Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Legal and Constitutional Affairs
Issue 15 - Evidence - September 11, 2014
OTTAWA, Thursday, September 11, 2014
The Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs met this day at 9:34 a.m. to examine the subject matter of Bill C-36, An Act to amend the Criminal Code in response to the Supreme Court of Canada decision in Attorney General of Canada v. Bedford and to make consequential amendments to other Acts.
Senator Bob Runciman (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Good morning and welcome, colleagues, invited guests and members of the general public who are following today's proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs.
We are continuing our pre-study on Bill C-36, An Act to amend the Criminal Code in response to the Supreme Court of Canada decision in Attorney General of Canada v. Bedford and to make consequential amendments to other Acts.
In 2007, a group of sex workers launched a court challenge to the constitutionality of three provisions in the Criminal Code relating to prostitution. The Supreme Court of Canada invalidated these three provisions in December 2013 and gave Parliament one year to respond. Bill C-36 was introduced in the House of Commons in June 2014 in response to the court's decision. This is our committee's third meeting on this subject.
Members, please welcome our first panel of witnesses: Vancouver Rape Relief and Women's Shelter, representative Keira Smith-Tague, Front Line Anti-Violence Worker; and from the Canadian Association of Sexual Assault Centres, Lisa Steacy, representative of the organization, and Michèle Léveillé, a member from Gatineau; and the final witness is Chris Bruckert, Professor, Department of Criminology, University of Ottawa. Thank you all for being here.
I believe, Ms. Smith-Tague, you have the honour of having the opening statement. Please proceed.
Keira Smith-Tague, Front Line Anti-Violence Worker, Vancouver Rape Relief and Women's Shelter: Good morning. My name is Keira Smith-Tague and I'm a front-line anti-violence worker at Vancouver Rape Relief and Women's Shelter.
Vancouver Rape Relief is Canada's oldest rape crisis centre. Founded in 1973, Rape Relief runs a 24-hour rape crisis line and a transition house for battered women and their children fleeing violent men.
Rape Relief is a collective of women of varying age and class, many of them women of colour and Aboriginal women. Our collective, both historically and presently, includes women who have exited the sex industry.
Our 40 years of front-line work informs our understanding of prostitution as a form of male violence against women, alongside wife battery, incest, sexual harassment and rape. Our analysis of the similarities between these various attacks is not an abstract theory. It is derived from and rooted in our front-line work: the work of answering call after call from women who have been beaten, raped, prostituted, incested and sexually harassed. There are only so many calls you can take until you can no longer ignore the fact that the biggest risks to women's safety and security is men's violence.
As a collective of women fighting to end this crisis and achieve women's equality, we have the privilege and the responsibility of working with each other and our callers to resist and fight against that violence from both the individual men but also from the systemic oppression we experience as women living in a male-dominated world.
The sex industry relies on women's subordination in order to flourish. This is obvious in the gendered nature of it. The majority of those sold in prostitution are women and girls, and almost all buyers, sellers and traffickers are men. This is not a coincidence. We live in a society where men have more power than women socially, politically and economically. This is why we are in support of Bill C-36, which recognizes the stark power imbalance between the sexes and how those implications are lived out in women's lives.
We know the demand by men in Canada for paid sex increases sex trafficking both domestically and internationally. The racist demand that fetishizes women of colour and Aboriginal women fuels and guides where a supply of women is needed across the country. From where we are in Vancouver, some of the most obvious examples are Asian women filling the massage parlours and the overrepresentation of Aboriginal women and girls in street-level prostitution, specifically on the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver.
We think that by criminalizing pimps, johns and traffickers, it sends a clear message that women's lives are worth more than men's rights to access and control us.
We are also in support of the recognition of the power and profit of advertisers in the industry and agree that they should be criminalized for their exploitative behaviour as well.
The debate that this is about protecting the sex trade as an empowering and lucrative job choice is an individualistic argument that privileges a few women's experiences over the collective well-being of women. We know from the majority of women we work with in prostitution that they entered as children and teenagers and overwhelmingly had experienced childhood sexual abuse before entering. They tell us that they were poor, desperate to survive, feed their kids, pay their rent and, more often than not, were forced or pressured from a boyfriend or husband to sell themselves.
We reject that a model of legalization or full decriminalization of the sex industry will ensure women's safety and equality. We also reject that the responsibility to screen men for potential violence be put on women. It privatizes our safety and security and reduces it to a woman's ability to detect if a man may or may not be violent, which we know is impossible to tell.
In Vancouver, Robert Pickton was not only a known john to police and never held accountable for a long time while he committed these crimes, but he was also a screened john. Women had screened him and went out to parties on his farm, what was called Piggy's Palace, of course not knowing he was a serial killer. The notion that more time to screen men and an indoor venue is what will make prostitution safe has clearly failed women because both of these things have not prevented women's deaths.
We know that being inside a brothel is not safer, and we reject that we must accept the notion that men will be given social permission to their entitlement to demand that it is their right to buy women.
Based on the lives of women in often the most dire and impoverished circumstances, those forced to prostitute in public space, we are continuing to reject their criminalization in any location. The Justice Committee amended section 213 of the act to a more narrow definition, naming areas near school, playgrounds and daycare centres. Even with this amendment, we are still calling for the full removal of this provision in order to eliminate the potential criminalization of any prostituted woman.
I want to address some points that have been presented by some opponents of the bill over the course of these hearings. There was a suggestion that the Vancouver Police Department has been executing the Nordic model in Vancouver for some time, and as a resident and crisis worker in Vancouver, I can assure you that that is not true. There has been little to no enforcement of laws against johns or pimps, and we see this firsthand as advocates who have to press the police to even take a woman's statement, let alone do a full investigation. I can expand on our experiences later on if there are questions.
In terms of the initiative of $20 million to be spent on helping women exit prostitution, we do think that federal money and political will is necessary, but we don't think that this amount is nearly sufficient enough in order to make real change. We think it's very important to address the conditions that get women into prostitution in the first place and provide a social safety net that doesn't force prostitution to be that social safety net. We need a guaranteed livable income; safe, adequate housing options; affordable childcare; and women-only detox and treatment centres.
We do think that Bill C-36 has the potential to set a precedent in Canada that the buying and selling of women and girls by men will not be tolerated, and for this we are hopeful the government will listen and follow the leads of women's groups and survivors.
Vancouver Rape Relief and Women's Shelter stands firm in calling for legislation to criminalize pimps, johns and profiteers for their violence against women, but we absolutely cannot endorse any criminalization of women in prostitution, and for this we call on the full removal of this provision in the bill.
Thanks.
Lisa Steacy, Representative, Canadian Association of Sexual Assault Centres: Good morning. I would like to begin by acknowledging that we are gathered here today on the traditional territory of the Algonquin and Anishnaabe peoples. My name is Lisa Steacy, and I would like to thank the committee for inviting Michèle and myself to present here today on behalf of the Canadian Association of Sexual Assault Centres, which I will shorten to CASAC.
Founded in 1975, CASAC member centres continue to provide crisis support and intervention to women across the country. As women and as front-line workers, we witness every day and confront every day the rampant danger and routine violation of men's violence. The evidence accrued by listening to and working alongside the women who call our confidential phone lines and join our groups is the basis for all of our public positions on male violence against women, including prostitution.
In 2001, our members insisted on and passed a resolution that prostitution is a form of male violence against women. In 2005 we further articulated our analysis that prostitution is a practice that capitalizes on and compounds the intolerable inequalities of sexism, racism and poverty.
We know that criminal law alone cannot and will not eradicate the desperate inequality that prostitution, like all forms of violence against women, exploits and entrenches. However, for decades, women and women's groups, including CASAC, have insisted that criminal law protect our right to equality by preventing and sanctioning the sexist violence that is perpetrated against us.
Since 2001, we have advocated for a model of criminal law that completely decriminalizes women in prostitution. We are asking for an amendment to Bill C-36 that would remove section 213 entirely. The amendment that simply lists specific locations is not consistent with an analysis of prostitution as violence against women, nor does it adequately respond to the nearly unanimous demand by witnesses for the removal of this provision.
The definition of consent in section 273.1 of the Criminal Code that follows the sexual assault offences, a definition that is a hard-won legacy of the anti-rape movement, provides a useful framework to counter the argument that prostitution is a consensual sexual act. This section defines consent as voluntary agreement to engage in the sexual activity in question, and the brutal forces of poverty, violence and racism that coerce so many women into prostitution effectively negate consent. We are encouraged that Parliament has acknowledged that criminal law can and should serve to condemn and curtail the continued prostitution of women and girls in Canada.
Bill C-36 precisely targets the men who demand sexual access to the bodies of women and girls, who coerce them into prostitution, who prey on their economic and social vulnerability to recruit them into the sex industry and who benefit economically from them remaining in prostitution.
CASAC knows that the criminal justice system, at all levels, too often fails to respond to and investigate women's reports of men's violence and, therefore, too often fails to hold violent men accountable. However, we must not compound this by failing to criminalize the violent behaviour of men who buy sex.
Thank you.
[Translation]
Michèle Léveillé, member, Gatineau, Canadian Association of Sexual Assault Centres: Good morning. As a member of the Regroupement québécois des centres contre les agressions à caractère sexuel (CALACS), and a member of the ACCCACS, our organization obviously agrees with my colleague's comments. Bill C-36 is a promising start, but the legislation alone is not enough to reach its own objective. The government must show real commitment by implementing social measures to address factors that lead women to prostitution, such as poverty, sexism and racism.
Moreover, the $20-million investment proposed for groups involved in prevention and those involved in the process for leaving the sex industry is clearly insufficient. Getting out of prostitution is a long process fraught with difficulties. Decriminalizing all prostitutes would mean one less obstacle. We also believe that expunging criminal records related to prostitution would really facilitate their journey.
Canada and the U.S. share the longest border in the world. Full decriminalization of prostitution would lead to an increase in the demand, a dramatic growth of the legal sex industry — and the black market industry would literally explode — not to mention an increase in child prostitution and sex tourism. Canada would become a haven for human traffickers.
On the other hand, Bill C-36 will deter traffickers, since it will make things more difficult for them. This situation calls for significant changes in attitude, so that no one would feel that buying or selling other people's bodies was an option. We ask for compliance with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, whereby everyone is entitled to security, and men and women are equal. It is of the utmost importance that the government participate in extensive education campaigns on the harms and consequences of prostitution as a form of oppression specifically targeted at women.
Ladies and gentlemen, today, I want you to ask yourselves the following question: "What kind of a society do I want to live in and see my children and grandchildren grow up in?" A society that trivializes the sexual exploitation of women or a society where gender equality would be prevalent and where purchasing women's bodies would become unimaginable? Thank you.
[English]
Chris Bruckert, Professor, Department of Criminology, University of Ottawa, as an individual: Thank you for this opportunity. I am a professor of criminology at the University of Ottawa, teaching in research methodology and violence against women. I have spent the last 20 years examining various aspects of the sex industry and have conducted hundreds of interviews with street-based, in-call and out-call sex workers.
As a researcher, I believe policy and laws should be evidence based. I thought, therefore, it was important to start with some comments about being discerning consumers of information, be it coming from research or from front-line service providers. Sex work is criminalized and stigmatized and no one can ever have a totally representative sample. So any claim to speak for, or about, most or the vast majority of sex workers is, by definition, spurious.
Moreover, samples drawn from organizations that provide services to women in distress are quite obviously speaking only to a specific subpopulation. These are important voices, but they cannot be generalized to sex workers as a whole, many of whom would never seek out this kind of service. To use an analogy that Professor John Lowman uses, it would be like extrapolating the experience of all women in intimate relationships from a sample of those in battered women shelters.
What we know when we look at the complete body of credible evidence is that 80 to 95 per cent of sex work is off street and that sex workers are an extremely diverse population with a wide range of experiences and labour practices.
To restate a point made by other witnesses, regardless of why an individual is doing sex work, the provisions of Bill C-36 will not protect them. It will do the opposite. I refer you to my submission that details what the empirical evidence tells us Bill C-36 will mean for sex workers' safety and security. It is on the basis of those harms that I echo the calls of others requesting that this bill be, at a minimum, referred to the Supreme Court for a ruling on constitutional validity.
I want to focus my remaining few minutes on the assertion that sex work is inherently violent. It's a foundational assumption of this legislation. Remove the inherently violent rationalization, and we are left with little more than legal moralism.
We can certainly all agree that there are intolerable levels of violence in the sex industry. Indeed, that is the reason why three very courageous sex workers took this issue to the courts in the first place. What does it mean, however, to say that sex work is inherently violent? It means violence is inevitable, constant and intrinsic. It also means that nothing can be done about it. I want to challenge these two suppositions.
The ruling by the Supreme Court of Canada that "the violence of a john does not diminish the role of the state in making a prostitute more vulnerable to that violence" speaks to the potential for laws to exacerbate risks. Moreover, while it may not be possible to eliminate the risks sex workers face — just like it is not possible to eliminate the risks nurses, personal care workers and convenience store clerks face — we need only compare the rates of violence, including the rates of fatal violence, between the street level, which accounts for 5 to 20 per cent of the sex industry, and indoor sex work, where most sex work happens, to realize that context, labour and legal context, matter.
What about the idea that nothing can be done to minimize the violence? Replace the word "prostitution" with any other occupation — construction, logging, cab driver — and the statement becomes unthinkable. The response to danger at work should be, and usually is, to implement safety and security mechanisms. This is the approach New Zealand took in 2003, and sex workers are safer as a result. They are better positioned to negotiate services and safer sex practices with clients and have much improved relations with police. Indoor workers can, unlike their Canadian counterparts, avail themselves to occupational health and safety laws and other protections.
It is worth noting that the argument that women should not be permitted to engage in sex work for fear of precipitating their own victimization draws on the same victim blaming trope as the rape myth that "women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be raped." It also entrenches the disconcerting stigmatic assumption about sex workers that I have heard bandied about in these hearings: Sex workers must be drug addicted, mentally ill or psychologically damaged to keep making these bad choices, clearly incompetent subjects in need of rescue, not rights. In real terms, this perpetuates social and civic exclusion by ensuring sex workers who choose not to exit the industry will continue to face judgment from social service providers, health care workers and law enforcement.
Let's be clear: This law will not eliminate or even significantly diminish the sex industry, but it is attempting to protect sex workers by increasing the challenges in order to force them to make what others deem to be the right choice. Shockingly, it is doing so in a vacuum. It does not even attempt to address the deep-seated inequalities of gender, race and class that constrain women's personal and professional choices. Instead, Bill C-36 imposes a moral script, perpetuates victim blaming and pledges $20 million to provide services to "those who want to leave this dangerous and harmful activity." Support is contingent on workers recognizing their need for rehabilitation.
As a criminologist, I'm deeply concerned about the impact of the law. As a feminist, I am appalled. Since the 1980s, we have rallied for women's right to choose what they do with their bodies — think abortion — even when those choices are not what we personally would do. We defend and respect a woman's ability to make decisions for herself, recognizing that those choices are very often made in less than ideal circumstances. I am deeply saddened that in 2014 Canada is going in the opposite direction, drawing on paternalistic rhetoric to justify criminalizing consensual sexual activity between adults.
The Chair: Thank you all for your opening statements. We'll now move to questions.
Senator Baker: Thank you, Mr. Chair, and welcome to our presenters here today. Thank you for the excellent presentations you have given to us for consideration.
I have two questions. I have one for the professor, but I have another general question for the other presenters.
Ms. Smith-Tague referenced section 213 and was very adamant that the section of this bill that criminalizes prostitutes be removed from the legislation, but I don't recall any reference by the other two presenters on this subject. Ms. Smith-Tague's words were "practically all" presenters were opposed to this section of the bill. I think your words were "practically all"?
Ms. Smith-Tague: I did ask for the removal, but it was actually Lisa who said almost unanimously.
Senator Baker: So you did. Let us be perfectly clear — I'm a bit older than you are — that you want this removed from the bill.
Ms. Steacy: Yes.
Senator Baker: That's clear.
Ms. Steacy: Yes.
Senator Baker: No doubt about it.
Ms. Steacy: No.
Senator Baker: Although you approve of the bill, you want this section removed because it criminalizes. The very thing the minister and the department said they didn't want to do, this does, doesn't it?
Ms. Smith-Tague: We think that by criminalizing women in certain locations, it actually undermines the intent of the bill, which was to protect exploited persons. So we do think that it undermines that intent.
Senator Baker: The intent of the bill, you believe, is not to criminalize the prostitutes themselves. However, I might say that the minister, although he did make that statement before the House of Commons committee, when he came before the Senate committee he was very adamant. He said that the act of prostitution is illegal and unlawful for the first time in Canadian history because of this bill. So the intent of the legislation, if you took the evidence of the officials before this committee, is to outlaw the act of prostitution, and the act of prostitution is defined, of course, as a two-way street.
Professor, you've suggested, as others have suggested, that this matter should be referred to the Supreme Court of Canada to look at as a reference, to look at its constitutionality. We've had a couple of lawyers who appeared before this committee who said, no, they don't agree with that because you need a body of evidence; you have to have an evidentiary foundation in order to adjudicate a reference.
I suppose, professor, your point is that we already have the evidence that was presented in Bedford, and they've adjudicated on all of these matters, and you believe that now a reference to the Supreme Court of Canada on this bill's constitutionality would be a good move. Is that correct?
Ms. Bruckert: Yes, because I think it's quite readily demonstrable that this bill reproduces very many of the conditions that were at the heart of the Bedford decision. Under those situations, I do believe that they could look at the evidence already submitted, as well as evidence that has emerged since then, including the research done by Pivot and the B.C. centre for excellence on the experience in Vancouver, when police did criminalize clients, went on sweeps of clients. So I do think that there is evidence they can look at.
I think it's really very distressing that we would have to wait five years and suffer the consequences of this bill, which I firmly believe will be horrific. Sex workers are going to pay a heavy price for this bill, and I think that's just too expensive of a price to pay not to check.
Senator Batters: Thank you very much all of you for being here today and the work you do every day on behalf of women and vulnerable women.
Ms. Smith-Tague, so many points you made in your presentation this morning were very good, and the fact that you're a front-line worker, the arguments in here are excellent. Thank you for bringing them to our attention today.
I wanted to give you an opportunity. You said in here, "There was a suggestion that the Vancouver Police Department has been executing the Nordic model in Vancouver for some time" — we heard that yesterday, I think — "and as a resident and crisis worker in Vancouver, I can assure you this is not true. There has been little to no enforcement of laws against johns or pimps. We see this firsthand as advocates who have to press the police to even take a woman's statement, let alone do a full investigation. I can expand on our experiences later on if there are questions." I'm asking if you could expand on that, because we heard contrary evidence.
