Status of Women Committee on April 17th, 2023

[Maria Mourani]

I'm not aware of this particular arrangement, but I've heard a lot of evidence from victims who told me about some politicians but who didn't dare inform on them. I encouraged them to do so, but kept hearing the same refrain to the effect that their words wouldn't stand up against against these powerful men because of the lack of evidence.

I'll give you an example. When—

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Sorry; I'll let you finish....

What sorts of accountability measures could be put in place to oversee these men in power, like police officers, lawyers, politicians? It's horrifying. What recommendations do you have for that?

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Hold on, Maria. I will come back. We're going to be starting our next round of questions, so Leah, I'm going to have to throw that onto your second round, if you don't mind.

I'm going to now turn the floor over for our second round of questions, starting off with Michelle Ferreri for five minutes.

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

Thanks, Madam Chair. Thank you to our witnesses. Welcome to the status of women committee.

If I could start with you, Sergeant Chrismas, you said you have 34 years in service. Is that correct?

[S/Sgt Robert Chrismas]

Yes.

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

Thank you for everything that you do, for what you've seen and for continuing to show up. Thank you for that.

I have a question for you on whether you think human trafficking is worse today than it was when you started.

[S/Sgt Robert Chrismas]

That's a difficult question to quantify. As was mentioned, it's so difficult to gather stats and information. It's largely a hidden crime.

I can tell you anecdotally that social conditions seem to be deteriorating in many corners. The challenges facing these populations who largely are victimized in the sex industry seem to be more up against it than in the past. It's really hard to quantify.

I can say without a doubt that in many places in Canada, especially during my experiences in Winnipeg and Manitoba, the transgenerational impacts of colonization are still continuing, if not increasing. I'd like to see more work done in that area, just trying to improve social conditions and help people become more resilient to succumbing to the challenges that they're up against socially and economically.

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

Thank you. I appreciate that, and I hear the compassion in your voice. I had the privilege to do a ride-along with one of my local officers in Peterborough—Kawartha who worked in the human trafficking industry. What I've seen on the ground—and we saw this with Halifax police as well—is that there is a big culture shift to build relationships, as you've said, as opposed to enforcement. I've really seen that shift in policing agencies.

We saw higher numbers of incidents in Halifax, the highest number of human trafficking cases in a Canadian metropolis. It's interesting, because one of the big problems is in getting the data around this. One theory was that because police were progressive, because they were open and had a softer relationship, people were more apt to come and report. I think that's an interesting thing. I don't know how we would quantify that. Again, it's always a challenge.

Ms. Mourani, thank you for your testimony. I know you talked a lot about supply and demand. There is some controversy around that approach. One tool that was being used, which I saw, was LeoList. I don't know if you're familiar with that. Are you familiar with LeoList at all?

[Maria Mourani]

No.

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

No. Okay. Then I'm not even going to go down that path with you.

In terms of the way we approach this, I see it as prevention through education, intervention when it's already happened, and then support. What would be your recommendations on the prevention end of things?

[Maria Mourani]

Thank you very much for that question.

There are all kinds of things that could be done, but that are unfortunately not being done.

I'll take Quebec as an example, because I'm very familiar with what is done there. In Quebec, there is all kinds of prevention, in schools, and through community organizations. However, the focus is generally on what are called at‑risk populations. As soon as a population is considered to be at risk, prevention efforts are made. There is also universal prevention, but on a much smaller scale.

At the moment, most of the recruitment is of people between the ages of 13 and 22 years, on social networks. Exploitation is accelerating, meaning an increase in prostitution, in terms of both recruitment and marketing.

Over 90% of young people, at least in Quebec, use at least one social network. The most popular is YouTube. TikTok and Snapchat are also very popular, as is Instagram. What's missing is prevention on social networks. At Mourani-Criminologie, we're working on a tool that would—

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

Can I ask you a quick question, because I only have 30 seconds left?

Would you recommend legislating that social media age change to 16, or would you recommend that we use the tool we already have, social media, to educate the kids who are already on it and are going to be on it regardless?

[Maria Mourani]

That's a bit of a thorny issue. I don't think that a 15‑year-old should even be on social networks. My son is not on any social networks.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Maria, thank you very much.

We're going to pass it over to Anita Vandenbeld. Anita, you have five minutes.

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thanks to all of you for your very useful testimony.

