The Hon. Gary Anandasangaree
Minister of Public Safety
269 Laurier Avenue West
Ottawa, ON K1A 0P8
Dear Minister,
Today, on World Day Against Trafficking in Persons, we urge you to expedite a new permanent national strategy to combat human trafficking. The realities of human trafficking call for deliberate, coordinated action, both in Canada and around the world.
We ask you to take steps to end human trafficking in our communities, following the commitment made in the Liberal Party platform
Canada Strong.
The new national strategy should include funding for victims’ services, ongoing training for law enforcement and those in the criminal justice system, and efforts to raise awareness and increase prevention. These are critical in the fight against human trafficking, alongside legislative efforts. It is crucial that Canada prevent trafficking, protect victims and hold perpetrators accountable.
The Government of Canada has long recognized trafficking is a serious violation of human rights and that it is most effectively addressed through a comprehensive, coordinated and multi-faceted national approach. However, Canada’s previous national strategy to combat human trafficking has ended without another one in place. Time-limited strategies can result in gaps in funding, policy and response.
Human trafficking is not just a serious crime with devastating impacts, it is also one that is often hidden, difficult to detect and hard to prosecute. As the UN states in its description of this year’s
World Day Against Trafficking, law enforcement and the criminal justice system play a vital role. It states, “Ensuring justice for survivors requires holding perpetrators accountable and providing a victim-centred approach to protection, support and access to justice.”
Prostitution is the most common end point for trafficking in Canada. Prostitution and sex trafficking are not the same, but they are inextricably linked. As the National Strategy’s
Annual Report 2020-2021 noted, ”Human trafficking for sexual exploitation continues to constitute the majority of trafficking cases encountered by law enforcement across Canada, most often in large urban centres and with most victims being Canadian women and girls, and Indigenous women and girls being disproportionately represented as victims.”
In his decision on the challenge of Canada’s prostitution laws in
CASWLR v Attorney General of Canada, Justice Goldstein found “a clear link between sex work and human trafficking.” The decision noted there is “considerable evidence that many sex workers are manipulated or coerced into sex work or trafficked while in it.”
A Canadian national strategy to combat human trafficking must necessarily have significant focus on exploitation in the commercial sex trade, in all its forms.
Traffickers are motivated by profit. As long as there is a demand for paid sex, there will be traffickers to guarantee a supply of women, girls and boys are available for purchase. It is this demand that fuels and supports sex trafficking. Decreasing the demand for paid sex is a crucial element of any efforts to eliminate trafficking for sexual exploitation.
The Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act (PCEPA), which takes direct aim at eliminating the demand that traffickers supply, is critical to Canada’s efforts to fight all forms of sexual exploitation. PCEPA must be upheld, fully implemented and consistently enforced across jurisdictions.
As promised in the previous national strategy, the government should also move ahead with establishing a Survivor Advisory Committee to ensure their expertise and experience informs the government’s efforts moving forward.
We urge you to work quickly to establish a permanent strategy that includes a survivor advisory committee, stable funding for victim services, and training for law enforcement and frontline personnel.
Sincerely,
Julia Beazley
Director, public policy
The EFC’s Centre for Faith and Public Life