Ms. Smith-Tague: For a long time, it was only women being criminalized, for many years, and in the past few years it has been pretty much hands-off for everyone. There has been no criminalization. As a woman who answers the crisis calls every day from prostituted women, you can't even get police to respond and actually take them seriously and get a charge or a conviction. That's across the board for all violence against women. There are very low conviction rates, and I think it's especially true for prostitution.
Senator Batters: I noted when Ms. Bruckert was speaking earlier, she made the comment:
It is worth noting that the argument that women should not be permitted to engage in sex work for fear of precipitating their own victimization draws on the same victim blaming trope as the rape myth that "women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized."
You had a substantial reaction to that. Would you like to respond to that comment?
Ms. Smith-Tague: I didn't realize I did. I apologize for that.
Senator Batters: That's okay; it's honest.
Ms. Smith-Tague: What was troubling about it is that this is not about demonizing women's choices; this is about calling out men's behaviour and calling out men's role in buying and selling women and checking their privilege on the backs of women. It's not at all about women's choices or blaming those women who are in prostitution. In fact, it's the opposite; I would blame the men.
Senator Batters: Absolutely. We heard that from a lot of witnesses yesterday. Professor Benedet, who is a substantial legal authority on this type of subject matter in Canada, testified yesterday and had a great quote when she testified before the House of Commons Justice Committee when she said:
I think there is something ironic about the argument that men must be allowed as a constitutional right unrestricted opportunity to buy women to keep women safe from those very same men.
I think that's exactly what you're getting at with your comment there.
We heard more arguments of why that one particular small provision, which has been substantially limited, why people think it should be removed entirely. I wanted to draw to the attention of those here that I was the justice minister's chief of staff in Saskatchewan for four and a half years so I had a unique vantage point into the criminal justice system in Saskatchewan. Of course, prosecutors and police have substantial discretion as far as charging authority whether or not to lay those charges, and there is also significant discretion by judges to be able to sentence appropriately and not to have sentences that don't reflect the appropriate disposition of an action. I wanted to draw that to people's attention.
[Cellphone ringing.]
Sorry for the interruption.
Senator Joyal: We have the same rules as in the Senate chamber, where it is totally forbidden to have an electronic device that might disturb the questioning or answering for a witness. I would suggest, Mr. Chair, that you apply the same rules here.
The Chair: Thank you for raising that, and I remind all members those rules do apply in this committee, and we would ask you to follow them in the future.
Sorry to interrupt the questions and answers.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: If I may, Mr. Chair, a number of people here have their electronic devices set on silent mode, and I just want to say that my device was not on silent mode. My apologies, Mr. Chair. I will fix that.
[English]
Senator Batters: I can certainly attest to the fact that my always-neighbour, Senator Dagenais, that's the first time that has ever happened; so I apologize for that today.
I was stating that I was the justice minister's chief of staff in Saskatchewan for four and a half years, and what I noticed from that unique vantage point is that there is significant discretion, both for prosecutors and police, in determining whether to lay charges in any sort of situation. There is also significant discretion given to judges in sentencing. I wanted to draw that to the attention of those here.
Ms. Smith-Tague: What I worry about with that is that already police have discretion and they use it often to not hold men accountable and to charge women instead. We see it with women who are battered; they often charge the woman and not the battering husband. I don't exactly trust their discretion right now.
If there is a law there, I would be worried that they would enforce it.
Senator Batters: Hopefully the difference with all of this is we are seeing a real paradigm shift with Bill C-36, as a law, to say that prostitution is not just mischief or nuisance. This is violence against women; it's sexual exploitation of women, and it is not acceptable. We're hopeful that that very strong message sent by the government to prosecutors, police, and judges, everyone across the country — men, women, everybody — will permeate throughout the justice system.
Ms. Smith-Tague: That's a good point to make. The paradigm shift does make a difference, and hopefully to eliminate that it's mischief or nuisance at all would be our goal.
Senator Batters: Absolutely. And having competent people come and testify before our committee and talk about all these real-life stories helps to cement that in everyone's minds as well.
Senator Jaffer: Thank you to all of you for being here. I have found all your presentations very convincing and a lot to think about.
Before I came here, I had worked with Vancouver Rape Relief and sexual assault centres, so I very much appreciate the work you do; you really work in very difficult situations.
My question to you, Ms. Smith-Tague, is that I also come from Vancouver and work with racialized and Aboriginal women, and I think one of the challenges is who is listened to. The reason that Pickton went on for so long is which women were being abused. I find that when racialized women make complaints, often there is no model; it is hard to get their stories heard. That has been my experience as recently as last weekend.
I may be wrong, because I'm not a front-line worker, but I find there is a Nordic model for some women and no model for some women, and that's the big challenge. We feel all women are equal. You especially know that that's not the case, because when you do the work it is who is being heard that is the big challenge.
You said it's not just about criminal law, but police have to be better trained. We have to have prosecutor teams that just deal with this issue. We have to have judges better trained and workers like you better resourced if we are going to deal with this. This bill will not change much without putting many resources in place. Would you agree with that?
Ms. Smith-Tague: I do agree that the criminal justice system would need a significant overhaul in order to actually respond to violence against women adequately at all levels of the criminal justice system. But I do think that this bill actually does send a clear message to society about the way men should behave and the way men treat women in all facets of society. Just because some women choose prostitution doesn't mean that all those women who don't should have to suffer.
Senator Jaffer: I can't think of a polite way of saying this but I will try and find a way. The challenge I have with this bill is it goes halfway. It's non-criminalization of women yet criminalization of women in a public place. In the house committee they tried to amend that, but still there are daycares and playgrounds everywhere and the women you work with will be around those areas. If there are not going to be any charges against women, section 213 cannot exist. That's my opinion. I'm opposing this because I feel it's halfway and the women you work with and I work with will still be caught under this bill.
Ms. Smith-Tague: Obviously I agree that section 213 should be removed entirely. The majority here is Conservative, and you've heard almost unanimously that we're calling for the removal of this across the board from all witnesses, and I think there is some responsibility to act on that. However, I think the alternative to not having the bill at all, with full decriminalization, would be far more dangerous for women so I still support it.
Senator Jaffer: Did you want to add anything?
Ms. Steacy: I appreciate you articulating your concern that if there's any provision that remains in the bill that would allow the criminalization of women to continue it would replicate the systemic flaws and inequalities of how justice is delivered. I do think that Aboriginal women in Vancouver on the streets of the Downtown Eastside would be much more likely to be charged. Acknowledging the inequality inherent to prostitution and then providing one provision that lets you criminalize women who are the most unequal of all unequal women is a mistake. I agree with Ms. Smith-Tague that there is a responsibility to hear that concern.
Senator Jaffer: Professor, it's my understanding that this bill is supposed to be answering what the Supreme Court said in Bedford. Perhaps I don't have as much knowledge as you have on these issues, but I read Bedford again last night and I read the bill again and for me it's not answering Bedford. Bedford talked about the state. Yes, the johns are violent. I always say it's a mantra for me in the Bedford decision that yes, the johns are violent against women, but the state has a responsibility not to make women more vulnerable.
The Chair: Can you move to the question, senator?
Senator Jaffer: So my question is: Is this bill answering what Bedford asked?
Ms. Bruckert: Absolutely not. It's not going to make sex workers safer. It's going to reproduce exactly the same situations and will be worse for the most marginalized street-based sex workers. Sex workers will go to where clients are, so if a client is trying to avoid criminalization, it doesn't matter if it's a sex worker or the client trying to avoid criminalization; it sets up exactly the same situation. We're back to dark alleys, isolated corners, no communication and quick hopping into the car without negotiating services. All the things that create the conditions that Bedford was about are going to be reproduced. It really doesn't matter which side of the equation you criminalize, this is what's going to happen.
The idea that street-based sex workers will simply abandon the street because of criminalizing clients isn't true. What they found in the Pivot report was specifically that sex workers ended up working longer, so they were actually at higher risk.
Senator McIntyre: Thank you all for your presentations.
I note that over the years the subject of prostitution has been analyzed by a number of committees at the federal level and by a federal-provincial-territorial working group. To name a few, there was the Fraser committee 1983 to 1985; Standing Committee on Justice and the Solicitor General, 1990; Federal-Provincial-Territorial Working Group, 1992 to 1998; House of Commons subcommittee, 2003 to 2006; and the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, 2006 to 2007. Over the years, the committee has heard from researchers, police officers, policy experts, private citizens and persons involved in prostitution all over the country.
As a result, numerous studies have been published, resulting in several amendments having been made on juvenile prostitution. However, I note no substantial changes have been made to the existing regime governing adult prostitution, street prostitution or out-calls. This may be the result of continuing differences of opinion concerning how best to approach this issue.
What's interesting to note, however, is that the various committees and working groups that have considered the matter had been unable to come to any agreement on how to go about framing this activity. However, the working groups were able to agree on one thing: that programs be developed to fund agencies to help those involved in prostitution to exit prostitution. On top of that, the working groups also recommended that the governments of the day review their social programs, housing, crisis intervention and counselling services to ensure that they effectively meet the needs of persons engaged in prostitution.
As a group, I'd like to have your thoughts on this. Tell me how difficult it is to go about framing this activity, because in reading the material that's what I found out. There's no quick answer. Bill C-36 may not be perfect and may have flaws, but at least it's filling a void created by the Bedford decision.
Ms. Smith-Tague: A major barrier will be trying to solve the social safety net we have now, which is almost completely gone. We have unlivable welfare rates, so women who are in prostitution and women who are not in prostitution are finding it impossible to live on welfare and have basic food and shelter for them or their children. We need to solve the lack of housing or safe, affordable, adequate housing. All of these compounding factors are what drives women into prostitution in the first place. Although we do need to have exit services available and access to education, we need to solve the problem of why women are getting there in the first place, and that's what we're really pushing for.
Ms. Bruckert: One thing worth noting is that the Fraser committee did actually come up with very clear recommendations, including decriminalization of at least some components of the sex industry, specifically bawdy houses. Unfortunately, Parliament didn't listen to those recommendations and instead brought the communicating law in with really tragic results.
We have seen a good summary of the evidentiary record and that is in Justice Himel's decision. If you go back to the Ontario Superior Court, in her decision she looked at over 25,000 pages of evidence and did a very careful analysis of who was a valid witness, an expert witness and met the court's criteria of what is an expert witness. I believe we have an excellent summary of what the evidence says. Based on that evidence these laws were overturned, so I'm back to the point that based on the evidence this law is going to create harms.
[Translation]
Senator Joyal: Ladies, thank you for your testimony. I would like to begin with Ms. Léveillé.
In the second paragraph of your brief, you raise an issue that is new to this committee. You say that the criminal records of individuals found guilty of prostitution should be expunged. The reasoning behind that approach is simple. Since the legislation under which those individuals were convicted is unconstitutional, by definition, they are not guilty. Moreover, the government maintains that the objective of its policy is to consider all women who engage in prostitution as victims. They are first victimized through the wrongful conviction, and then they are victimized again when their criminal record is maintained, as that makes their reintegration more difficult.
Have you considered challenging the validity of the criminal records those women unfortunately have for life?
Ms. Léveillé: We are actually considering this whole issue now, and we feel that women who have criminal records after being sexually exploited should not have them. The reason we are saying this is that, first, with our request that amendment 213 be withdrawn, women would not be criminalized.
Second, existing records are making reintegration very difficult for women. Their issues sometimes have to do with social housing or education.
Senator Joyal: What about employment?
Ms. Léveillé: Employment, as well, of course, and that creates numerous obstacles. Women who want to leave prostitution already have so many difficulties to overcome and steps to take before they can truly reclaim ownership of their lives. The authorities should at the very least expunge the criminal records, while adding what we discussed earlier and more resources to help prostitutes leave the sex industry.
[English]
Senator Joyal: Professor Bruckert, I have a fundamental question for you. You have probably read the presentation of the Minister of Justice and the officers of the Justice Department, who contend that the objective of this legislation is the one enshrined in the preamble, which is based on the assumption that all women who are involved in prostitution activities are victims. It is on that basis that they contend that the sections of Bill C-36 that are questionable constitutionally will survive because they will have to be balanced on the basis of the objective that women who are prostitutes are, per se, inherently victims. It is on that basis that, as I said, the section related to communication, and so on, would survive a constitutional test.
What you told us this morning is that this premise wrong and false. That's what you say in the second last paragraph of your presentation, namely that:
. . . sex work is inherently violent. It's a foundational assumption of this legislation. Remove the inherently violent rationalization, and we are left with little more than legal moralism.
In other words, if you were in court, you would challenge the very objective of the principle on which this legislation is based. How would you make that proof to the court to be successful in your challenge?
Ms. Bruckert: You do appreciate that I am not a lawyer, so I will do my best.
While there certainly is victimization in the sex industry, we need to look at the idea that "inherently violent" means nothing can be done. Things can be done. It can be lessened. I take issue with this premise of victims.
I also suggest that if that is the intent and what we will see is that the outcome will be greater harm, then on that basis I suspect it will not be constitutional. You cannot have a law that ostensibly protects and helps victims but puts those people who do not exit or are not able to exit in harm's way. That sounds like a very solid constitutional challenge.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: I want to thank our guests for joining us. My question is for Ms. Smith-Tague. Ms. Smith-Tague, as you said, historically, police and prostitutes do not necessarily get along.
I would like to hear what more you think police officers could do for prostitutes and what could be done to improve the relationship between those two groups. You also know that police officers can sometimes protect those individuals, as well.
[English]
Ms. Smith-Tague: I do think removing any criminalization or the threat of them having a criminal record or a charge against them would absolutely help the relationship. I do think that because of the historical relationship between women who have faced violence and the police, it will not happen overnight. Police need to know that women can have access to advocates, support groups and women's groups they can go to and facilitate that relationship with the police. Women are more likely to want to report once they trust someone. We often work with women in order to help facilitate them reporting to the police and getting a better response and holding the police to give a response that the woman's entitled to. I think the removal of the threat of criminalization would absolutely help that, and then police need to follow the legislation and policies in place and respond to violence against women more adequately.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: Ms. Smith-Tague, you know that, for a number of years, police forces have included female officers. We know that some police officers are assigned to specific cases.
Has that helped improve the relationship between police officers and prostitutes? We know that police officers can be in charge of specific cases.
[English]
Ms. Smith-Tague: I have personally seen some police officers who do a fairly good response and individual police officers who care and work hard. But until there is actual systematic change within the police force, followed by all police officers, it doesn't go anywhere. If it's only one good police officer, then it will not go. Sometimes once it gets to the Crown, then charges are dropped. We're at the next level of the criminal justice system that fails women.
Most charges for all violence against women — this is not just prostitution — are dropped at the police level. We see that based on lack of evidence. I think women are discouraged by that and do not want to report.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: Ladies, thank you very much for your very thought-provoking presentations. Michèle, good morning. It is always a pleasure to see you. I want to congratulate you on the work RQCALACS is doing with sexually abused individuals. You are doing a great job in Quebec, and I just wanted to highlight that.
In your brief, you express an opinion that resonates with me. You say the following:
Canada and the U.S. share the longest border in the world. Full decriminalization of prostitution would lead to an increase in the demand, a dramatic growth of the legal sex industry — and the black market industry [. . .]
Professor, your position is more or less the opposite. You are in favour of prostitution being liberalized. I am trying to figure out how we can reconcile your position with that of RQCALACS, given that, when Canada has adopted laws that were much weaker than those of our neighbours to the south, the U.S., both in terms of drugs and pedophilia — where we were lagging behind European countries — we saw the arrival of many people involved in that kind of work, as our legislation was too weak. I am trying to understand your opinion that prostitution should be completely legal, when our neighbours to the south are relatively closed to that idea. Michèle Léveillé claims that the arrival of American clients would lead to the explosion of that industry in Canada. Should we not worry about that happening if prostitution was legalized?
[English]
Ms. Bruckert: I base my call for decriminalization and not legalization on the safety, security, health and well-being of sex workers. For me, that has to be first and foremost. We cannot have laws or a legal regime that creates harm for one population of predominantly women, although not only. How do I resolve it? That's how I resolve it. Certainly there are already laws that need to be enforced around things like trafficking. That's fine.
We have a very robust Criminal Code. I also think that we need to really recognize the violence that sex workers experience.
To respond to some of the comments, I think it's important. I acknowledge and I would certainly agree that police do not respond adequately to violence against sex workers. This is often where we get the "just a whore" mentality, is what Jacqueline Lewis and Fran Shaver call it. We need to move towards recognition of human rights, as well as labour rights, for sex workers.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: When New Zealand's government decriminalized and legalized prostitution, it said that the country was an island and that little influence came from abroad. Clients will not come by boat.
Over here, given our closeness to our neighbours to the south and very weak legislation on prostitution, do you not, as a researcher and professor, see legalization as a danger? Should our legislation not remain somewhat competitive with U.S. laws to ensure that Canadian prostitutes would not be dependent on American clients?
[English]
Ms. Bruckert: No, quite the opposite. I'm not completely clear on this idea of equalizing it. Again, I'm not sure how Canadian sex workers will be disadvantaged if the position is different from that in the United States. Again, I think Canada is a sovereign state and we need our own laws. I'm not convinced, by the way, that New Zealand had that conversation that we're an island state. My understanding is that New Zealand brought in the laws because they put the safety and security of sex workers first. The laws I'm talking about are actually a decriminalization; I should be very specific. It's not the same as legalization. So I'm not quite understanding.
[Translation]
Ms. Léveillé: The demand did increase wherever lax laws were adopted. That goes hand in hand with changes in attitude. We know that laws can lead to changes in attitude, especially if awareness is raised. If legislation to legalize or decriminalize prostitution was adopted, we would without a doubt be overrun. That is already the case. Certain legislation was in effect when this happened during sports events in Montreal. It also bears saying that, in places where prostitution was legalized, a black market also exists — and a large part of the sex industry is always underground. The same thing would probably happen here, as well. I do not see why we would be any different from others. However, what makes us different from New Zealand is the border we share with the United States. I also want to add that, with increased prostitution comes increased violence.
[English]
Senator Plett: Professor, I want to continue along the line of what Senator Boisvenu started. I would suggest that there is a very fine line between decriminalization and legalization. They may be two different things, but they are awfully close together.
In your presentation, you used the comparison of construction workers, loggers and hairdressers with prostitutes, and we aren't criminalizing them for fear of abuse. I'm not sure where you were going with that. I have yet to hear of a construction worker or a logger, or even a hairdresser, being brutally beaten because of their line of work. They may have been beaten for other reasons, but certainly not because of their line of work. They haven't been raped because of their line of work. I'm not sure why that comparison.
