Mr. Speaker, there are a lot of barriers to protection, one of which is the lack of awareness. The government needs to ensure that trafficking issues are given a high priority and that the general public is educated on the issue. Unless there is public pressure, government policies will not change among service providers who sometimes do not recognize trafficking and do not understand the context that puts people into a trafficking situation.
The victims themselves need to be educated. Some may have a low literacy rate and therefore have little understanding of what is happening to them. That lack of awareness is a barrier. There is also a lack of information for the victims, the NGOs, the lawyers, the police, the public and especially for the women and children who are sometimes put in detention and criminalized.
We also know there is a lack of services, such as access to health services and insufficient legal aid coverage. As I said earlier, a lot of non-profit organizations do not have sufficient resources to support these folks. The attitude is a problem. A stigmatization sometimes takes place where people are marginalized because of race, culture, lack of language skills and, in part, because of the shame associated with their status.
Many of the victims are fearful and do not trust authority. They are fearful of their traffickers. They do not know or understand the system. Front line workers sometimes are fearful or worried about dealing with trafficked people, which is also a problem.
We also see a lack of national coordination, which is why we need a national policy. We need a centralized place where all the information would go, perhaps a hot-line of some kind. We need focal points and we need advocacy efforts so that all these issues we are talking about are not fragmented.
Lastly, there needs to be partnership of all the people who care and support taking action on this issue. If we do not work as partners we will not be able to deal with this human tragedy.