I want to pick up with something that Sergeant Chrismas said.

You talked about the fact that there is too much emphasis on enforcement and policing and not enough emphasis on prevention.

One thing that struck me as we've been going through this study, and particularly as we travelled last week, is the usefulness of the Criminal Code, which is essentially a dual pole—it is either legal or illegal—versus what we're hearing from survivor-oriented agencies, who are saying that this is a spectrum.

Ms. Mourani talked about the difficulty of enforcement and Ms. Pomerleau talked about the distrust.

I'd like you to comment a little bit about how we, in a society where one of the strongest tools we have—at least federally—is the Criminal Code, make that work in a reality where it is about social conditions, where we need to look at prevention, where coercion versus agency is not something that can be.... There's no clear line where one ends and the other begins.

I wonder if you could give us your thoughts and recommendations about how we move forward in that kind of a context.

I'll start with Sergeant Chrismas.

[S/Sgt Robert Chrismas]

To start with, there's a lot of talk about how to reduce the demand and how we affect that market, because if there's no demand, then there's ultimately no problem, right?

Further research is needed. One thing that government could potentially do is to push for further research into the fine balance between enforcement and education, which might have a bigger effect on the demand.

I know there have been john schools and some findings that they're effective, but it's unclear what level of enforcement, in combination with education, is most effective.

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Madame Pomerleau, would you comment?

[Miriam Pomerleau]

I'd like to talk to you about the inflexibility of the structure. At the moment, it's blatant and can be seen everywhere. It's true of the police. The lack of communication is also obvious.

If the current structure were more flexible and brought people from various walks of life together, instead of just categorizing everything, it would change a lot of things. I'm not sure how we could go about doing that, in view of the Criminal Code, but the fact remains that the current structure is too rigid.

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Ms. Mourani.

[Maria Mourani]

At the moment, there isn't much to be done in terms of the Criminal Code. The emphasis should really be on introducing the resources needed to enforce the Criminal Code, which is not currently being done. If the police were to focus their efforts on sexual services customers, a lot of men would have been taken in for questioning by now. But that's not what the figures show in terms of arrests for procuring sexual services.

Education is where the problem lies. Resources should be spent on educating potential customers. There are no resources for assisting people who go to prostitutes or for their rehabilitation, even though I don't like this term, to ensure that they stop using such services.

Prevention efforts are also required for young people. For example, I once went to a high school to give a workshop on procuring prevention. I was talking about prison sentences to a group of young people, and all they were interested in was knowing how they could get around the system. It just goes to show how empathy for others is something that has to be learned when you're very young. I told them that there could be a maximum sentence of 14 years in prison, and they were surprised. That's what they learned. I then pointed out that there was also a minimum sentence for minors. What they were interested in was how to beat the system.

Why is it like that? Because we're in a society that trivializes prostitution. It's like cancer; it eats you from inside. You could spend millions of dollars on prevention in the schools, but it wouldn't be enough.

I also spoke about prostitution to some 14‑year-old girls in a number of schools. Here again, what they wanted to know was how they could earn some money. They told me that it wasn't really work. That's what they had heard.

What we need is to do is stop trivializing prostitution and change Canada's culture on this, but it's very difficult.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thank you so much, Maria. I can hear that passion. Wow. It's amazing.

Let's go on to Andréanne for two and a half minutes.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chrismas.

Ms. Pomerleau, I'd like to go back to what you said in your report. You mentioned places used for recruitment, like schools. One survivor did indeed talk to me about schools, but also about recruitment at sports clubs. There's a lot of talk at the moment about the importance of changing sports culture. Sports clubs can also become targeted for recruitment.

I'd like to hear what you have to say about that. I'll have a few other minor questions to ask you after that.

[Miriam Pomerleau]

You've been talking about culture, and in doing so have zeroed in on the problem. In sports clubs and schools generally, young people are learning about sex increasingly early. I'm dumbfounded by what Ms. Mourani just said, about how young people were trying to circumvent the law, and how 14‑year-old girls were looking for ways to earn some money through sex. The level of trivialization is unbelievable.

It's equally worrisome to learn that many people allow their children to open TikTok accounts when they are only seven or eight years old.

There's certainly a lot of prevention and education work to be done here.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

It's also high time for an independent study on effecting real culture change in sports.

[Miriam Pomerleau]

I fully agree.