Yesterday, Megan Walker used — and I'm going to read a quote here, or read what she said:
Legalized prostitution does exist in Germany, and as a result of prostitution-related activities, there have been 22 murders of prostituted women in Germany, all related to interactions between prostituted woman and the john — 22. That's in legalized Germany.
In Sweden, where they have the Nordic model, which is what we're advocating for here, there have been zero murders. Not one woman has been murdered in prostitution-related activities.
I would like you to respond, number one, in terms of how you rationalize using a construction worker and a prostitute and comparing them, and these stats — and these are correct stats.
Ms. Bruckert: I will do my very best. The point I was making is that our normal response when there is risk at work is to increase safety and security. So it's not true that sex workers are the only population of women workers who are at risk of violence. According to Statistics Canada, 29 per cent of nurses providing direct service were victims last year of patients or their families. Certainly those kinds of statistics are really scary, and what they mean is that we need to increase safety and security, and we need to put in protocols.
That is what I am calling for. I'm calling for recognition that if we acknowledge that sex work is "work," we can start to move towards increasing their safety and security, like we would for any other worker.
I appreciate that, for you, legalization and decriminalization are very close. To me, they're quite different. The difference is that in decriminalization, unlike a legalized regime, which essentially says some sex workers can work legally, but most, if they don't fit this particular profile, they can't work. So you end up with exactly what my colleague was talking about, a huge black market.
That hasn't happened in New Zealand because they took a rights-based approach. They brought in human rights. Well, they didn't bring in human rights; they made the same laws apply to sex workers as they do to anyone else — occupational health and safety, labour rights, Labour Code. It applies, and that works, and that makes sex workers safer.
Senator Plett: And, of course, we're trying to make things safer for sex workers here as well by passing Bill C-36.
To any of the other ladies, or all of them: Some witnesses who have appeared here and are appearing here this week are advocating for the legalization of prostitution because they argue that it is a legitimate profession and should be viewed as such. How would you respond to somebody suggesting this is a legitimate profession, as possibly has been suggested here already this morning?
Ms. Steacy: One thing I want to make very clear is that our position, while being different, isn't accusing the women who tell their own stories about their life that are different from ours, or who come to a different conclusion, of lying or not understanding or being too stupid to understand the way that their life is. However, I think the argument that it's a profession negates the fact that it is a profession to which very few women aspire. It's a circumstance that replicates the inequality.
I think somebody said yesterday that if it's a line of work that's freely chosen, does this mean that Asian women overwhelmingly choose to be in massage parlours and Aboriginal women overwhelmingly choose to be in the most dangerous types of street-level prostitution? I see the exchange of money as a way of capitalizing on and coercing women because of their poverty and their dire need for money.
Senator Frum: I would like to ask the three witnesses who are doing front-line work with prostitutes to respond to Professor Bruckert's assertion that prostitution is not inherently violent. We heard that from Valerie Scott yesterday as well. They also both seem to believe that Bill C-36 will make it more violent, but it's not inherently violent. Can you tell me what you think of that assertion?
Ms. Smith-Tague: Sure. I think it has been recognized by almost all witnesses that there is obviously a need for the safety and security of women, so it contradicts that it is inherently violent because we have to be talking about how to keep women safe in this profession specifically.
Just because not every single john may be violent with every single woman who is prostituted does not mean that it's an equal transaction. It doesn't mean that men don't have the power to do that at any moment and that women aren't in a position of vulnerability to that violence. We do see that a large number of women are attacked by men, and men use the position they have to attack women and gain access to them.
The very act of even buying a woman, they're paying a woman so that they can do what they want. They do have more power in that situation.
Senator Frum: We haven't discussed very much in the past few days the health consequences — the health risks, the disease, infection, cancer risks, all kinds of risks — in addition to physical violence.
Ms. Smith-Tague: Absolutely, yes.
Senator Frum: Professor Bruckert, you asserted that this bill perpetuates victim-blaming. I'm curious to know what part of the bill you think does that.
Ms. Bruckert: The entire framing of sex work as inherently violent and the push towards ensuring that women exit — in fact, that the only goal is to ensure that sex workers exit — suggests that those who do not exit will be blamed for the violence that befalls them. This is a classic trope. We hear from the police, "high-risk lifestyles." That's how I feel it perpetuates victim-blaming.
Ms. Steacy: The idea that women who are in prostitution can and should have to take measures to ensure that men don't perpetrate violence against them is more accurately called victim-blaming. That's similar, to me, to rape myths: instead of saying, "It's not okay that he did that to you," saying to women, "Why were you in that place? Why were you doing that thing? Why didn't you know better? Why didn't you see the red flags?"
I think screening is basically telling women that they're responsible for seeing red flags, the same way with domestic violence and rape.
Senator Frum: To be clear, that's not part of this bill.
Ms. Steacy: I know. I think I'm just disagreeing with Professor Bruckert.
[Translation]
Ms. Léveillé: It is clear that having more time to negotiate with the client will not make prostitutes safer. For over 20 years, I have been working with women who were sexually assaulted by people they knew — their husband or someone else. The same applies in the world of prostitution. A client you have seen several times may ultimately decide to assault you. An additional 5, 10 or 15 minutes of negotiation will not help women be safer.
[English]
Senator McInnis: Thank you for coming.
I'm trying to get a fix on how we can handle and transition prostitutes from the industry, from the trade. It seems to me there are a number of programs out there now to do that, but the great challenge is to get them to it. I would like your comments on how we might do that.
It seems to me it's not only concurrent, it probably involves the federal level, the provinces and of course the municipalities. There are programs there, but it's getting them to it. I'd like your comments on that.
Also, I want to put on the record that the House of Commons committee put in place an amendment with respect to communicating for sexual services near daycares, playgrounds and schools, and I've yet to hear any of our presenters mention the rights of the child.
I know of factual situations in the province of Nova Scotia where parents had a terrible time going to the daycare or school to pick up their child. Not only were there drug paraphernalia and condoms, but in fact individuals having sex in the back seat of a car.
I get the theme here that we should be eliminating that law that will come in. I think there's a danger here, and the rights of the child and the rights of the family are important. When women pick their child up, they have to walk quickly with their head down to get to their car. I would like your comment on those.
[Translation]
Ms. Léveillé: If purchases were criminalized, prostitution would occur everywhere — including the places you mentioned — but if prostitution was totally decriminalized, similar situations could increase everywhere. It is important to mention that women who are victims of conjugal violence are not criminalized even if they have children who witness that violence. Women who are exploited through prostitution should under no circumstances be criminalized. The legislation could criminalize potential clients who solicit women — not only prostitutes, but all women. We may be waiting for the bus and be asked how much we cost. That happens often and anywhere. How would the authorities know whether the woman was soliciting or not? An exchange took place, but the woman may not have solicited it. I agree; it is unpleasant to experience something like that when you are taking your child to daycare.
As for figuring out how to influence women to leave prostitution, they definitely often have trust issues, as they have been let down many times in their lives. The best approach would be to provide venues where they would not be judged. If a woman comes to seek help and she goes back to prostitution afterwards, the staff have no business judging her. It is a matter of gradually building a relationship of trust in order to help those women rebuild their self- confidence, and then providing them with guidance in all matters. At times, they do not even have an ID card, education or any previous employment. They can really be provided with guidance through all those steps, but the process does not occur overnight.
[English]
Senator Baker: Just a clarification on what was changed in the House of Commons relating to 213. There are two sections to 213: One is offering and the other one is communicating.
The new law now says:
213(1) Everyone is guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction who, in a public place or in any place open to public view, for the purpose of offering, providing or obtaining sexual services for consideration . . .
That's the new law.
The second portion of the new law is what was changed, the communicating section, on the next page. That's the wording; we just verified it a moment ago.
So what remains in place in 213, in this new law, is the offering or providing. Everyone is guilty of an offence punishable in exchange for consideration.
You're criminalized if you offer in a public place or a place open to public view. So that remains. It's only the communicating that has been changed to close to a school or playground.
With that clarification, I suppose, even more so now, you would suggest that the entire section 213 be removed?
Ms. Léveillé: Yes.
Ms. Steacy: Absolutely.
Senator Baker: As some of the senators have pointed out to you, the section has been changed. The important section is what will drive the prostitutes into the dark alleys in offering. So you do not recommend removal of the section that deals with schools and playgrounds; you're asking for the removal of the entire section.
Ms. Steacy: Yes.
Senator Baker: Thank you.
Senator Batters: I'm just looking for a little clarification on that, which might take me a bit to find so it may not happen on this particular round, but I think the importance on that would be the fact that we are immunizing in many cases the prostitute for many different types of offences which include the provision of their own sexual services; advertising their own sexual services; aiding, abetting, conspiring, attempting to commit an offence; being an accessory after the fact or counselling a person to be a party, if that offence relates to the offering or provision of their own sexual services. That last part is in proposed subsection 286.5(2). I think that might cover it off, but just because this was just brought up I might need a little clarification later.
I had another point I wanted to raise before that was brought up. I'm not sure, Ms. Smith-Tague, if you were here when Minister MacKay testified or if you had any opportunity to read his testimony?
Ms. Smith-Tague: I wasn't here for it, but I did hear some of it, yes.
Senator Batters: He was here on the first day of this particular pre-study. I make reference to this because in your opening statement you talked about the $20 million initiative and in your view thought it wasn't enough. I wanted to reiterate that Minister MacKay stated that the $20 million is in addition to other very substantial programs offered through the federal Department of Justice, the Aboriginal Justice Strategy, the Victims Fund, all of those things. As well, something that he didn't get into, the Aboriginal Affairs Department has funding that goes directly to First Nations, and also the Status of Women department as well, so the $20 million is simply one piece of a much larger pie.
We also need to keep in mind that our provinces are responsible for social services, et cetera, and they have funding envelopes to deal directly with these issues. From Saskatchewan, I know provincially that we spend significant resources in all those different areas, including the provincial Department of Justice through the Victims Fund, Aboriginal Justice Strategy, and all of those other departments. I guess I wanted to provide some comfort that that is not the only piece of the pie.
Ms. Smith-Tague: I do realize that; it's true. Although $20 million is only one part, it still has to be spread out over five years across the entire country, which makes it even less for the provinces. I do agree that of course a lot of the funding is provincially controlled, and there is no initiative for the federal government pushing the provinces to spend more money on rights of women.
Right now in British Columbia there are huge cuts to health care providers, to front-line services, to detoxes, to all these services that are just being erased, and that is what adds up, so we see those are the compounding factors in B.C.
Unless there is a push for the provincial government to actually take initiative on it, then we may not see the results. We will only see some of the money that trickles down from the federal government.
Senator Batters: That might be an issue that can be discussed at federal-provincial-territorial justice ministers meetings. They meet usually at least once a year, and I'm sure prostitution will be a big item on their agenda, and that's something that they could perhaps discuss. Thank you.
The Chair: We have about six minutes left and we have three senators who would like to ask questions and receive responses in that time. If we have quick, to-the-point questions, and similar responses by our witnesses, we could accomplish it.
Senator Jaffer: This morning, listening to you all, what you say is so persuasive, but I am so troubled that this bill says one thing but yet still criminalizes women. Women still cannot advertise, and the women who are the most marginalized, who are on the streets, cannot go to a commercial place. They often don't have a place to go to, so where do they go? On the one hand it gives some rights, but it doesn't really help people. I don't have much time and I would like to hear your opinion.
Ms. Steacy: I would say that in light of the alternative, which is the complete decriminalization of prostitution, which I think ensures more prostitution, more women seeing more men, the violence comes from those men who either have a vested economic interest in getting them into and keeping them in prostitution or who purchase them in prostitution. I don't think women are protected by an increase in the amount of women men have access to.
Senator Joyal: Professor Bruckert, I would like to come back to the assumption on which this bill is based, which is that all persons in prostitution are victims of some sort, either victims of themselves or victims of the social conditions or pressures of family situation and so on. How would you prove in the court that persons who are involved in prostitution are not victims per se?
Ms. Bruckert: Not ever to say that sex workers are not victimized because I am quite clear there is a great deal of victimization, I think the testimony of sex workers speaks volumes. You have heard some sex workers, current and former, speak here in previous days, and you are hearing more this afternoon. I think you have to listen to what people say about their own lives. Listen to it, hear it and respect it; and I think that speaks volumes.
Senator Joyal: But you've mentioned also that the street level prostitution represents only 5 to 20 per cent of what might constitute the number of prostitutes or the average number of prostitutes. Do you have any figures of those who are not on the streets and, in your opinion, work safely?
Ms. Bruckert: What do you mean by "figures"?
Senator Joyal: I mean numbers, a percentage of those people in prostitution who would consider that they are there of their own free will and are not coerced or pushed into prostitution but have chosen on their own to be in prostitution.
Ms. Bruckert: There is a great deal of research. The problem is, and I'm going to be rather ethical and honest, that no research can have a representative sample. No research can ever tell you this percentage of anything is like this. In the sex industry, it's criminalized and stigmatized; we just don't know. There's is a great deal of research saying sex workers having a wide spectrum of relationships to the sex industry, and so very many sit on the spectrum of choice, mediated choice, constrained choice to situations where there are very few options. I think when we say "choices" we are talking about meaningful choices.
I have no numbers. We cannot have numbers while this industry is criminalized because we will never know.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: My comment is for Ms. Léveillé. Reducing the demand by criminalizing clients will in turn reduce the benefits that encourage organized crime to create networks and exploit women. That is sort of the idea behind Bill C-36.
As prostitution does not require a work permit, should prostitutes not be worried that total legalization will lead to an invasion of American prostitutes, who would take business away from them, except in situations involving children?
Ms. Léveillé: In places where prostitution was legalized, the demand increased so much that competition has been growing steadily. You are talking about American prostitutes who would, in a way, come steal Canadian prostitutes' jobs. Human trafficking is also a consideration.
I do not think this concern is justified. There would be enough demand to provide work for everyone. Women from all over would definitely come to Canada to engage in prostitution either by choice or, in most cases, not by choice.
[English]
The Chair: Thank you all for your appearance here this morning and your assistance with the committee's deliberations.
To our next group of witnesses, welcome. Representing Maggie's — Toronto Sex Workers' Action Project is Nicole Matte, Vice-Chair, Board of Directors and Jean McDonald, Executive Director; and from an organization called Stella, l'Amie de Maimie, Anna-Aude Caouette, Spokesperson.
Ms. Matte, did you wish to lead off with an opening statement?
Nicole Matte, Vice-Chair, Board of Directors, Maggie's — Toronto Sex Workers' Action Project: Thank you. I'm a board member at Maggie's — Toronto Sex Workers' Action Project. I have a background in feminist anti-violence advocacy, women's sexual assault support, youth sexual health education and sex work theory from an academic standpoint.
At Maggie's we work directly with current sex workers, and the service users we work with tell us that they are, quite frankly, terrified about the impacts that Bill C-36 will have on their lives. We're seeing that street-based workers still fear the same police oppression that they've suffered for many years. Those working alongside fellow sex workers in safe in-call locations are cancelling their leases and opting to work alone. Some who felt most comfortable working for an agency wonder what else they can do to make money in a tough economy, and they really lament a missed opportunity that could have given them the same basic employment protections that other Canadians enjoy in the workplace.
Already we're seeing this legislation isolate workers who have been working safely, and we anticipate these dangers will spread further throughout the community if this legislation becomes law.
Inequalities in sex work are the same inequalities that plague all sectors of Canadian society. Histories of colonialism, racism, sexism and transphobia mean that indigenous women, racialized women and trans-identified folks are overrepresented in sex work, but it's important to keep in mind that these marginalized groups are overrepresented in underpaid, marginalized labour across the country in all sectors.
Bill C-36 does absolutely nothing do address the systemic roots of oppression and inequality in our country; rather, it proposes to further marginalize and stigmatize the most vulnerable of Canadians.
Sex workers will continue to work no matter the level of criminalization or risk put in front of them. Our service users still need to pay their rent and feed their kids. This has been proven time and time again by the World Health Organization, the UNAIDS organization and other anti-violence organizations that are demanding full decriminalization of prostitution worldwide.
Indeed, some sex workers want other jobs, but just like other low-income Canadians living paycheque to paycheque, they cannot transition overnight. Where vulnerable street-based workers are forced out of the trade by police crackdowns and repressive legal environments, we only see a displacement of these workers. Their criminalization did not erase them, but it might have pushed them back into a relationship with an abusive partner, for example. So it makes them more vulnerable.
Some representatives here today argue that this legislation represents a "paradigm shift" in the way our country addresses inequality, and I wonder, is it compassionate to sentence your country's most vulnerable people to a more precarious life? Sex workers are not just symbolic representations; we're living, breathing Canadians who will suffer under Bill C-36.
Jean McDonald, Executive Director, Maggie's — Toronto Sex Workers' Action Project: Hello, everyone. My name is Jean McDonald, and I am the Executive Director of Maggie's — Toronto Sex Workers' Action Project.
I'm not going to lie: I came into this week of Senate hearings with a sense of futility. I have the sense that no matter what I say, no matter what current sex workers say, that our views, evidence and arguments will not be taken into consideration in regard to Bill C-36.
However, I am here and I want to dispel some myths. I want to explain some realities. I want to tell you how Bill C- 36 will impact current sex workers on the ground, working, paying bills, indoor, outdoor, with choices more constrained and less constrained.
Bill C-36 will criminalize consensual adult sex work. We have heard many awful, tragic stories this week. Bill C-36 does not deal with coercive sexual relationships, sexual assault, rape, abuse, murder, physical assault, forced confinement and other clearly terrible acts. We have criminal laws on the books, and when the three laws were struck down by the Supreme Court, those laws remained on the books.
When I argue that the decriminalization of sex work is the best way to protect sex workers, I'm saying that we need to uphold those same laws that would protect everyone, that are on the books, which forbid sexual assault, rape, forced confinement, et cetera.
I believe that adults, men and women, have the ability to consent to sexual acts. Why is our ability to consent suddenly revoked when there is money on the bedside table?
There has been a lot of talk this week about violence and the violence that many sex workers face. Some have even asserted that sex work or prostitution is inherently violent. I want to address the violence that sex workers face, and this is why I support decriminalization. This is to ensure that sex workers can have access to the same labour, legal and human rights as any other person in Canada. This is essential to ensuring our safety and security.
Some witnesses have suggested that screening clients cannot completely protect sex workers, and therefore they're in agreement with communication laws and criminalizing clients who, therefore, won't be likely to provide screening information. And it's true. Yes, no one can be perfectly screened. Similarly, seatbelts will not completely protect car passengers from injury or even death, but I would never deny someone the ability to wear a seatbelt.
Some analogies have also been made to domestic violence. You can date a man, he's wonderful, you're in love, you marry him, and then it's not until the honeymoon that he becomes abusive and controlling. It's true. That could happen. In fact, women in Canada are very likely to face abuse and violence within spousal relationships.
