Status of Women Committee on May 15th, 2023

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Madam Chair, I would ask that you let me speak for 30 seconds.

I'd like to clarify the procedures. The vote will take place at around 1:03 p.m. In any event, our meeting is supposed to be over before that. I'm trying to understand what the issue is. We can let the bells ring for 30 minutes and end our meeting.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

We're just continuing with our rounds. We'll deal with it very shortly.

Go ahead, Sonia.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would suggest that we continue through the bells and adjourn when there's 10 minutes left. That is just my point.

Thank you to the witnesses for appearing at this meeting on the human trafficking study.

My first questions will be directed to Ms. Wu.

Ms. Wu, what are some misconceptions about sex work that you think are harmful and that contribute to the problem of human trafficking?

[Angela Wu]

I think the main piece is that sex work is inherently exploitative; it is not. There are people who exploit and people who are exploited. However, the act of sex work is not in itself exploitative. I think that is the underlying misconception in all of our laws and policies in Canada. Our sex work laws.... The PCEPA preamble is based on the premise that sex work is inherently exploitative.

When we consider sex work to be inherently exploitative, it's like what other witnesses have been saying: It infantilizes the people who are doing it and who have chosen to do this work. It makes it seem as if they couldn't have possibly chosen this for themselves, or that they need to be rescued.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you.

My next question is for Ms. Price.

Ms. Price, we know from Stats Canada that nine out of 10 victims of police-reported human trafficking knew their accused trafficker. We've also heard in the committee that traffickers often pose as romantic partners to recruit.

Can you comment on whether you have seen this in Alberta, as well as any recommendation you might have for data collection?

[Kate Price]

We have absolutely seen this in Alberta. It's prevalent in the testimonials of the survivors and clients we have worked with. I certainly wouldn't say it's exclusively so, but it's certainly a higher percentage than you might think.

In regard to data collection.... That's challenging. It requires the survivor to feel safe enough to provide that level of detail to someone collecting data. That is an inherently flawed system—requiring a survivor to share a highly painful testimonial in order for the data collection to be improved. I'm not entirely sure what recommendation to make, other than to further invest in community-based response services that are able to build trust and have a nuanced understanding of the regional and cultural needs of the individuals in question. They may be able to help and assist with data collection.

To Ms. Stone's earlier point, without the ability to have multi-year funding within an organization collecting this data—the inability to afford someone trained in a technical skill set, such as proper data quality and collection—this will continue to be a challenge, even if we consider prioritizing community-based responses to data needs.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you, Ms. Price.

We also heard about your free education program called “First Defense,” which goes over the signs of—or what to look for in detecting—human trafficking. Can you please give us an overview of what these are and how this program works?

[Kate Price]

We have a series of offerings.

What's not uncommon in Alberta and, I suspect, Canada is to have a human-trafficking one-on-one module that tends to be a one-hour “lunch and learn”. That can have pros and cons, because there's so much context to provide. It is very hard to provide a nuanced understanding of trafficking and how it impacts different communities in that hour, but we try. We do an online webinar for that, which is free and accessible for folks.

We also provide tailored training for industries. What we do is work with specific industries in, for example, transportation. We worked with the Edmonton International Airport to curate a multi-level training program that addresses how their team actually works. For example, if they have shift work, we can't do an in-person training session for everyone, so we do online modules in addition to in-person training, which we film. We try to train on identifying the indicators of trafficking—even that sentence is a highly flawed one, because indicators are so much more complicated than that. How do you identify signs of trafficking specifically in your industry? How do you safely respond? Does that mean reaching out to someone within your industry or job? Does it mean reaching out to the Canadian Centre to End Human Trafficking, in order to seek a referral? Does it mean reaching out to a community resource—

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

I'm going to interrupt.

The bells are now ringing. That means we have a vote in half an hour. I would need unanimous consent to carry on. I'm looking at all those in favour of carrying on.

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Okay. We'll finish up at one o'clock today, which will give us time. That's fantastic.

We are done with that round. We're going into two and a half minutes.

Andréanne Larouche, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Ms. Price, again, thank you for answering my initial questions.

