I would encourage law enforcement to work collaboratively with sex worker advocacy organizations. There are some examples around the country where that's occurring. The primary problem, as I understand it, is that the police enforcement tactics themselves are quite aggressive. There's a lot of targeting of indoor sex work locations, like micro-brothels, spas, and massage parlours. The police will arrange fake dates as a way to get in, knock on the door, and then come in with weapons drawn and doing an aggressive enforcement action. This is simply terrifying for the people who are there, who don't understand that the police may be acting with good intentions. I should add that police often bring CBSA agents with them to these enforcement actions, and people can be detained under immigration provisions and deported as a result. These stories get around to the community very, very quickly. Sex workers have fantastic networks of communication among them. Once they find out that this kind of thing is happening in their community, they think they shouldn't trust their local police department because they're aware that last week they went to so-and-so's place of business and acted in this way.
What I would suggest is that police spend more time simply listening to sex workers and to sex work advocacy organizations about how to improve the way they're actually investigating these offences. Specifically, the police themselves need to take a good look within their own departments to make sure they're acting with integrity. I gave the example of the detective here in Vancouver, Jim Fisher, who did plead guilty to the sexual exploitation of a victim of human trafficking. Stories like that are just horrific to imagine. I'm sure this committee can understand why such a story would erode, perhaps permanently, the trust between individual sex workers and local law enforcement.