According to a Statistics Canada study in 2011, there was, on average, one woman killed by her spouse every six days in Canada. Shall we ban marriage next? Is marriage inherently violent? Or, similar to the legal supports and laws that we have created and should continue to create to protect survivors of domestic violence, we need to make those same kinds of legal rights and social supports available and more accessible to sex workers. If we truly want to address some of the reasons why people get into sex work, some of the more constraining reasons, we need to increase minimum wage. We need to increase welfare rates and disability supports. We need universal child care and affordable housing. We need free secondary education and job training.
Many of the sex workers we work with are single moms, and if they are going to be able to exit prostitution and change their life, they need free child care. Child care in this country — and I know because I'm a mom — it costs me about $1,200 a month simply to have my child in daycare. When you make about $3,000 a month on my salary, that's a huge chunk of money; right?
What we need to do is increase the options that people have. We need to increase social supports rather than diminish or criminalize the few options that people might have.
I have some thoughts on how Bill C-36, piece by piece, could be challenged according to the different provisions of it, so feel free to ask me more specific questions.
[Translation]
Anna-Aude Caouette, Spokesperson, Stella, l'Amie de Maimie: Good morning. My name is Anne-Aude Caouette, and I work at Stella, a feminist organization by and for sex workers that focuses on human rights. Stella was founded in 1995, and its mission consists in informing sex workers, providing them with services and defending their rights. Every day we meet sex workers where they work: on the streets; in massage parlours; at in-call and out-call escort agencies; at strip clubs; in dungeons; and occasionally even at their home.
Stella hosts a biweekly medical clinic in partnership with the CLSC. Together with our members and project participants, we create violence prevention tools, such as the Bad Tricks and Aggressors List, which is compiled with the help of our members. The list is distributed within our community. Hundreds of sex workers and partner organizations can receive that information and share it with their community.
We also accompany sex workers to meetings with health, social and legal service providers. We annually respond to over 5,000 calls to our listening line, not only to break through isolation, but also to provide support and references, and to create a sense of belonging to a community, since it is known that sex work is so stigmatized that it is difficult to discuss it openly.
Stella deals with transwomen, students and single mothers. Some of them are drug users, but some are also educators and nurses. They may be your mothers, daughters, aunts, sisters. We are full members of this society and your neighbours.
We are very worried, of course. Our members regularly ask about the bill. They are very critical of the bill, as it reuses the same legal provisions that were just deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court — only the wording has been changed. The fact that sex work will continue to be criminalized is a source of concern for us. In its ruling, the Supreme Court explained how and why the provisions of the Criminal Code of Canada contribute to violence against sex workers.
The bill perceives prostitution as violence, as if the workers were experiencing violence on a daily basis. The current bill does not take into consideration the experiences of those among us who have not suffered any abuse. Yet those who continue to work will be affected by the new bill.
The bill equates prostitution with violence and further antagonizes the delicate relationship between police services and us. Stella's workers are well aware that sex work conditions vary greatly on a continuum of experiences. Some of them may be victims of violence owing to things such as "hophobia," criminalization and stigmatization. When that happens to us, it is still a crime among others all Canadian women face.
Think again if you believe that passing Bill C-36 will make it easier for us to report cases of violence to the authorities. If our lives and work are criminalized, it is very difficult for us to report a violent crime against us without a risk of losing our source of income, as well as the professional relationships that provide us with support.
So this approach would exclude police services from the potential resources for sex workers who are victims of violence. A real discussion should be held about where and how sex work happens, so that municipalities and sex workers can engage in a respectful and meaningful dialogue in order to find solutions that will work for us and for communities.
It is wrong to think that the provisions of Bill C-36 will reduce violence towards aboriginal women. Resorting to criminal law to address prostitution — and particularly to save us — reinforces the legacies of colonialism and places aboriginal sex workers in even more precarious working conditions. The claim that prostitution and human trafficking are intrinsically linked hurts people who are part of the industry.
Sex work is not coercion. It is important to listen to sex workers when they tell you what is happening in their lives and what their experiences with violence and coercion are. There are even global organizations that fight trafficking — such as the Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women (GAATW) — which strongly oppose that link and point out that this kind of an approach in no way reduces human trafficking or sex work. Let us not forget that our French colleagues just refused to implement a bill that would have criminalized clients and sexual purchases in France.
The criminalization of sex work increases inequality, as it results in sex workers experiencing even more violence, discrimination and poverty — a reality supported by Bedford. We need to stop thinking that using criminal law is the only way to regulate prostitution.
The Supreme Court of Canada's Bedford ruling clearly asserts that the use of criminal law to protect sex workers actually puts us in more danger.
We need to look to other regulatory mechanisms to improve our health and security, instead of further marginalizing sex workers. Thank you.
[English]
The Chair: Thank you very much for your opening statements, and we will begin the questions with the deputy chair, Senator Baker.
Senator Baker: Thank you to the witnesses. Is there anything in the bill that you like?
Ms. Matte: From Maggie's' perspective, we are rejecting this bill wholesale. We want to see a full decriminalization of sex workers, specifically the three sections struck down by the Bedford case.
So anything that will reproduce the harms that Bedford recognized that were posed by those laws, we will not accept those. What we are seeing with Bill C-36 is a reproduction of the same criminalization around the communication laws. It may have reversed it, as some are calling it asymmetrical, and we're seeing that working directly with sex workers, sex working populations who are working today, it puts them in danger. This is something we can't accept.
Senator Baker: You all agree there is nothing in this bill that you really like.
Ms. Matte: Exactly.
Senator Baker: Could you give me examples of the justification of paying for sexual services? You appear to be saying that not all johns are bad. Could you further that argument that you appear to be making, that not only should the prostitutes be criminalized but that as a general rule it would be an error to criminalize the purchase of sexual services in exchange for money, payment, compensation or "consideration," as is used in the Criminal Code?
Ms. McDonald: Yes, I do believe that purchasing sexual services from a consenting adult should be a legal activity, absolutely. I see nothing wrong with purchasing sexual services, much like any other kind of service such as massage therapy or getting your nails done. It can be very therapeutic for a lot of clients. They're not all wonderful people, no, but I'm sure in here there are probably people I think are great and some people that I think aren't so great. In any group of people you're going to get those you like and those you don't like, some who are nicer and not as nice. There are lots of people who are lonely and they might have disabilities.
Senator Baker: I see. Could you elaborate on that?
Ms. McDonald: There are clients who seek out sexual services because of their disabilities. I know one woman who regularly visits a fellow who is in a wheelchair. He's a regular client, a lovely guy, but he wants some caring and attention, some intimacy in his life, and they have a relationship. She's been seeing him for many years. I don't see why we need to deny that relationship.
Then, to put it to the other side, there are also people who just want to have sex. If there is someone else who is also interested in having sex and would like to be paid for their time, I don't see the problem with that. Frankly, I don't understand why it's wrong.
Senator Baker: Could you elaborate on it as well, please?
[Translation]
Ms. Caouette: At Stella, we see a diversity of individuals involved in the industry. We recognize that our clients are part of that diversity and belong to all social classes. Just like us, they have a variety of experiences behind them.
What makes the Bad Tricks and Aggressors List useful is that all those involved in the sex industry use it. We can see who is hurting us. That is what we want people to focus on. We want to emphasize the fact that a client assaulted someone, mistreated them, disrespected them or sexually assaulted them. However, in cases where a consensual sexual service was exchanged with the other individual — we had a contract and made our exchange — there should be no problems. The Supreme Court just handed down a decision that should be taken into consideration and whereby there may be no need to look into Canadians' bedrooms to find out what is happening there, whether money is involved or not.
I would imagine that the clients are also fathers, sons — perhaps your children — like anyone in society. I hope that your children will not be clients. They could be criminalized for purchasing sexual services. I think that imprisoning individuals who bought a service provided consensually, as part of a job, makes no sense.
[English]
Ms. Matte: We have to ask ourselves why we ask these kinds of questions of sex work, why someone might want to do it or why someone is seeing someone. We don't ask that of other industries. It would be helpful to be able to identify two consenting adults, one who is consenting to sell his or her sexual services. This is not a forced relationship. We're not talking about exploitation; we're talking about a consensual situation here, so we can leave those ideas outside of this conversation as well.
It would be useful to compare it to another industry that we see as being intimate, such as counselling or maybe an artist, or where there is also an extreme disparity in income between the two people who are engaging in this financial relationship. There is an artist who doesn't make much money and who is producing something that is potentially very intimate to them. It's their art. Somebody is buying a piece of their experience, a piece of their soul, perhaps, as some have even described sex work.
I don't know why those would be terms on which to base if they can or cannot engage in that kind of financial exchange. I think we really need to examine our associations of sex, of women's sexuality, that we think she may not be adult enough to consent to something like that or perhaps social fears around sex that we have and have been ingrained in our culture for a very long time.
I think this is in part about trusting women, and sex workers, who are not always necessarily women. Clients are not always men either. That's really important to look at the diversity of the reality of sex work, right?
Senator Baker: Yes.
Ms. Matte: It is also important to be able to trust the person there, as a consenting adult, that this is something they want to do.
Senator Batters: Thank you very much for being here.
I want to go right to this topic of consent. From what we've heard over the past two days, and earlier this morning, from a number of people who I don't think we can discount — certainly there's a wide array of views on this topic. At the same time, I don't think we can discount the experience of some of these really tragic stories we've heard, which from my point of view in Saskatchewan you hear a lot about those kinds of stories. My point of view is that consent is affected by many factors: poverty, drug addiction, abuse history, et cetera. How consensual is that relationship really for the vast majority of prostitutes is what I would question.
Also, I'm going to ask you to comment specifically on consent. Would you agree that consent is impacted by who is deriving the economic benefit of that transaction? Would you agree that there is a difference between a prostitute's ability to consent if only she, herself, is deriving that economic benefit or if she provides some of her economic benefit or almost all of her economic benefit to her pimp or a madam or someone running a brothel? Would you agree that there's a difference in those two situations?
Ms. McDonald: I would agree with you. When we talk about consent, we need to think about constrained consent and the choices that people make when there are only so many choices. That's why I said in my opening statement that we need to increase people's choices. For instance, if you could advocate for a universal child care strategy, do you know how many sex workers that would help out? They wouldn't have to work as much. They would be really happy if you created more affordable housing. That would be wonderful. They would be, like, "Wow, maybe I don't have to see so many clients to pay for my really high rent in Toronto."
Increase the minimum wage, because frankly you can't live on minimum wage. Increase disability payments and welfare payments so when the money runs out at the end of the month, you don't have to hit the street to feed your kid for the next few days until you get to your next cheque.
Frankly, these are the realities and this bill is decreasing those choices. Rather than taking these resources that would go towards Bill C-36 and enforcing this law, which criminalizes adult consensual sex work, we could take those resources and really help the survival of sex workers by doing those kinds of things.
I can address the other part of the question a bit. Again, I think I would agree. I think what you were getting at was that someone working independently has more control over their economic situation, or that they have more economic benefit, something like that.
Senator Batters: Do you see a difference between prostitutes who are working only for themselves or ones who have to pay a lot of their money to pimps, madams and people running brothels?
Ms. McDonald: Yes, I do see a difference between that. I would compare it, for instance, to the constrained choice that someone living in Bangladesh makes to work in one of those giant garment factories and is getting paid a few dollars a day. It's dangerous work, the work conditions are terrible, they can't unionize and they don't have access to labour and legal rights. Yet, the CEO of that company is profiting from those people working in those factories. I think what we're looking at is a capitalist relationship. I actually think capitalism causes a lot of problems because of the very problem that you're pointing out here, that we're constrained under capitalism to sometimes have to choose work that we don't necessarily need to choose. I didn't know you were anti-capitalist. That is wonderful.
Senator Batters: No, I'm not anti-capitalist, but I would not equate capitalism to criminalization.
Ms. McDonald: I would like to address the third-party issue. I know people who went from working in an agency to becoming independent. First, lots of people choose an agency because they're new to the industry and they want a safer place to work. They're with other sex workers. They learn the ropes from those people. The space is provided for them, and they have a driver if they need one. All the advertising is done for them. For that, the agency takes a portion of their profit. It's similar to the artist example that my colleague here mentioned. Many artists have an agent or an agency — it is the same with actors — who they pay to find them clients. They do that kind of outreach and publicity work for them. I see it as the same relationship.
In fact, by decriminalizing sex work, such as in New Zealand, there are labour laws that sex workers can actually access. For instance, a story came out in February, where a young woman who was working in a brothel was being sexually harassed. She brought the owner and the manager of the brothel to court for sexual harassment. Some people might say, "Well, she's a hooker. Of course, she's going to get sexually harassed at work. That's part of the job." But no, the courts found that they were in the wrong and that no one — not even a sex worker, a prostitute or whatever you want to use — should be sexually harassed at work. She won a settlement of approximately $25,000.
Senator Jaffer: You have answered 10 questions on this issue, and I would recommend that my colleagues read your answers. There is one question that we have heard a lot about and that I would like you to expand on.
There is a lot of talk around this table about reducing prostitution. Won't the laws that criminalize johns and pimps be a good thing because it will reduce prostitution? Would that happen? If the law criminalizes johns and pimps, would it reduce prostitution?
[Translation]
Ms. Caouette: We cannot make that assumption. If we look at Sweden's case, no decrease in prostitution has been noted since the country decided to criminalize the purchase of sexual services. However, what has been noted is that prostitution has moved to other locations. Everyone agrees regarding that shift.
Although many folks do not understand or refuse to acknowledge that some individuals work in the sex industry, people must continue to pay their rent and earn a living in current society. I do not see why we would want to reduce prostitution. The people who work and fight for the recognition of sex workers' rights do not want to reduce, but rather increase, protection, respect of human rights, the right to life and security. At Stella, we think that communities should be safe for everyone, including sex workers.
I want to reiterate that it is wrong to think that tackling the demand for prostitution will reduce the women's need to work. As my colleagues said, not only women are involved in this industry — various types of individuals are represented. Generally, we have to continue to work.
Over all these years of sex work being criminalized, prostitutes have continued to work, even under extreme conditions. Displacement and repression have forced us to work on the black market. However, as you have seen, that did not make us stop working. We are still on the streets and in strip clubs, and we are still here today.
Sex work will not stop overnight, but you can help us improve our working conditions and, more importantly, put an end to stigmatization. I would never want my children to be ashamed to say that I may have worked or am still working in the sex industry. We cannot put the burden on our children to remove the stigma surrounding hookers. That perception should be dispelled, and sex workers should be seen as human beings.
[English]
Senator Jaffer: I have a question for both of you, Ms. McDonald and Ms. Matte. The Minister of Justice made a different kind of presentation here than he did in the house, and I've been reflecting on what he's been saying. There is an assumption in this bill that all sex workers are victims. As in life, there are sex workers who are exploited and sex workers that are trafficked. We accept that. However, you are saying there are also sexual workers that do this on a consensual basis.
Given your testimony, obviously you disagree with the minister's fundamental assumption that all sex workers are victims. Would you agree with that?
Ms. Matte: Yes, absolutely. We do disagree with that. We work closely with sex-working populations. I can tell you quite frankly that none of them identify as victims. They might be struggling economically. They have faced challenges in their lives and they have faced a great deal of discrimination and oppression.
We live in an unjust society where some people have more options than others. The response to that should not be to criminalize the most marginalized and make their lives worse; it should be to raise them up so they have more options so their lives can improve. This framework of victimization, in my opinion, contributes to the stigmatization that sex workers experience. It's the same kind of stigmatization that leads them to become targets for predators, this idea that they are helpless victims who have nowhere to go and no one cares about them. What a more targetable population for violence. If we can change this conversation and talk about sex workers as agents and as independent, capable individuals who deserve options and support, I think that would make a big difference.
Ms. McDonald: I thought she was asking both of us.
The Chair: We have time limits. You'll have to wait for another opportunity.
[Translation]
Senator McIntyre: I want to thank all three of you for your presentations. You heard about the federal government's $20-million investment fund, which, as you know, will be used to help community organizations assist sex workers. It is also my understanding that the fund will be used to help those who want to leave prostitution and rebuild their life.
Here is my question for you. How should that investment fund be administered so that those who need help the most can benefit from it?
Ms. Caouette: For us, at Stella, not only exit programs would be provided. We have been working for almost 20 years with our members who have not identified that as a priority area of need for the Stella organization. As sex workers in Montreal, we have needs that differ greatly from the simple need for an exit program. For instance, this year at the Stella organization, we are working on a violence prevention program that puts forward a much broader vision of violence — whether we are talking about violence perpetuated by a pimp, boyfriend or girlfriend; violence stemming from the system; or violence associated with incarceration.
The Stella organization provides support, regardless of the type of violence the individual has experienced. We do not provide a de facto exit program for them, but we do offer those people support based on their needs. This year, we have had many programs to help women leave an abusive relationship, and not necessarily prostitution. People sometimes leave the industry for various reasons, and others stay for other reasons.
Organizations such as Stella and others whose mission is not focussed on leaving the industry must exist to defend sex workers and fight against violence, exploitation and stigmatization.
We cannot provide sex workers only with exits programs, as many of us will continue to work for various reasons. For instance, drug users will continue to look for work. Sometimes, it is a matter of choosing between stealing a piece of meat at the store or performing fellatio on the street. Sex workers who also use drugs have to make those types of decisions. Those are the choices available to us.
Providing only options for leaving the industry is an insult to sex workers who continue to work. That is not one of their needs.
Senator McIntyre: Thank you Ms. Caouette. Ms. Matte and Ms. McDonald, do you have anything to add?
[English]
Ms. Matte: I'll respond quickly, just to say that the reality of sex workers' lives is not often represented in these more religious, moralistic exit programs that we're seeing. Rescue agencies don't recognize that. Sometimes sex workers might leave the industry for a while and come back if they have to put a new roof on their house or buy school supplies for their children. Quite often a program that is framed solely around exit from the industry isn't going to be welcoming when she comes back and says, "I'm doing it again now. Can you support me?" Focusing on those is creating unsafe environments for sex workers where they can't actually get support if they need it.
Ms. McDonald: At Maggie's, we work from a harm reduction perspective, and part of that perspective is about meeting people where they are at. We offer services to sex workers, to youth sex workers, to male, trans, et cetera, sex workers that are not contingent on them leaving the industry. We will help people. If I speak with a youth sex worker, I will try to get them into affordable housing, which frankly there is not enough of. I will try to help them access certain things. I don't want to see kids working on the street. For homeless youth, we need to create more shelters. We need more accessible spaces.
