of policing for a number of years there was nothing I enjoyed better—-as I still do today—than walking into schools and talking to kids. In those 40 years I've never had a young kid come up to me and say, when I grow up I want to be a drug addict, a criminal, or a hooker. It never happens.
I want to also talk a little bit about human trafficking, and the fact that it's a $3-billion-a-year industry worldwide. Let us not pretend or ignore the fact that if Canada changes its course in this regard we will be a place where this becomes more and more prevalent. We can all beat our chests and wail about what happened in Nigeria with the kidnapping of almost 300 young school girls, but the reality is those girls are going to wind up sexually trafficked and could very well come to this country, like they go to other countries. We've visited Scandinavian countries to study the Nordic model. East European girls and those from Africa are disproportionately represented.
There are two other points I want to make. There's been the belief that somehow you can pick out serial killers. I can tell you from 40 years of policing and studying jurisdictions across North America where killers have done their thing, people like Jeffrey Dahmer or the Green River killer in Washington, you can't pick out a serial killer. You can't interview him and say, “That person is a serial killer”. They come across, they present like you or me until they get captured.
I just want to conclude with the story that I started with. This young girl was brought back to Calgary. She was put into a program for addictions, and it was a battle, but this woman today is a second-year medical school student. She is in medical school, second year. Yet had her parents not taken steps that technically they shouldn't have had to take, this young girl would be a woman on the streets and if interviewed today, she would say, “Of course, it's my choice. Of course, I'm here because I selected it.”
I'm not saying that in each and every case there aren't those who voluntarily choose it without being abused or having backgrounds of abuse. I'm not saying that, but our experience is that the vast majority of them have. All we're asking for is the legal authority to intervene in a way that allows us to target organized crime and johns, while using the law as an opportunity to extract and provide services for those who are the victims of prostitution, the service providers.
Thank you very much.