Thank you for that opportunity.
I understand the need to have the committee. For people who have worked in this area for a number of years, on various fronts, it's not a lot of time.
I shared with the committee the three calls to justice of the national inquiry and a couple of them from the Pivot report. One of the other ones that is important is recognizing the complex realities of indigenous people who sell and trade sex. Specifically, the federal government should increase broad-based support, including through funding to indigenous communities for self-administered education and vocational training, housing programs, income assistance, and health and addiction services based on indigenous traditions.
In Canada we have 613 first nations. In Ontario alone we have 13 indigenous languages, so one indigenous group cannot say what other indigenous groups' languages include or don't include. It's important to recognize the complex reality of indigenous people in that context of historical legacy and the way that children have been sexually exploited even by government-sponsored programs, whether it was intentional or not.
We also need to invest in supports to low-income sex workers.
You're probably wondering, “Ms. Big Canoe, I just asked you this question and you're not giving me an answer as it relates to PCEPA specifically.”
Part of the solution is not carving out the specific law that is not going to address the issues that we know exist. Investing in supports for low-income sex workers, whether they want to do the sex or not, would also be an important thing. Poverty and discrimination are what drives a lot of choices within industries and outside of them. Using criminal laws to deny people their income sources is not the way to assure genuine autonomy. Instead, people experiencing poverty, discrimination and low income, like low-income sex workers, whether they wish to do other work or not, need access to more substantial income assistance benefits; safe, affordable housing; and culturally appropriate education, opportunities and health services.
In a nutshell, we often try in law to craft something that we believe is addressing a “problem”, but sometimes we're creating additional problems or barriers for people, like life and liberty ones or accessing the resources they need to choose to exit or to choose to continue within a safe way of exercising their lives.
Thank you for the opportunity to allow those recommendations.