When we have a space like Maggie's, where sex workers know they can go and there's no underlying assumption that they are victims or that they're damaged or there's something wrong with them or they're icky, or that they're going to be pushed one way or another, they feel more comfortable coming. They come to us, right? If a youth sex worker doesn't know where to go and is worried they'll be reported or sent back to an abusive home — because many homeless youth are runaways — they want to go to a place where they can actually be assisted on the ground with what they're doing.
Senator Joyal: Thank you for your testimony. I have a question for Ms. McDonald.
In your presentation, you offered to return to some sections of the bill that you feel would be damaging to persons who are involved in the sex trade. Could you identify them quickly? You seem to have a clear perception of which sections of the bill would be more damaging.
Ms. McDonald: For instance, section 213. There has been a lot of discussion this past week on section 213, which criminalizes communication. That gives police a lot of power to continue to target and harass sex work. If we want to make sex workers safer — because, yes, sometimes we are victims of violence; sometimes we are assaulted by a client or a predator posing as a client. There are statistics that say 50 per cent of women in Canada will face sexual assault at least once in their lifetime, some statistic like that. I believe it's from the Canadian Women's Foundation website.
We want to be able to contact the police, but when we have laws like this, it breeds mistrust and fear. It would be great if we could scrap the bill and use some of this $20 million to re-educate police on how to really connect with sex workers, because that will help them if they're in coercive situations or they have a bad date or they are having their money taken away from them. They'll be better able to do that.
Then there's the section about third parties and criminalizing commercial enterprise around sex work, something like that. With that, I was talking about the agency example. That means that a sex worker who might be new to the industry, or maybe not, who chooses to go and apply for a job at an agency — there are some really great agencies in Toronto. There are some wonderful employers. I know some of them, not well but peripherally. Then there are some other agencies where you know the agency is not so great, not the greatest people, and you hear horror stories. But if these were legal establishments and the workers there were able to access labour laws, the manager or owner couldn't say to them, "Well, I've got to try you out first." That's messed up. I was going to say something else, but that kind of thing should not happen in the sex industry.
We need to foster better relationships with enforcement. We need to, frankly, protect sex workers, not push them away. By criminalizing clients, you criminalize the ability, A, for sex workers to make money. We all need a job. We all need to pay our bills, so there's that part of it.
There's also the part where it impedes our ability to screen our clients. I talked about that earlier. There's no perfect screening method. But, as I said, it's something that we can use to practise safer screening techniques, safer work tips.
That's some of the information we provide at Maggie's: Here are ways that you can screen clients. Tell your friend, "I'll be back in half an hour." Or to do a safe call to a person: "I'm in this hotel room. I'll be done in one hour." Or when you're contacting the client, he would need to give you his phone number or his name or a reference from another person. They're not likely to give you any information about themselves if they might be criminalized, because you could be an undercover cop.
If you want to ask me about any other specific ones, I can go on, but I don't want to take up too much time.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: The goal of Bill C-36 is to stymie individuals who abuse women and children, force them to work and, occasionally, abuse them physically. Prostitutes' right to work still exists under Bill C-36, but the legislation may simply limit prostitution's scope, so that it would not occur around children.
I do not think the legalization of prostitution is a real option here, nor is asking all Canadians to provide compensation for the money made through prostitution.
Without passing judgment on what prostitutes do, it should be said that not only women have a hard time making ends meet. Many others have the same issues.
Ms. Matte, do you have any suggestions — aside from legalization — to put an end to the control organized crime or abusers have over those incapable of helping themselves, since they are the ones the bill aims to protect?
[English]
Ms. Matte: First of all, it might have been a translation issue, but I would like to remind everyone in the room that we're not talking about a legalized regulatory framework around the sex industry right now. We're talking about decriminalization, so just the removal of certain criminal elements that have put sex workers in danger. I think there are a lot of assumptions that this might mean certain open spaces used within a municipal context, so we need to be specific about what that means.
The purpose of the Bedford decision was to keep women safe, to keep Canadians safe. It was found that these three parts of the Criminal Code were putting people at risk and conflicting with their Charter rights.
I'm having a really hard time looking at Bill C-36 and seeing anything in that that will remedy the issue. In fact, it just replicates the same harms we saw in Bedford, almost point for point, the exact same things we saw rejected by the Supreme Court.
Bill C-36 is unfortunately not a bill that is going to help women who might experience exploitation in this business. If anything, it's going to make people who experience exploitation in the sex industry much further away from support. That's unfortunate.
There are bills, as was pointed out yesterday repeatedly, which apply to issues of exploitation. That is already illegal. Violence is still illegal, as is assault and confinement. All the issues that we associate with sex work are criminal acts in and of themselves.
What this bill is actually doing is criminalizing the consensual exchange of adult sex. What that will do, and what we've seen working with sex workers at Maggie's on the front lines, is that it pushes the industry much further underground. Sex workers will continue to work in these increasingly dangerous situations. If the government wanted to support women, this is not the bill to do it.
Ms. McDonald: If I could give a specific example, at Maggie's we have a weekly lounge that is predominantly attended by street-based sex workers, and we have different activities. Sometimes we do how to make your own website or a résumé. Sometimes we just hang out and chat.
One day we were talking about the bill. They were really concerned because they were saying, "If I can't find clients on the street, how will I pay my bills? I'm going to have to work for some asshole who can find me those clients." Sorry, pardon my French. Sorry, that was bad too. I just put my foot in my mouth.
They are worried that they would have to work with criminals, with organized crime, with a pimp in a more exploited relationship, because independently they won't be able to find clients. Do you know what I mean? Where are you going to get your clients?
Ms. Matte: I would like to expand on the comment about organized crime. What we're looking at here is almost a replication of laws that prohibited alcohol. Prohibition-era legal frameworks around access increased organized crime because it was so lucrative.
When you bring things out in the open you can deal with formalized legal procedures and labour laws. That's when people can access justice, their rights and safety.
Senator McInnis: Thank you very much. You're great communicators. The great thing about the democracy we live in is we're all entitled to our opinions and divergent views.
The government's intent is to reduce the numbers of those involved in the sex trade. We've heard people speak about the Nordic model and that it works in Sweden. It reduced prostitution by 40 per cent. Then we hear you this morning saying that it won't work, that it drives the sex trade underground. That's not what we've been told, and I'm sure that's not what Department of Justice research indicates.
The government's intent was to reduce the numbers of those involved in the sex trade using the Nordic model. Why did they do that as the government? We've heard consistently here, over the last two days, the horrific situations of individuals, youth, being forced into the trade, being forced to have sex and being addicted to drugs and all of this.
That's why we have governments and respective departments to look after Canadians, to the extent they can. That's the intent and that's what they're doing. With the utmost of respect, I do not believe that Canadians are ready to provide benefits directly to prostitutes.
Prostitutes are entitled, as any other Canadian, to health care benefits, to social services benefits, whatever benefits come with respect to housing. They're entitled to that, and that is the way it is.
That's the intent. To be candid, that is the responsibility of government. I think in this instance, after what we've heard, they are being extremely responsible in moving in this direction. I respectfully disagree with you.
You do not work to reduce the number of individuals in prostitution. That's a question. Or do you just help prostitutes who are in crisis, who have a difficulty or a problem? Is that the goal of Maggie's and the others that are here before us? Is that your goal? You don't have, in your job description or the set-up of your organization — and I suspect there is a board or whatever — it's not there to reduce those involved in prostitution. Is that correct?
Ms. McDonald: I can answer that. Maggie's is a small service organization. We're funded through the AIDS bureau of the ministry of health. We predominantly provide safer sex and safer drug use education and materials to sex workers. We distribute condoms, needles, stem kits, a variety of educational workshops, et cetera.
What we do at Maggie's is more than just helping people in crisis. We also build communities. We build connections and communities between sex workers, because when we're together we can share information about bad dates. We can use each other for safe calls. We can give each other tips.
Given that it's such a stigmatized and misunderstood occupation, it is so nice to hang out with other sex workers and connect. So that community is really important, because a lot of people aren't out as sex workers. It's difficult. You face a lot of prejudice if you identify as a sex worker. So we support current and former sex workers with their needs.
Ms. Matte: Do you have a second part of that question or do you want us to respond to that? I would like to respond to that.
Senator McInnis: Go ahead.
Ms. Matte: It's really interesting that a government's purpose is to protect its citizens. I think we can agree that what you suggested was a fact of why governments exist. That is not the same thing as aspiring to reduce the sex trade. Those are completely opposite things, in fact. The intention of this bill in our opinion, as people working directly with sex workers, is in complete opposition to the purpose of a government to keep people safe. This bill actually increases harm that sex workers and marginalized people are going to experience, so there is a difference between the intent of the bill and the effect of it.
I want to touch on the issue of Sweden. You mentioned believing that the Nordic model might reduce prostitution. There is absolutely no evidence. In fact, there is evidence that came out in I believe 2008. It was a study by the police out of Stockholm, Sweden. When the bill was put in place, the Nordic model, there were 90 massage parlours. Now there are upwards of 250, so not only has it not decreased, it has multiplied threefold. It's just happening behind closed doors.
Sweden is a place where there is no harm reduction material available because it is seen as enabling sex workers. So if you're a sex worker and you want to go and get some condoms so you can work as safely as possible, you are not allowed to do that. Agencies like Maggie's offer support for safety no matter where you are, no matter what you're doing. We're not allowed to operate that same way.
It's turning a blind eye to the issues that really impact marginalized people, and it's putting an entire population at risk, in my opinion.
Senator Plett: I think I heard in your response, Ms. Matte, that you agree that it is government's job to at least try to keep Canadians safe. I think we need to all agree that we may disagree with how that is done, but I think we need to agree that that is the intent even of government. The first paragraph of the preamble says:
Whereas the Parliament of Canada has grave concerns about the exploitation that is inherent in prostitution and the risks of violence posed to those who engage in it;
I think we want to make our streets and our cities, towns and villages safer, and we need to try to find a way of doing it, and we can respectfully disagree.
My question to Maggie's and possibly even to Stella is twofold. Ms. McDonald, you shared a little bit about what you do at Maggie's. I didn't hear in there that you do counselling. Do you have a percentage of youth that you have there? Again, we are constantly talking about sex between two consenting adults, and yet earlier in your testimony, Ms. McDonald, you did refer to youth.
What percentage of people under age 18 are in the organizations that you work with; and if you have that, do you at least counsel the youth to find a different occupation or work with them to find a different occupation, even if you don't with adults?
[Translation]
Ms. Caouette: Our approach is non-directive and feminist, and this means it is not up to us to decide what is in someone's best interests. Everyone is different and has different needs. We deal with adults working in the industry. Services already exist in Montreal for young people involved in the industry. When we come across young people in our street work, we refer them elsewhere and establish links — we listen to them and, of course, provide everyone with a number of resources, including counselling. We listen actively and refer people, but most importantly, we respect them.
We also receive funding from the Direction de la santé publique and the ministère de la Sécurité publique du Québec for the excellent work we do in the area of violence prevention and, especially, for supporting prostitutes in what they need to do, with discrimination-free access to all services. People who work at Stella are provided with ongoing training from day one. They know the community they are involved in, as they are part of it. That is known information. They know exactly what they are talking about.
People want to know what options we can provide them with, but we do not make decisions for them.
[English]
Senator Plett: Could you please also tell me if you have statistics on the number of youth?
Ms. McDonald: Sure. I would love to offer counselling at Maggie's. The fact is we have two staff members. There is myself who does most of the administrative work, and then there is our outreach worker. If we could have more funding to employ counsellors for the reasons you're suggesting, maybe we can chat afterwards. That would be great if you can pass me your card.
Senator Plett: I don't pass out the money.
Ms. McDonald: Well, you could maybe give me an idea.
What we do is a lot of referrals, so we refer people who come to us who might need help with housing or job training, counselling. We have a list of sex worker-positive counsellors that we can send them to so we know they're being sent to a safe space.
It's also important for me as working to reduce HIV/AIDS. You probably heard that the World Health Organization released a report recently saying that the number one way to reduce the spread of HIV/AIDS across the globe is to decriminalize prostitution, homosexuality and drug use.
Senator Plett: I would like to know how many young people you have.
Ms. McDonald: Oh, right. Currently we don't work with any youth at the moment. We did have a program for youth a few years ago. That was before I was there.
I am going to be presenting two different workshops. One is with an organization for LGBTQ youth, and I'm doing that in coordination with a lawyer from a legal clinic specifically for children and youth because we have been asked by community organizations to go and help them out.
There is another organization that contacted us to do a workshop because they want to find out how they can help the youth they are working with.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: Thank you very much, ladies. I would say that your testimony has the virtue of being clear, as do your positions. I respect that.
My comments will be in the same vein as those of Senator McInnis. We know that Canadians' position on prostitution is crystallized between legalization and criminalization, at least partially. Groups in favour of either position have appeared before the committee. The law must represent the opinion of the Canadian community as a whole. It is clear that liberalization is impossible, as is full criminalization.
As legislators, we have to find an option that would work for the women who practice prostitution, as well as for Canadians who have elected a government that must legislate based on their interests. Some groups have told us that full liberalization will make matters worse. You are saying that criminalization will make things worse.
If you put yourself in our position, what compromises could be made to allow you to practise your profession in maximum safety, without total liberalization, which is to some extent your approach?
Ms. Caouette: In fact, I find the Bedford decision to be a very interesting avenue which we have to think about. We need to know how we can work with the people who are in this industry, both those who have a negative experience and those who have a positive one, whatever that may mean. People work to make money, to have fun, and sometimes this can be interesting. Just as for you, there are moments that are more pleasant than others. Criminalizing people for the purpose of protecting them is to me nonsensical.
Senator Boisvenu: The Supreme Court does not adopt laws, it interprets the laws that Parliament has passed. And so we cannot say either that because the Supreme Court made a decision, we are going to decriminalize prostitution.
The Supreme Court said, "Do your homework over again." That is what we are doing now. We are doing our homework with an eye to the people, the population that elected us, the members, and the government that appointed us.
I will put the question to you again. Suppose you are elected representatives, and you have to pass an act which must find a consensus in the population between the total decriminalization you would like to see, and controlling the criminal aspect, which is what we wish and what the population wants to see. Where would that consensus lie?
Ms. Caouette: I think that we should criminalize people who commit criminal acts, such as acts of violence, and let workers work. It is as though you were criminalizing the workers in the textile industry, for instance, those at the receiving end of some exploitative situation. Would you then say, "Let us put them all in jail, we will rehabilitate them, there, that is sorted, no more problem?"
The reality lies elsewhere. Workers in any industry, including the sex trade, have the same rights as the other members of society. I do not want my children, my mother, or anyone else sent to jail because they work in the sex trade, even though many people have trouble understanding why at a certain point in their lives some people may choose that type of work.
I dare hope that legislators will consider the people in that industry to be human beings just like everyone else, and acknowledge that one day or another, for all sorts of reasons, it can happen that people work in that industry.
[English]
The Chair: Thank you. We have time for a second round. There has been some interest expressed, and we will begin with Senator Baker.
Senator Baker: So you're particularly opposed to section 213 in this bill, which will criminalize you if you impede the flow of a pedestrian or an automobile or attempt to stop in a public place or in a place that can be viewed by the public. That's the first section of 213. The second section has been changed to "communicate" in a general area where children may be present. So you are particularly concerned; you want that removed because it criminalizes the activities of a prostitute.
Am I correct in saying the second thing you also oppose are the increased sentences on those who purchase sexual services? Your message is that not all people who are termed as "johns" — although we have men and women who purchase sex in Canada and throughout the world — are bad and that you provide a healthy service that should not be criminalized? Is that a good encapsulation of what you're saying?
Ms. Matte: Yes. We oppose the criminalization of the buying of sex because it has been shown in many countries — and here in Canada. Prior to the Bedford decision, it was illegal to communicate for the purposes of prostitution, whether you were selling or buying. It was illegal to be found in a common bawdy house. There have been criminal charges that have applied to the purchase of sex before. We're finding that those put the most marginalized women further at risk, so that is why we oppose them.
Similar to the question that was just asked, this isn't really a matter of opinion but a matter of basic human rights and the right to safety and security of the person. When you find a criminal law that impedes the safety and security of a person, as we're finding with a law that criminalizes the purchase of sex and communicating the ways that sex workers use their safety mechanisms, it's unconstitutional.
Senator Baker: I think the one aspect we haven't heard much of is the fact that you provide a service to some people who actually need the service, and it should be recognized as a legitimate service for that particular person. You've given some examples, Ms. McDonald, which I appreciate. We haven't heard much about that. The assumption is made that all persons who purchase sex are bad and that it's not a healthy thing to do.
Ms. McDonald: I don't think that the purchase of sex should be criminalized whatsoever. I don't believe that purchasing sex is a violent act. I think that assaulting someone, raping them, beating them, those are all violent acts, and sex workers should be protected from those violent acts. But if I'm consenting, no matter what the constraints in my life are, if I'm deciding to do this work, I should be able to do that with whomever I choose, whether that's the fellow in the wheelchair or the guy who wants to hang out for a bit and go for dinner or go away for the weekend or, frankly, the guy picking me up on the street who wants to go to a parking lot. I think it should be my choice to decide who I want to see and who I want to sell my sexual services to.
Senator Batters: First, I wanted to clarify. Near the end of the last panel, Senator Baker brought up something about this proposed 213(1.1) public communications subsection. I think at that point he was thinking it was a lot broader in application than it was. Then I gave my response, but it was not correct in that regard.
What I've found since then is the particular part that he was referring to — and he just referenced it right now — subsections 213.1(a) and (b), which are the parts that talk about impeding traffic or pedestrians, but it's not referring to the blanket prohibition. I just wanted to make that clear for the record. Section 213(1.1) is the new offence of communicating next to a playground and that sort of thing. The previous section Senator Baker was referring to already exists; it's only being modernized by removing the word "prostitution." I just wanted to clear that up.
I wanted to ask the representative from Stella if your organization promotes programs that facilitate creating relationships with police because we've heard it is important to get vulnerable women to report violence and increase their safety. Do you do that? If you don't currently do that, would your organization consider working on that?
Ms. Caouette: We've been working on that for 20 years now. Creating a relationship with police is complicated.
[Translation]
Do you know why? It is because we are still considered to be victims, and this is the case still today with this bill, and often what we do is not taken into consideration. Thus, it is sometimes difficult for them to consider our needs when they have to enforce the law.
We have a lot of contacts. As an example, I can cite what we do with the police service in a particular neighbourhood in Montreal where there is a lot of street prostitution. The level of violence directed at my colleagues who are street workers was really worrisome. The community as a whole and that of the sex trade workers was very concerned by that, and we made some connections. One of the project action modules of that neighbourhood station is to allow sex trade workers to provide information through a call line where they do not have to identify themselves. They can report the fact that they were assaulted in a given location, for instance.