I will now turn to Ms. Kim or Ms. Stone, who are joining us virtually.

As we've seen, the witnesses all agree that the federal government absolutely must work with organizations on the ground, police services and the provinces and territories to gather comprehensive data on human trafficking. We've already talked about the fact that the government must work collaboratively. I know that plans are in place, particularly those of the police services in the riding I represent, whether it be the Sûreté du Québec or the Granby police.

Ms. Stone, you work in the Yukon. How do you feel we can ensure that we work more collaboratively? What impact could that have?

Ms. Stone, I will ask you to answer first, and then Ms. Kim can complete your answer.

[Jessica Stone]

Thank you for your question, and I apologize for what I missed there. Unfortunately, the Internet in Yukon is not great, especially at 9:30 in the morning, so I apologize for being off for the last bit of the call.

Hearing what you were saying about all of the unique services, especially in a place like the Yukon, where is a reduced number of resources available given the population size we have here, we really need to be effective in creating a wraparound support service for people who've experienced all types of gender-based violence and for people who do sex work.

In our stance, this does include the police at this time. However, we must be considerate in that we are talking about violence, and we are being explicit when we name violence. We are not conflating sex work and violence, which has historically happened and has caused this tension between sex workers and policing.

That said, given the lack of resources we have in rural, remote and northern communities—and that's not just in Yukon, but that is where my experience lives—I believe we need to have all hands on deck and create this wraparound support service to create these formal and informalized support networks, so that people are able to have multiple options for access to safety.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

You have about five seconds, if you want to say thank you.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you.

Ms. Kim, I will let you reflect on what you'd like to say about this. There may be another round of questions, and you can share your thoughts with us if the opportunity arises.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

I love Andréanne. She and I with the time, I love it.

Leah, you have two and a half minutes.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you so much. My question is for Ms. Kim.

Ms. Kim, you spoke about anti-oppression. Could you share with the committee what an anti-oppression framework would look like for sex work and sex trafficking.

Ms. Kim...?

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

She is not here. She has left.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Okay. Maybe I'll move over to Ms. Stone.

Ms. Stone, you spoke about conflating human trafficking and sex work. That's something I bring up often in committee, that conflating sex work, sex trafficking and, in fact, child sexual exploitation places people in harm. Can you expand on that a bit?

[Jessica Stone]

Yes, definitely.

When we are labelling all types of violence that happens to sex workers as trafficking, we don't have a clear image of what violence sex workers are actually experiencing. Much like how we see this play out in a court setting, when we don't use the accurate language to describe violence, we often minimize and hide the impact of the violence. Therefore, we are unable to address it as it happens.

It needs to be clear. There needs be a clear and shared definition of trafficking, which I don't think we have achieved in this space or across the country. We also need to lean into recognizing individuals as the experts of their own experience and allowing people to use their own terms to define what they've experienced, so that we are able to be person-centred in our approach when responding to the violence and other experiences.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Centring individuals...you spoke about autonomy and agency. We've heard discussion about decriminalization.

Is decriminalization part of that for you, in terms of providing individuals with the autonomy to make decisions about their own bodies?

[Jessica Stone]

Absolutely. Decriminalization is the first step, and it's a very important step.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thanks so much.

We're now going to go into our next round.

Leah and Andréanne know how to really work those two and a half minutes out.

I'm going to pass it over to Michelle Ferreri for five minutes.

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

Thanks so much, Chair.

Thank you, guys, for all being here. It's interesting testimony today.

I have a quick question, if I can, for Ms. Price.

You talked about sensationalizing human trafficking. I'm curious about your thoughts on social media's role with minors, and whether you think there should be implications around young people using social media or being exposed to social media who are highly vulnerable, or kids in general.

[Kate Price]

I want to answer this question, but I want to provide the context that ACT Alberta only serves individuals 18 years and older, so I'm not necessarily the expert on that particular demographic.

I will say the connection between online sexual exploitation and social media is very evident and the risks are absolutely there. However, I suspect that social media's not going anywhere, so it's about focusing on awareness-raising education and training in schools to ensure that youth understand what it means, how far photos can go and how invisible people can be on the other side of that screen.