You have done a bit of a dive with respect to our backgrounds. You'll probably note that I come from an experience of 30 years in lawyering, the last 15 of which I've been a Crown prosecutor. I've taken some great pride in dealing with numerous human trafficking cases involving children and adults and dealing with other child exploitation offences, not so much on prostitution, but there is an intersection between the trafficking component and prostitution under the current legislation.
You spent some time talking about experts in general. I'm going to use these words, and these are my words. Whether you agree with them or not, you're very critical of Mr. Brandt's testimony.
As you know, we have heard from numerous, numerous witnesses, and I can assure you that none of them have been qualified in the traditional sense of being an expert witness. This is not a court of competent jurisdiction. It has not met the legal definition of what an expert should bring to this particular committee, but everyone we have heard from in cases such as yours has brought not only an academic perspective to things but a lived experience.
In Mr. Brandt's case, in his defence—he can speak well on his own behalf—his evidence was helpful to us in the sense that it enabled us to get a full picture of the pros and the cons of this particular legislation.
I know that, ultimately, you see no path forward other than a full repeal of PCEPA, and you also referenced some other aspect to something that's being introduced into the House either today or soon thereafter to offer some protection to workers.
Ultimately, as a committee, we have to decide whether we are going to recommend that the act be given a further chance of seeing its strengths and its weaknesses or to recommend changes, tweaks, amendments or things of that nature.
On that particular point, should this committee ultimately conclude that we are not going to repeal PCEPA, I'd like to get your perspective on what amendments or what sorts of adjustments you think we should be looking at to try to find a nice balance between reducing the overall demand and protecting the exploited.