If I am in my quadrant or in a zone I do not have the right to be in, I will go and hide after the assault in a bush rather than looking for help. Thanks to the project action module and the work we did with Stella, another organization that seeks to quell the wrongdoing in the neighbourhood, we can simply call and provide information. The police can then check to see who in that neighbourhood is currently thought to be committing crimes against sex workers, make connections using the information the sex trade workers provide them, and finally put an end to the violence.
However, not everyone is comfortable contacting the police. Consequently, this year, we are continuing to build links in certain locations where people find it difficult to work with the police. The police consider that the work we do with Stella is somewhat removed from their mission, which is to repress and prevent criminality. Our perspective, however, is informed by human rights and the respect of those rights.
We work to raise the awareness of police officers. We even provide training for future police officers, students who are talking police science, and so on. We have trained several judges as well as several people who enforce the law. We at Stella believe that it is important to make people aware of the reality we experience, precisely to put an end to the violence perpetrated against sex trade workers; we would like to dispel the inaccurate picture people have of the life we live.
And so we work to ensure that sex trade workers are taken seriously, and that their files will go forward in the investigation work and not be shelved somewhere.
[English]
Senator Jaffer: I wanted to clear something up. I don't want to leave a misimpression. I understood that the Supreme Court did not tell Parliament to rewrite the law; they just struck down the law, and we could decide not to do anything. That's my understanding of it.
In reading the whole of Bedford — and I have said this many times here — what the Supreme Court says:
It makes no difference that the conduct of pimps and johns is the immediate source of the harms suffered by prostitutes. The impugned laws deprive people engaged in a risky, but legal, activity of the means to protect themselves against those risks. The violence of a john does not diminish the role of the state in making a prostitute more vulnerable to that violence.
Are you all saying that the state has a role to make sure you are all protected in the work you do?
Ms. Matte: Absolutely. That's extremely well put. The government has an obligation. We all have Charter rights regardless of whether we are lawyers or senators or sex workers. What we're asking for is our right to safety and security of the person under the Charter.
My colleague mentioned marriage. Being married to a man is extremely dangerous. It is the highest risk factor for women in this country to be in a relationship with a man. Do we think it would help them to make marriage illegal? No, it will definitely make people's lives worse. That is what we're seeing right now, absolutely.
[Translation]
Senator Joyal: Ms. Caouette, yesterday we heard a witness, Ms. Valerie Scott, who was one of the parties in the case that led to the Bedford ruling. In her brief she said that in 2001, the City of Montreal had adopted a version of the Nordic model, that is to say that their approach focused mainly on the client; she referred to the three months that followed that new approach to prostitution in Montreal — I believe you made some comments about this — and she mentioned the Stella organization specifically. Her brief said that there were three times more sex trade worker assaults, and five times more assaults with a weapon.
Could you give us your comments on that information Ms. Scott provided in her brief?
Ms. Caouette: Yes, that is true. That is what we have seen in Montreal since the Cyclope project was put in place, but also since some clean-up projects were launched precisely to target clients and not sex trade workers. Of course, when you criminalize clients you are indirectly attacking sex trade workers.
The Montreal experience shows us precisely what the impacts are on sex trade workers when you criminalize clients. First of all, there are no more clients in any given location, because they have all been arrested or driven away from the neighbourhood; the only ones left are those who have already had dealings with the legal system and have nothing to lose, and they are already known to police and are often known for having assaulting us. And so we face far greater risks.
When there are "client operations" in a Montreal neighbourhood, sex trade workers will of course get away from there. And then they work in more industrial areas far away from the usually benchmarks. When there are client- focused operations, we cannot work in groups either, because police notice us more. And so our list of bad clients always contains a record of many assaults on sex trade workers, precisely because we are in these areas and because of the climate of impunity that surrounds these aggressors. But there is certainly an increase in assaults when these client- focused operations unfold.
Recently I attended a community meeting, and the person responsible for the project module in the neighbourhood station we work with mentioned that that police station is not carrying out any client operations, nor arresting any sex trade workers, because it is aware of the impacts and is waiting to see what will happen with Bill C-36.
Given the Bedford ruling, many are not comfortable with criminalizing people who finally are not doing anything wrong. Rather, they are focusing their efforts on arresting criminals, the real ones, and not consenting adults.
[English]
The Chair: Witnesses, thank you all for your appearance here today and your testimony. We very much appreciate it.
For our next panel let me introduce Maxime Durocher, who is here as an escort for women; Tyler Megarry, Street Worker, Sex Workers Program, RÉZO; Chris Atchison, Research Associate, Department of Sociology, University of Victoria; and Konstadia Spooner, Representative of the Coalition of Body Rub Parlours of the Greater Toronto Area.
I understand you all have opening statements. Mr. Durocher, we can begin with you.
[Translation]
Maxime Durocher, escort for women, as an individual: Good day. My name is Maxime Durocher and I am 40 years old. I first of all completed a B.A. that led me to a 10-year career with computers. It is after that that I decided to become a male escort.
When I say that I like my work, people are often surprised; and yet I am not the only one. A lot of my colleagues, men and women, like their work. Like any other work, we do it for money, but for many of us it is also because we like it.
Unfortunately, appearing in public as I am doing today often leads to stigmatization, a phenomenon Bill C-36 is going to make worse because it simply links crime and prostitution. Over the past few days you have heard lawyers explain to what extent this bill is unconstitutional, so I will not go over that again, but I would like to emphasize the fact that in the past the Canadian government has not legislated the sexual practices of consenting adults, and here I am referring to homosexuality.
With respect to abortion, the Canadian government decided not to legislate to control what women do with their bodies. In the same way, I think it makes no sense to want to legislate how women or men express their sexuality. Those who are in favor of Bill C-36 often claim that they have the good of women at heart, but such an objective prevents women from making their own decisions. It is as though you are telling my friends and lovers that they have no judgment in expressing their own sexuality in a way that suits them. You are telling my clients that they will not benefit from my presence and that they are criminals. You are also denying that men such as me or other kinds of persons practise the oldest profession in the world, and there are a lot of us who do so.
Furthermore, Bill C-36 will necessitate an increase in the budgets to put in place the law enforcement necessary to enforce it, in addition to the legal costs involved. All of this will have to be paid by taxpayers until the Supreme Court agrees with us once again, since there are reasons to believe that after another long hard battle in the Supreme Court, we will once again be victorious.
For myself as well as for other male and female sex trade workers, this means a drop in income. I already began to see it when the bill was introduced by Mr. MacKay. Imagine the insecurity the loss of 50 or 75 per cent of your income overnight can cause, as well as the increased anxiety and anguish when we do not know if we are going to have enough money to make ends meet at the end of the month.
Finally, our clients are neither perverts nor criminals, they are people just like everybody else, and we are not victims; but we need the support of our society and of law enforcement so that we can work in a safe environment, in proper conditions. Unfortunately, Bill C-36 runs counter to that. It is not a tool that will help us. It is a tool that will lead to additional expenditures and marginalize us in society. Thank you.
[English]
Tyler Megarry, Street Worker, Sex Workers Program, RÉZO, as an individual: Over the 17 years of its existence, the male sex work program of RÉZO has continued to offer front-line house services and social support to male sex workers in Montreal. In general, there is relatively little focus on the realities of male sex workers in the discussions around sex work. RÉZO feels it's important to highlight that criminalization of sex work will have a direct impact on the health of the men working in this industry, as well as their clients.
The laws that criminalize certain aspects of sex work limit access to essential health and social services for male sex workers, such as sexual education and testing for HIV and sexually transmitted infections. For those who are already living with HIV and hepatitis C, this can limit their access to proper support and treatments. When following a treatment for either one of these, an adherence to a strict daily routine of medication is important to ensure success. When sex workers are criminalized and spend more time being arrested and incarcerated, gaps are created in their treatment plans which directly diminishes their effectiveness and the health of the person. The same applies when sex workers can't access medical institutions, pharmacies, community organizations or even their own homes due to legal conditions that are imposed on them after they're released from prison.
The criminalization of clients will also create environments of stress and fear for both the clients and the male sex worker. Clients will have to search for sexual services in more isolated areas and, in turn, the male sex workers will find themselves working in these areas where they risk their safety and lack control over their work environment.
When the process of selecting a client is rushed, it is harder for a sex worker to evaluate the potential danger, put in place measures of protection for themselves and negotiate safer sex and condom use. If the use of different tools for advertising and communication, such as the Internet and classified ads, are also criminalized, then a similar environment is created where they lack the necessary space to negotiate an equal and respectful encounter.
Many clients of male sex workers may also be going through their own coming out process in regard to their sexual orientation. They often will be struggling with both external and internal homophobia. Criminalizing their experiences creates stigma and reinforces the fear they experience. This further isolates these clients in their difficulties, as well as limiting their access to health and counselling services. When clients are less able to access services for their well-being, there is a direct impact on the health and safety of the male sex workers that they frequent.
Thank you.
Chris Atchison, Research Associate, Department of Sociology, University of Victoria, as an individual: I'd like to speak to three issues today, which I'm speaking about from my position as a researcher. I've been researching people who purchase sexual services for 20 years, but I'm also speaking as a research methodologist, which is part of my profession.
The issues I'd like to talk about briefly today are limiting advertisement and communication of sex workers and clients, using the law to prevent people from purchasing sexual services and the research methodology that underlies much of what has been presented to you.
On the issue of limiting advertising and communications of clients, while the communication provision that was struck down in the Bedford decision primarily affected people involved in exchanges on the street, the communications and advertising provisions of Bill C-36 have the potential to extend the noted dangers to people who work in off-street environments and, by doing so, make it much more difficult for individuals to ensure their safety.
The results of my research over the past several years have focused specifically on the effect of criminalization and of uncertainty around the law on the transactions that clients have with sex workers. What I found on the basis of this research is that clear and transparent communications between sex workers and clients resolves much of the potential for conflict. When communications are hurried, when individuals are worried about being arrested, when individuals are worried about being outed or stigmatized in any way, shape or form, when they tend to restrict their identity, they tend to be much more hurried in their conversations with workers, leading to miscommunications and uncertainties, which then lead to conflict at one level. That conflict can manifest itself into economic conflicts — i.e. robbery exchanges — or it can manifest itself, on occasion, in violence. This is primarily due to the fact that people are forced to interact in uncertain environments.
On another level, and something that we haven't heard in these testimonies before you, there is the effect it has on sexual safety, sexual health practices. When transactions are hurried — that is, when people don't have the opportunity to communicate clearly about their expectations, about what they're willing to do, their boundaries and the services that they're exchanging — the likelihood that they will use sexual safety practices gets reduced. Hurried transactions lead to careless sexual safety practice. That has a tremendous impact for the spread of HIV and STIs, which currently are not a problem in much of the Canadian commercial sex marketplace because of open communication. However, when we look at other areas around the world that are criminalized, they are very much a problem.
On the issue of using the law to prevent people from purchasing sexual services, the law is a blunt instrument. It has limited effect when it comes to general deterrence; i.e., you cannot change social attitudes by simply passing laws that say you must behave in this way.
There are two types of deterrence that we look at from a criminological point of view: general and specific. On a general level, law is meant to pass a message to the wider society, the general public. In theory, it is great that we have these laws and everybody knows about them. But what you haven't heard coming out of Bill C-36, and what I don't see anywhere in Bill C-36, is how, exactly, people are supposed to learn about these laws. Is part of the $20 million going to a massive education campaign for all of Canada and, if so, how much of that money? At a level of specific deterrence — i.e., does the law deter people specifically? — then we get into the issue of enforcement. In order to enforce the laws against people who purchase sex, law enforcement will need to quadruple their current efforts and probably multiply their budgets infinitely. The assumptions seem to be that we can curb this demand by simply doing this.
The other aspect of this is there's no provision in Bill C-36 that I've seen so far for education of people who purchase sexual services. Simply going out and arresting people doesn't actually teach them what it is that is supposed to be wrong with their behaviour.
I'd like to conclude with what I think are very important issues and those are issues of methodology. We need to pay attention to three things. First, we need to pay attention to the samples that we are relying on when we talk about the sex industry and the people involved in it. Most of the research conducted on the industry focuses on the smallest segment of the industry — i.e., street-based sex workers. By my calculations, the majority of Canadian published research looks at street-based or survival sex work. We know that makes up 5 to 15 per cent of the entire industry, which means we know comparatively little about the 85 per cent of the industry that exists off street.
Most research accounts presented before the committee come from very small and selective samples. People presenting to you will talk about their experiences with their small samples or their own life experiences. While this doesn't negate the truth of these accounts that you've heard, I would encourage you to pay attention to people in groups who are not represented in these hearings so you are better able to understand the experiences and the truths of the diverse range of people involved in Canada's sex industry.
The other issue is how we define and measure things. Within the academic ledger, and certainly within much of the testimony that has been presented here and at the Justice Committee hearings, no attention has been paid to what we actually mean by terms such as "violent" or "inherent" or "exploitative" or even "sexual services." If we don't know what we mean by these terms, how do we know that we're all talking about the same things and, more important, how do we know what we're measuring?
The Chair: Mr. Atchison, I'm going to ask you to sum up, please.
Mr. Atchison: In conclusion, the samples we use and how we define and measure key issues have direct implications on our ability to generalize findings. Many people who have spoken before you have attempted to extend their conclusions beyond what their samples actually allow. Attempts have been made to compare conditions and legal approaches in countries that have social, political, legal and economic systems and conditions that are very different from the ones that we have in Canada.
I would encourage you not to continue to see the sex industry as simple. While I appreciate that some of you might want to bring an end to the commercialization of sex and sexuality, I do not believe that Bill C-36 will accomplish this.
Konstadia Spooner, Representative, Coalition of Body Rub Parlours of the Greater Toronto Area: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I welcome the opportunity to speak with the committee this afternoon. I'm here representing a coalition of licensed body-rub parlours in the Greater Toronto Area. I started in this industry when I was 23 years old by choice and became a co-founder of a facility two years ago.
Our coalition has studied the bill and would like to state that we are not in favour of the bill as written. We must accept that throughout history sex work has never been eradicated anywhere, under any type of legal regime. I believe the government's main focus should be to ensure that participants in sex work are not exploited and to keep such activities away from residential areas. That is why I am surprised the government has taken the approach to target body-rub parlours, as they provide many benefits which align with these objectives.
Body-rub parlours have been licensed by municipalities across Canada for decades. These regulations allow for their employees to work in a clean and safe indoor location. The licensing process requires owners and employees to undergo criminal background checks, to ensure underage persons are not employed and people with serious criminal convictions are not involved in these establishments.
Municipalities also have strict zoning requirements that ensure that our facilities are located in industrial areas. In addition, we must comply with building codes and safety bylaws. Furthermore, our facilities have an ongoing relationship with local police, which allows them to interview workers to ensure they are not being exploited or working under the influence of drugs and alcohol. For example, my facility collaborates with the local police to raise awareness of sexual exploitation and to provide an avenue of support to potential victims.
Our coalition is concerned that Bill C-36 will negatively impact sex workers across the country. I would like to first point out that not all sex work is the survival sex work that has been extensively presented at this committee as well as the Justice Committee earlier in the summer. My experience, both as an employee and now as an owner, has shown that the vast majority of massage parlour employees work in this industry by their own free will. These women make a conscious and economic choice to work in this industry because of the opportunity to earn a vastly higher income than they would be able to elsewhere. Such a decision is no different from someone who chooses to work outdoors in a Fort McMurray winter to move ahead financially in life.
Specifically, we are concerned that potentially criminalizing massage parlours and their clients will force these operations into more dangerous environments with a client base who are not afraid to break the law, both of which will increase the danger to people who work in this industry. I would like to point out that this same conclusion was reached by the French Senate in June of this year when they struck down a similar provision in proposed legislation.
In conclusion, I would like to ask this committee to consider two reasonable amendments.
First, section 286.1(1) should be changed to only criminalize purchasers of sexual services where they should have reasonably known that the sex worker was being exploited, similar to what is in place in the U.K.
Second, section 286.2(5)(e), pertaining to commercial enterprises, should be amended to only criminalize such enterprises which knowingly exploit sex workers to derive a material benefit.
We believe these proposed amendments will more closely align with the stated objectives of this bill by separating exploitative and non-exploitative activity.
Thank you, and I look forward to any questions you may have.
The Chair: Thank you all for your presentations. We will begin the questions with the deputy chair of the committee, Senator Baker.
Senator Baker: Thank you to the witnesses and the presenters here today. These are very interesting presentations that you have made, which we will of course take into consideration as we examine this bill.
Let me start with the last point that was made. We appreciate that you've suggested two amendments to the bill, specific amendments relating to the definition of "sexual services."
We asked the department about the meaning, why they didn't define "sexual services" in the bill, and the response was that the definition of "sexual services" is adequately being provided in existing case law. What is your reaction to that statement by the department and how do you interpret that?
Ms. Spooner: There's difficulty in offering a service when you don't know whether the service you're offering is legal or illegal, and where is that line drawn? I'm here representing body-rub parlours. I'm in agreement that this bill is not going to do what it has set out to do, other than criminalize prostitutes, and if not prostitutes, then the establishments they work for and the people who seek their services.
All this will do is endanger women even more. There is no definition of "sexual service" at this time, so these women often work under conditions where they don't even know what is legal and what isn't legal. It's a very flawed system right now.
Senator Baker: There's a lot of case law, to my memory, in which the police go in and pose as clients to body-rub parlours. I've read a lot of these judgments over the years as to whether or not a sexual service was being provided in these parlours. Your point, though, is that you are asking for an amendment that is reasonable in that the establishment itself would not be held liable for any illegal activity that took place without your knowledge. Is that your point?
Ms. Spooner: No. We take responsibility for the people who work for us and the actions they perform. I guess the bigger issue is that we want to distinguish that if we have an establishment and we have women working for us, there are already regulations in place that ensure, through the licensing process, that we do not hire anyone under the age of 18. I personally don't hire anyone under the age of 21. They have to have a criminal background check. They must be legal to work in Canada.
That, in itself, helps mitigate a lot of the issues with drawing girls into the industry who are being exploited. I conduct thorough interviews with young women before I hire them, to ensure that they are there of their own free will, and there are certain questions I ask which help determine that.
So I guess my bigger issue is that, as an establishment, I don't want to be criminalized for having a business that employs these women. Because under this new bill, and depending on how the court defines this legislation, I could be seen as a madam or a pimp.
Unlike madams and pimps, we do not receive any money from our girls. The customer pays a door fee when they come in, and then there are massage services which are posted in the room. The girls can only offer posted services, nothing above and beyond that. Any gratuities they receive are simply because the customer enjoyed their service, not because there were additional services offered. We do not get any part of what is paid to the girls from the client.
We also have no outside involvement with these girls, outside of them working for us, unlike pimps, who keep a tight control over their girls, inside work and outside work. We have very limited contact with our staff outside of work. They're free to live their lives. They're very independent women. They have other jobs. They go to school. They have their own businesses, many of them.
Senator Baker: We will question the officials when they come back — and I'm sure all committee members will agree to do that — to make sure that your legitimate concerns are understood in the legislation, if not in changing the legislation. I'm sure the government doesn't intend to criminalize activities — or they shouldn't intend to criminalize activities that should not be criminalized. We will check with the department officials as to their exact definition of these services, or propose amendments.
Ms. Spooner: Our concern is that the justice minister's own comments and the government's technical paper have specifically targeted massage parlours and strip clubs. Massage parlours have been named in this legislation. We would not be here today, perhaps, if that were not the case, but they specifically named massage parlours. Meanwhile, we work very hard with our municipality to ensure that our staff are safe and are working in a secure, safe environment, zoned away from schools.
Senator Baker: And licensed.
Ms. Spooner: And licensed, correct.
Senator Batters: Thanks to all of you for being here today. To Tyler and Maxime, I just want to say that because prostitution is more typically men buying women's services, it's unfortunately too easy sometimes to overlook the presence of men and boys as a commodity in this industry. So thank you very much for appearing here today to bring that to our attention. You offer a perspective that I don't think the House of Commons Justice and Human Rights Committee heard, so that's something that uniquely the Senate is bringing today.
I wanted to ask a question, first of all, to Mr. Atchison. When you testified before the House of Commons Justice Committee in July, you went into a little bit more detail, so I reviewed that, about what your particular research found and your methodologies. So that I understand correctly, it's my understanding from re-reading your testimony that you do research with what we would think of as johns, people who purchase sexual services. You referred in your House of Commons testimony to having done two projects. You said there were 50 in-depth interviews and 2,004 surveys.
Also at the House of Commons, it sounds to me like the particular research that you do is that these purchasers of sexual services self-report to you their experiences with prostitutes. I quote from what you said to the House of Commons committee, "In terms of their instigation of physical violence, less than 5 per cent" of the clients in your studies "have presented" or admitted to, basically, "physical violence in varying forms." It's a self-reporting mechanism; is that correct?
Mr. Atchison: Yes, no different than the self-reporting mechanisms used to gauge the violence that's experienced or perpetrated by people working in the sex industry.
Senator Batters: Right. But you're asking the people who are alleged, generally, to have perpetrated the violence, as opposed to the prostitutes who might have been experiencing the violence; is that correct?
Mr. Atchison: Could you clarify your question, please?
Senator Batters: Your in-depth interviews and your surveys are not generally with the prostitutes; they're generally with the purchasers of sexual services, correct?
Mr. Atchison: I've done research with all parties in the sex industry over the past 20 years. My particular focus is on people who purchase sexual services, not just "johns," which I'll add is widely seen as a derogatory term these days. It also camouflages the diversity of the people who are involved in purchasing sexual services because it presents these individuals as if they are all Caucasian, heterosexual, typical males, and they're not.
Senator Batters: The two projects you were talking about to the House of Commons, 50 in-depth interviews and 2,000 surveys, what percentage of those were clients, purchasers, and what percentage of those were prostitutes?
Mr. Atchison: The second study was part of a larger study called Understanding Sex Work, where my colleagues and I looked at all aspects of the industry. My colleague Dr. Cecilia Benoit had 267 interviews with sex workers.
We also looked at managers, owners and operators of commercial sex venues in six major cities. We looked at regulators, policy makers and police. We looked at intimate partners of sex workers and at clients.
Senator Batters: Do you know what percentage was of purchasers of sexual services? I'm trying to get a sense of whether someone is self-reporting, because I noticed that the Chair of the Justice and Human Rights Committee asked you whether you follow up and if there's a matching process. Do you follow up with the person they apparently bought the sexual service from to find out if that particular purchaser was telling the truth, if they were or were not violent in that situation? You answered at that point that at this juncture that would be impossible.
I'm trying to find out how much of a potential methodological problem the self-reporting aspect of this research would be.
Mr. Atchison: Like I said, no more of a methodological problem around self-reporting than we see with the existing research on sex workers' experiences within the industry.
You seem to be asking whether we should have a double standard of the acceptance of the truth of someone's claim just because of their status as a purchaser or seller of sexual services. As researcher, I find that peculiar.
I go out into these spaces and construct elaborate methodologies for data collection. In addition, you overlooked the fact that I've also done hundreds of hours of ethnographic observations in various settings.
We construct these methods out of existing and tested social and health science measures. We do a lot of work validating, crosschecking peoples' accounts. We attempt to look at how those accounts compare and contrast with people in the industry.
The question about whether or not one follows up with a particular sex worker or with somebody's intimate partner I thought was rather interesting because it wasn't a question that was ever asked of anybody doing research with sex workers. No one said, "Did you go and track down the client to get her or his side of the story?" It seems to me like there's this interesting double standard in terms of what it is we're going to accept as truthful evidence.
Senator Jaffer: Thank you very much for being here today.
Mr. Megarry and Mr. Durocher, I don't know if you've had an opportunity to read or hear what the minister had to say at the Senate hearings. Did you have a chance to hear that?
Mr. Durocher: A bit, yes.
Senator Jaffer: It was my perception that the minister was under the impression that all sex workers are victims and they're exploited — these are not his words, they're my words — and we need to save you guys. Is that correct? Is that a correct impression?
Mr. Durocher: I'd say personally, we don't need to be saved. I don't need to be saved. All my friends in the sex work industry don't need to be saved. It's their decision. Sometimes they wish things were different and that they could call 911 when needed.
Right now the dangers and risks are simply seen as being part of the work, and it's not. Bill C-36 won't help with that because then our clients are deemed criminals. Basically the bill says that if we call 911 the police will say you invited a criminal in your bed so they're not going to help us more.
The help we need is to have law enforcement on our side. If you criminalize part of it, then law enforcement won't be able to be on our side. They will be trying to track down our clients, and even those that are sweet. In my experience, my female clients are just sweet women. I know from talking to my friends that they have a lot of male clients who are just sweet. They're the sweetest thing you can find and they wouldn't hurt a fly and are always asking if everything is okay.
It's not 100 per cent of the time, and that's when it's incorrect. It's when we want to press charges that we need to have a backup and be able to go to the police and have them treat our cases the same as they would treat any other case. That's not the case. With Bill C-36 it's not going to be the case either.
We're going to have to suck it up. It's not going to change. We're still going to be anxious about what we do. As has been said, if they are criminals then we'll have to go underground and have lesser contact with them to be able to determine if they are good clients or not.
Not being able to advertise correctly will also undermine this because we're not going to be able to have as good a contact and it's going to be difficult to maintain a trail of emails and see what kind of client it is and make a decision whether we want to see that person or not. It's not helpful.
We don't need saving. What we need is to be part of society just like everyone else and have law enforcement on our side.
Somebody who perpetrates an aggression or a rape is already a criminal. We don't need it to be stated in any other way, certainly not in a way that engulfs everyone and people who are quite innocent and sweet.
Mr. Megarry: Maxime brought up a lot of the points that I wanted to bring. It's important to remember that the laws that are being proposed, everything is so broad and the industry is huge. There are so many different people who work in it, so many different people who use the services, as well as clients. To put it all into one basket like this has these effects on people and it's generalizing and it's not working.
As far as for male sex workers who have been left out of this discussion very often, it can be because male sex workers don't fit the ideal image of a victim, and that's important to bring up as well. When people are pushing these laws and putting a certain thing forward, they already have an idea in their head of what they want to sell and what they want. Often male sex workers are pushed aside because they don't fit into that. Their needs and interactions with their clients are different. Everything about how they work is different.
There are similarities, yes, but it is so broad. There are different profiles of people and contexts of work. It is all so large, so to bring it in and use these words like everyone is a victim and everyone is like this and everyone works like that, is just not relevant. It does not work for what we see.
I work with street-based sex workers a lot, but also with other sex workers in other industries: escorts, dancers, massage parlours. They are all so different and very unique people. It won't work to put it all into one thing like this, and these laws can cause these problems.
Senator Plett: Ms. Spooner, is there a difference between a body-rub parlour and massage parlour? Is that the same thing?
Ms. Spooner: It's the same thing. Our attendants are actually body-rub attendants. That is what is on their licence.
Senator Plett: Do your body-rub parlours sell sexual services?
Ms. Spooner: No, they do not.
Senator Plett: What's the problem then? If they do not sell sexual services, it's not illegal to get a massage.
Ms. Spooner: Exactly, however the justice minister stated in his comments, and it is in the government's papers, that body-rub parlours are being targeted under this legislation. What kind of impact it will have we do not yet know. It may be up to the courts to decide how to read the legislation.
All I know right now is that our clients are scared to patronize us once this bill passes. Our fear is that business will slow down. It will no longer be feasible for businesses like ours to stay in business.
Our girls are not going to give up their livelihood. All they will do is go work independently. Unlike this bill suggests, they are not going to hire bodyguards. They're going to be working out of condos. Condo buildings will be saturated with girls working as massage attendants in their own homes close to schools, close to residential areas, which is not the case with our businesses. We are zoned the way we are structured. We are regulated and have been for the past 20 years.
Senator Plett: It's certainly not my place or intent to argue with you or debate with you, but I would think that, for myself, I would feel more comfortable going to a massage parlour after this law was in place because I would feel I was going into a legitimate massage parlour and get a massage as opposed to at this point when I don't know for sure what I'm going into and what will be the chances of somebody standing there with a cellphone and taking a picture of me going into where I legitimately want to have a massage.
Ms. Spooner: Correct, and I hope that is the case and I hope many of our clients feel like you do. However, we are here today because we have been named in this legislation. Specifically body-rub parlours and strip clubs have been targeted in this legislation. That is why we are here today.
Senator Plett: Again, a strong difference between massage parlours and strip clubs.
Ms. Spooner: Yes, absolutely. Just like there is between male escorts and female escorts. We are an adult entertainment industry. I don't refer to us as a sex industry, not that there's anything wrong with the sex industry. We are all in it together. We all want the same things, but I do like to make the distinction that the people who work for me are not prostitutes. They are body-rub attendants.
Senator Plett: That's not entertainment, then. You said you were an entertainment industry. That's not entertainment.
Ms. Spooner: Our clients think we're quite entertaining.
Senator Joyal: This bill is premised on the assumption that offering sexual services is exploitative of the person, whatever the context. It is the first paragraph of the preamble of this bill, and as the minister and his officers said here two days ago, this is the philosophical basis for the whole structure of this bill.
But from what I hear from you, it doesn't seem that the people you know who perform those activities have been pushed into it because of all kinds of factors that would have put them into an exploitative situation. Can you comment on this?
Mr. Durocher: Yes, absolutely. The thing is that this bill, like you said, is intended to stop trafficking and basically wanting to equate prostitution with trafficking. The two are very different.
Personally, I think a lot of my compatriots would support amendments to this bill, the two proposed by Ms. Spooner, the one that would say you are targeting clients and saying that purchasing is illegal. We would like it to be amended to purchasing being criminal if the person is under age or if the person is being coerced. Those two things, I don't know why we need this bill particularly to do that, but they could be amended to restrict it being a crime to purchase sex from a minor or from somebody who is coerced. The same thing is that it would be illegal to have a massage parlour or any agency that would have underage people or coerced people, so it would be illegal to have those two.
So maybe agencies would pay more attention to the people they're hiring and maybe the purchaser also would look more into the age of the person that provides the service. It would be very important to clarify that they are restricted to those things. We want to abolish this basically because I'm against that too.
If a minor came to see me, somebody who is even close to being 20, I would ask for ID. I would do the same thing that in Quebec the SAQ does for someone who wants to purchase. If they come close to being 23, they ask, even if 18 is the law. Automatically they do so, and I would do the same because I'm against minors being in the industry. I'm also against being coerced into the industry. I'm doing this of my own free will and this should be how it works.
Mr. Megarry: We're talking about the need for protection for these people who are being exploited, minors who are working in the industry. But like we were saying, the industry is very large and the laws for those situations will be different than what goes on between two consenting adults, people who do choose to get into the industry. They are two different things and those laws should exist. It is just this law that is being proposed throws everyone into the same barrel and that doesn't work. It criminalizes the entire act around it whether you're 51 years old or whether you're younger. It's important to bring out that they are two different things.
Like Maxime said, there should be things in place to protect people who are being exploited and forced into things, who are under age, but they're different and that needs to be looked at separately. They are complex and they can't be all thrown into one thing where it's all summed up together because that doesn't work. Some people will face repercussions for it while other people gain and it just won't work. It needs to be separated and dealt with each on its own.
Senator Joyal: Mr. Atchison, in your research, have you paid attention to the aspect of the bill which is about victimization? As I said, the first paragraph is about "exploitation that is inherent"; those are the words of the bill. Of course, the corollary is that if it is exploitative, there is a victim. Have you ever made any evaluation of the perception of the persons who are involved in offering sexual services as victims? Is it part of the psychology of somebody, or is it something that might happen in certain circumstances such as poverty? Generally, in terms of your research what kind of conclusion can we draw from your own studies?
Mr. Atchison: I have paid particular attention to that over the past eight years. I have been very interested in trying to understand how power works, the dynamics of power and when abuses of power occur, an awareness of abuses of power.
What I can say on the basis of the people I've observed and have come in contact with is that there is no demand for coerced bodies. The simple fact that comes through the interviews that I have done and the surveys is that somebody who might be doing this against their will, at a very sort of crass level, takes away the enjoyment of the interaction that the person purchasing sexual services is having.
Only a complete psychopath would enjoy having sex with somebody who is bound and gagged and crying and clearly there against their will. I've never come across a single person in an interview or a survey who said that that's what they get off on. For that matter, when I ask people about their preferences, when I ask people and dig deeper to get into issues around what it is they're looking for or want to get out of this, a lot of it comes down to a need for some sort of connection at an emotional level, at a level of intimacy. If somebody you are with is there by force, they're going to be incapable of making that type of connection.
On a second issue related to that —
The Chair: We're not going to have time to get into the second issue. We will move on to Senator Dagenais.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: Thank you to our witnesses. My question is addressed to Ms. Spooner. I listened to you very carefully. As a former police officer, I have some trouble with the image you want to project of your business. I do not think your comments hold water when you say that you do not know what goes on behind the door. I know that you are not under oath here and that this is not a court.
Seriously, would you be surprised if some former masseuses said that when you hire them, you provide training mostly on what to say to clients, and eventually to police officers, should that arise?
[English]
Ms. Spooner: Are you implying that the girls are offering full service?
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: No. You say that in your business, people do so freely and that you do not know what goes on behind the door. I am saying as a former police officer that you might be surprised to learn that former masseuses state that when they were hired by massage parlours, they received training that focused mostly on what to say to clients and eventually to police officers. There is a lot of training on what they should say when they are asked for explanations. That is essentially what your training centres on, and you did not mention that.
[English]
Ms. Spooner: We do not train our girls on what to tell police. On many occasions, we have had police come in and interview our staff. Their main focus has been on ensuring that the girls are there of their own free will and are not being coerced and to make sure that there are no drugs or alcohol on the premises and that everyone there was legal to work.
All of our doors have peepholes as part of the bylaw. Police and bylaw enforcement can come in at any time and look through those peepholes to see what's going on. The doors are never locked; it is against the bylaw to lock them.
I'm not so naive as to think that it's beyond possibility for two adults in a room to engage in an activity that I wouldn't approve of, but all I can tell you is that I train my staff, and I only hire girls who are comfortable performing full-body erotic massage, not full service. I trust my staff, and if ever I do find out that someone is performing services above and beyond what we are comfortable offering, I let that individual go. I have fired girls in the past.
Again, I don't want to imply that there is anything wrong with prostitution. It's just that I know the massage parlour business; I'm not in the brothel business. I conduct my business as a massage parlour.
Our girls are comfortable offering those services, and again, through a thorough interview, I make sure I hire girls who are only comfortable offering full-body erotic massage. If I knew someone was offering extra services, I would let them go because our customers come for many reasons, but the majority of them come because they know that no matter what, it's a safe environment, the girls are there of their own free will and there are no additional services offered. It's good clean fun. That's how they see it. It's about as good clean fun as you're going to have in this industry.
Senator McIntyre: First of all, thank you for your presentations. I have two quick questions. My first question is directed to Mr. Atchison.
In your summary of the legislation, you make reference to the $20 million in new federal funding. As you rightfully pointed out, the emphasis will be on funding programs that will help individuals exit prostitution. I note that you support this initiative, regardless of the exiting intent.
However, you add on page 7 of your summary that the vast majority of those you surveyed are not in this situation, meaning the exiting intent. Could you briefly elaborate on that, please?
Mr. Atchison: The notion of exiting is an interesting one. We don't apply it to any other industry or any other occupation. We don't have exiting strategies for police or politicians who desperately want to get out of police work or politics.
When we approached investigating people working in the industry, my colleague Dr. Benoit looked extensively at what it is that people need. Another colleague of mine, Ms. Raven Bowen, did research specifically in this area, which I counselled on and which is about this transitioning in and out of the industry. Quite often, people drift back and forth through this industry. It's not this notion of "I'm here today and gone tomorrow." It is "I can be here today and I can come back a month from now." So there can be temporary work in this area.
From what I understand and from what I know of people providing front-line services to individuals who are involved in the sex industry, the greatest need isn't about exiting; it's about help with poverty, help with child care and help with other issues that are more pertinent in their life than exiting.
Mr. Megarry: As someone who does front-line work with sex workers full time, three and a half years at this organization, I can echo what he's saying and it is true. With the issues that people deal with, exiting is rare. In the work I do, I help people leave the sex industry, if that's their choice, if that's what they want. I can help them do that. People may want to stay in and work safer or leave at some point, but it's not realistic right now because they need to have a place to live first, they need access to health services first, all sorts of things.
So I think the idea of just putting out this exit strategy for everyone isn't going to work because everyone is at different places, and they need to determine where they are themselves. Sometimes there are really basic needs that need to be met first, and some of those needs are just respect, being treated as an individual and being able to have access to medical care, to find a home and not be looked down on and to have child care and be able to do what you need to do. Looking at what he was saying, it's not realistic to imagine that everyone wants to exit and that exit programs are the answer because that's not reality for all people. The people who are working right now, that's not meeting them where they are and it's not realistic of everyone in the industry.
Senator McIntyre: I think the emphasis of the $20 million will be on people to exit, but there are other community programs to help street workers.
Bill C-36 contains 49 clauses, and the House of Commons Justice Committee proposed an amendment to clause 45. The proposal in the amended clause 45.1 is to review Bill C-36 amendments to the code after five years. Very briefly, could I have your thoughts on this, please?
Mr. Durocher: Five years is a long time. As it is, legal processes will be put in place — it's going to be fought right off the bat because it's going to hinder our ability to earn a living. In five years, it may have already gone through at least one court system, and in seven to ten years' time, it will be back at the Supreme Court. So five years is too long. We already have research from around the world that has presented how unbeneficial it is. In Sweden, I've seen research that makes clients criminals, and that is actually detrimental.
Senator McIntyre: Some people have told us that they agree with the five years because we have to give time for the legislation to sink in. That's one argument. Thank you.
Senator Frum: Mr. Atchison, did you have the opportunity to hear any of the testimony before this committee yesterday?
Mr. Atchison: Yes.
Senator Frum: Oh, you did. So you heard Casandra Diamond, Bridget Perrier, Larissa Crack and Diane Matte? You heard their testimony?
Mr. Atchison: Yes.
Senator Frum: And you still say you are unfamiliar with the interest in coerced sexual activity?
Mr. Atchison: No, I don't say that I'm unfamiliar with it. What I do say —
Senator Frum: No, you're right; you said there was no demand for it. Do you stand by that statement?
Mr. Atchison: What I do say is that among the people that I have conducted research with, there is no discernible demand for that. Among the hundreds of hours of observation in various communities, I have not detected any support within the communities of people purchasing sexual services that encourages that. As a matter of fact, it's quite the opposite. There is a normative fabric within many of these communities where people gather to communicate that sex with people under age is not approved of. It's shunned within the community. Acts of violence and aggression are shunned within the community.
Senator Frum: I don't know what that means. I don't know what you're talking about.
Mr. Atchison: What it means is when — discussion forums full of people who are involved in the sex industry form online and they communicate about their experiences in the industry. If somebody steps forward and says, "I'm looking to have sex with somebody under age," the entire community comes down on that individual and says that is unacceptable.
Senator Frum: That's how it's done?
Mr. Atchison: That's how it is done.
Senator Frum: If I want to have sex with somebody under age, I tell the community that's what I want?
Mr. Atchison: No, what it shows is that a large section of the community does not accept that as appropriate behaviour, that there are people out there that definitely have those types of desires, in any population, regardless. Within this particular population, they're as much of an anomaly as in any other population.
Senator Frum: You said there is no demand for it.
Mr. Atchison: Well, I would also extend one thing. To make a distinction between somebody who is a client and somebody who is out to violently abuse, it seems that the two are getting very conflated. People who are out to rape and murder are not clients. They are not people who are interested in adult consensual sexual services.
Senator Frum: As you said in your presentation, we haven't had a good definition of "violence," and rape and murder obviously qualify, but there's a wide spectrum of violence. As we heard from our witnesses yesterday, putting out a cigarette, pulling your hair, all kinds of other things I don't need to list that are very violent things, or words — words can be violent — insulting language, violent language.
Mr. Durocher: If I may step in, I've been in contact a lot with different groups. First of all, we're talking about sexual activities between consenting adults. I don't know if you're aware of it, but some adults like BDSM activities. You cannot judge somebody for their sexual behaviour between two consenting adults. Violence, as you define it, is not consenting. Anybody who does something like that, we have blacklists. We blacklist our clients that show any kind of violence, that rip off the condom before penetration or are just suspicious. We have our blacklists. We don't consider those as clients, and they are the minority.
Mr. Megarry: What you're bringing up when you're talking about this violence that people can face — pulling hair, cigarette burns, people being raped, stuff like that — this is something that can happen to anyone. It doesn't just happen to sex workers. These laws exist for people. So making these other laws created for sex workers is making them be, like, "Well, you aren't like these other people," but they should fall into the same category.
If someone is raped, whether a sex worker or anyone, they should have a right for that not to happen. Laws against violence exist, protection and stuff like that exists, and so these laws that are coming in are making it so the choice someone makes is putting themselves at risk, so it is kind of like their fault that this is happening, but that's not true.
These laws exist already. If someone does get raped, there are repercussions for that. There can be. These things exist, and separating them dehumanizes sex workers and doesn't make them feel like they fit in with the rest of society. The same laws don't apply to them, but they should be applied to them.
Senator Frum: I don't think there's a law against treating someone in a degrading way during sex. I don't think that law exists; so that law gets covered by this bill.
Senator Baker: I have found this conversation very interesting. I'm wondering, Mr. Durocher, as a sex worker, there are some sex workers who are male, and of course they have clients who are female. Is there widespread violence that you encounter from women? Do you encounter any violence from your women clients?
Mr. Durocher: From my clients — this is personal — I've never encountered violence. What we tend to encounter is something different. It's more like psychological violence. Let's say the client is not in the best possible state. Let's say she had a few drinks, and then at some point she flips out because she feels uncomfortable, unsafe or anything, and then has a panic attack. We have to deal with that. It puts a lot of stress, and she can cry out and be really upset. So we face more psychological violence than physical violence, and we try to deal with this calmly, to the best of our capabilities to help bring the client back to a calmer state, and so exit the date.
Senator Baker: There are very popular television shows that are watched in Canada by a great many people that are reality shows of gigolos.
Mr. Durocher: One is called "Gigolo" and another one is called "Hung."
Senator Baker: These are reality shows that Canadians watch, and the clients are women. Those are reality shows that are very popular with ordinary Canadians. How prevalent is the practice of women who hire male gigolos or prostitutes? How prevalent is that in Canadian society and how prevalent do you think it is in American society?
Mr. Durocher: American society or Canadian society, or I think Occidentals by and large, it's not extremely prevalent. It's not really in the mindset of most women that we offer that kind of service, that it is possible, unlike the mindset of males where it is as old as time that if they want they can have services for a fee.
It's not as prevalent, but women have been exploring their sexuality more and more as years go by. They made extreme advances in their right to vote in the early 20th century. The equality in pay is getting there. Women are getting stronger and stronger in our society, and they're seeing that their sexuality should be the equal of a man's sexuality. In our society often we say men are very strong, sexual beings, and we should be there and it's our duty to explore, whereas women are shown as more sexy but not sexual. They should be sexy but they shouldn't be sexual.
Now there is a counterbalance to that. Slowly it is coming back to be more equal on that level. Of course there is always the rhetoric that if a woman wants to have sex, all she has to do is go to a bar and pick up a guy. But more and more women are realizing that that strategy in itself is not a very good one because the guy in the bar would probably think about his own satisfaction first and the end result will probably not be very satisfactory. That's why a professional service is more satisfactory.
Senator Baker: This bill will really crack down on these women. This bill will put these women in jail.
Ms. Spooner: We have seen a large increase in females and couples seeking out our services in recent years; so it is females also along with their husbands that are also seeking our services.
The Chair: You operate on your own. You're not part of a business?
Mr. Durocher: Yes.
The Chair: How important is advertising to you with respect to attracting clients?
Mr. Durocher: It's very important because I need to expose myself, my personality online. By the way, women don't like to have explicit pictures; it turns them off. But still I need to present my personality, because most female escorts will offer their services directly and men will come and answer their ads. But for females, I need to be out there, to have a Twitter account, forums I participate in. I need to engage them in other manners which are non-sexual, which is just presenting my personality and showing them that I'm there. I need to be out there on the web so that they can find me and see what kind of person I am. Then they'll take their time, usually. They can sometimes take months to decide who they find interesting or if the gentleman will fit what they want to encounter.
It's very important to me and to a lot of people in the industry, because it helps us make better connections. If you have access to a wider spectrum of potential clients, then you can filter out those you don't want. Often, when you get weird wording in the email, and you get like, "I'm not too sure I want to see that person." You say, "I'm sorry, but I don't feel comfortable," and then you turn and go to the next one. But the narrower the field is, the less demand you get, you jump to more icky situations and you'll just feel downright disgusting sometimes giving services to certain clients.
Of course, with Bill C-36, you narrow it down to people who are not afraid of being criminals. What does that leave? Those who are exactly criminals, those who would perform criminal acts like violence, rape, murder. They are already doing something wrong so they don't care if being a client is being criminal.
Senator Batters: Mr. Atchison, just so I'm correct on this, you're a research associate with the Department of Sociology at the University of Victoria. You're a sociologist.
Mr. Atchison: Correct.
Senator Batters: No legal training.
Mr. Atchison: No.
Senator Batters: I don't think you were able to get to this at the end of your opening statement. I was aware of it because a written copy was passed out to us. At the end of your opening statement, you wanted to tell us that you recommend that this particular bill be sent to the Supreme Court of Canada for a reference or review. I don't agree with that.
I'm wondering if you heard the testimony yesterday afternoon during the infamous panel. In that panel we had Ms. Bedford's lawyer sitting right beside her, and we had Professor Benedet. The two lawyers were from completely opposite sides of the equation on this particular issue. Yet, when they were asked whether we should have a reference to the Supreme Court of Canada on this particular issue, both of them said that they did not think that we should have a reference. Ms. Bedford's lawyer was fairly junior, but Professor Benedet had 20 years of legal background on exactly these types of issues. Would it surprise you that both of those lawyers had completely the same response on that particular point of view?
Mr. Atchison: It wouldn't surprise me. My encouragement to send this to reference is to save needless suffering and countless amounts of money that the government is going to have to spend over the next 30 years. It took 30 years of court challenges to have the current laws that were in question overturned. It could very well take another 30 years. That means that the government is going to be spending millions and millions and millions of dollars for something that they could conceivably bypass by simply sending this to the Supreme Court for review.
Senator Batters: In the meantime, if we don't have a law passed by mid-December, then we would have those particular provisions that the Supreme Court has suspended striking down not be in place at all any more. We would have significant gaps in the prostitution law in Canada. Aren't you a little bit surprised by the fact that Ms. Bedford's lawyer had that particular approach when you would expect her to perhaps have the same viewpoint as you did about this?
Mr. Atchison: Perhaps; different legal reasoning.
I also beg to disagree. Not putting forward the new laws doesn't leave significant gaps. We have existing laws in the Criminal Code to cover many of the instances of abuse. We have laws against murder. We have laws against rape. We have laws against assault in existence. We just need to actually have a space where they can be enforced. We need to have police that actually take the complaints of people involved in the sex industry seriously and respond to them and treat them like humans.
Senator Jaffer: Mr. Atchison, I really appreciate the paper you've done and your point of view. The one reason I appreciate it, and my colleagues will correct me if I'm wrong, is that we heard from many different people from many different facets on this bill, but the one group of people we haven't heard, for obvious reasons, is from people you study, the clients.
When the minister testified here, he spoke about prostitution being illegal. I don't quite agree with him. He talked about giving immunity to the seller, but not to the purchaser. I don't know if you've had discussions with people who purchase. Would you be able to share with us how they are reacting to this?
Mr. Atchison: At present, within all individuals in the sex industry, there is this climate of uncertainty that is contributing to a climate of fear, the fear of the unknown: What's going to happen; what's going to happen next, in December or January? The conversations I've had with people who purchase sexual services are, "Am I going to be a criminal? I've already been labelled a pervert by the minister." That probably accounts for why you don't see very many people who purchase sexual services wanting to step forward and testify. They are already being shamed, shunned and stigmatized, so it would be very surprising to see somebody walk in here and say, "Yeah, shame, shun and stigmatize me more."
When it comes to the law, fear of the law, and my research has shown this, creates the very same conditions that I was speaking about earlier in terms of an unwillingness to be transparent and clear in communications. It causes people to be rushed. It causes people to want to hide their identities, which is a key safety mechanism for both sex workers and their clients — being open and knowing, "Okay, this is your number; this is where I can contact you." This whole notion of the potential of them being criminalized is shaking them up.
Moreover, I find it interesting that it's also causing many people to move advertisement offshore, out of Canada. The very act that this is going to stop, no, people are already doing exactly what I would figure, the same thing that happened when we saw enforcement of street level provisions: They're basically moving. They're moving, and it's displacing the activity. People are thinking, "Okay, how can I continue doing this," but still within a climate of fear.
Mr. Megarry: With the work I do, I work very directly with clients as well. In the work I do, I work for sex workers' health and wellbeing and all that, and the health of their clients directly affects them as well. We're looking at these laws, and you have a good point about the interactions seems rushed in this climate of fear and no one can really be honest about what's going on, and there needs to be honest discussions. If we are talking about protection and sexual education and safer sex use, that's a discussion that needs to be had, and there needs to be a space for that to be had. Many of the male clients who access male sex workers, like I mentioned, can be going through a coming out process and aren't necessarily sure about their sexual identity and having these problems as well. Maybe the health services they are accessing don't actually answer any of these questions that they need to know about safer sex practices between two men. They don't feel comfortable going to services for gay and bisexual men because they're not necessarily there. That's not where they're at and maybe that's not how they identify, and that's okay as well. But there needs to be the access for them as well, to have access for services for testing, for counselling, for their own health, and that does affect the health of the people around them, the people they work with, their friends, their families or other partners they have outside of their encounters with sex workers.
Criminalizing them or criminalizing their client, no one can say what's going on. No one can have these discussions to talk about these things, to talk about health and safety. A lot of the discussion we have been having has been about violence towards people, but we're leaving out things. We're talking about HIV rates, hepatitis C, STIs and stuff like that as well. This is something that needs to be addressed. People need to be able to have these conversations and feel free to have access to condoms. Workers like myself need to be able to go out and speak with people and have a space where we can talk about this and accompany them to resources and the services they need so they can feel secure and safe and make good decisions and can follow treatment plans if they are on treatment. They can get tested. Criminalizing either one will still create the environment where these conversations can't happen. It limits access. We're talking about violence but also health. If we're looking at public health, we're looking at larger scale things with what's going on right now with all the advancements for the treatments of hepatitis C and HIV and how to control these viruses and bring down transmission rates. A lot of it is through treatment, testing and counselling, and we need to be able to offer those services to people. These laws will further push this away and close that. I think that's something as well.
Senator Joyal: Thank you, Mr. Megarry.
Mr. Atchison, you were interrupted in giving me your answer on the issue of victimization. If you remember what we were discussing earlier on, could you come back with the second part of your answer?
Mr. Atchison: Absolutely. The other thing I wanted to get at was this issue around victimization. Clients play a very important potential role in reporting abuses. Quite often, people who are purchasing sexual services are in a position to witness potential things going on. They go into an establishment and see that something doesn't seem right, that the worker presented to them doesn't seem like she's there by her own free will and volition. With all due respect, in situations where these are run by unscrupulous individuals, it's not the managers and owners who will report that. As we've heard from testimony, quite often that particular individual providing the service isn't in a position to do so but the client is. One of the things that my recent research shows is the willingness of clients to do this.
Senator Joyal: Mr. Megarry, you're a street worker, so I would understand that you certainly have encountered a police presence on the streets in the areas where you might be working.
Mr. Megarry: Yes.
Senator Joyal: What is your perception of what the police will do now that they will have the responsibility, according to this bill, to chase the customer?
Mr. Megarry: What they will do exactly I don't know, but I think when it comes to the effects it will have on the people it will still be very similar to what's going on right now. In doing sweeps like this we see the effect it has on neighbourhoods, making people feel less safe, not have the moment to discuss, be incarcerated more often, coming in and out of the prison system and not getting the support they need.
Whatever they end up doing now, if it comes to really striking down on street-based sex work, the clients and whatever, it will still have the same effects. There will still be these issues where people will be coming in and out of prisons; they will be dealing with incarceration, not getting support and not getting heard. It will just keep driving things more and more underground instead of having people feel like they have a space where they can discuss the issues and problems and bring stuff forward.
I'm not sure if that answers your question.
Senator Joyal: It does, partly.
Mr. Atchison, the second last paragraph in the preamble of the bill is that people who are involved in the sex trade will want "to report incidents of violence and leave prostitution," if we try to understand all the objectives of the legislation. That's one of the key elements. If you want to reduce prostitution, because that's the stated objective of the bill, police forces have a primary role to assume. It seems to me that when we look at the practicality of the bill, in fact it will produce the reverse situation. It will further push the person who offers sexual services outside the police ambit; in other words, they don't want to encounter the police because they feel in the end they will be caught in the justice system. What is your evaluation of the bill in relation to that objective?
Mr. Atchison: I agree with that contention completely. I don't say it pushes it underground, which we've heard. It pushes it out of view, pushes the people's interactions out of our view, and makes it increasingly impossible to detect where things are going wrong, where people are experiencing some form of victimization.
As I said before, if you are labelling clients as criminals, and then we've heard de facto that prostitution is illegal, so de facto you're also saying that the people who provide those sexual services are party to a criminal act and so they're also criminal by proxy. That just creates a climate of mistrust. Why then would anybody in their right mind believe that somebody will turn to the police and say, "Yes, I now trust you to report this"? That doesn't seem realistic to me.
When it comes from the vantage point of clients who again could report these things and also experience their own forms of victimization, they will be even less likely to report those types of instances. Then basically what we have is this gets resolved at a street level. Personally, I'm not very comfortable with people resolving things with street justice and I don't think anybody would be. That equates to violence.
Senator Plett: Mr. Atchison, part of the preamble also says:
Whereas it is important to protect human dignity and the equality of all Canadians by discouraging prostitution, which has a disproportionate impact on women and children;
You have been emphatic here on saying that you haven't been able to find out where people actually want to be violent. Senator Frum asked you and Senator Batters asked you. We heard Senator Frum give you names. We had a lady here yesterday who said that at the age of 15 she had to have 15 stitches in her cervix and could not have children because of the way she had been abused. We have heard over and over and over about this. And then you sit here and you somehow self-righteously say that we shouldn't be calling those people perverts.
We haven't called one person around this table a pervert, nor have we any of the other sex workers present here this week. I don't believe they are. I believe they are trying to eke out a living. These two men right here are trying to make a living. I haven't called them perverts.
Robert Pickton is a pervert. He's a killer. I won't apologize for calling him that. And for you to suggest that we should somehow call them something else and for you to sit here and suggest that we don't have violence, continued violence, I find objectionable.
Is this the way you usually conduct yourself when people disagree with your point of view?
Mr. Atchison: The way I conduct myself when people disagree with my point of view? I listen to what they have to say. I acknowledge that there are truths in different accounts, that there are many different accounts of the sex industry, but I also acknowledge that it was Minister MacKay who outright called all people who purchase sex perverts. He set the stage for that comment, not me.
The Chair: We have run out of time and I want to thank you all for being here and offering your perspectives on this important piece of legislation.
Members of the committee, before we adjourn, next week we're hoping to conclude our pre-study of Bill C-36 on Wednesday. We're still in the process of firming up the appearance of a number of witnesses, but certainly the intent is to complete the pre-study next Wednesday and then move on to the tobacco legislation on Thursday. Further information is to follow.
Thank you very much.
(The committee adjourned.)