In February 2018, I had the privilege in accompanying Kelly Franklin, from Farmtown Canada, and MPP’s Laurie Scott and Jeff Yurek to speak at the Ontario Legislature, Queen’s Park. The event was a press release to raise concern about the challenges in accessing funding and licencing for treatment facilities for minor-aged victims of sex trafficking. My message was edited for time and content. The following is the uncut version of my speech.
Advocating for child sex trafficking victims, at Queen’s Park, Toronto, 2018.
The human rights crisis of minor-age sex trafficking is on the rise in Ontario because we have been ill-informed and too slow to respond. Despite a dramatic increase in arrests of human traffickers, the problem remains because the demand for paid sex goes largely unchecked.
Sex trafficking is an industry that is predicated on gender violence. The greatest risk factor is, simply, being a girl. The perpetrators are men who pay for access to the bodies of young victims. They destroy countless young lives in this province, and the lack of intervention is shameful.
Premier Wynne and Attorney General Naqvi, Ontario trails behind other provinces in providing legislation to protect vulnerable young people from exploitation. In 2002 Bill 86, Rescuing Children from Sexual Exploitation Act, was intended to protect trafficked minors. Without the legislation, police and child protection workers were greatly limited in their ability to intervene. With a change of government in 2003, Bill 86 was mothballed, and eventually tossed into the trash by the then Premier on News Years Day, 2013. After all these years, nothing has changed.
In 2014 the federal government finally gave the provinces effective tools to address illegal sex industry activities with the Protection of Communities and Vulnerable Persons Act (Bill C-36). While these new criminal code provisions largely focus on prostitution activities, their greatest potential is to significantly cut the volume of human trafficking in Canada. The effectiveness is conditional on aggressive enforcement against the purchase of sexual services.
Ms. Wynne, you evidently have a soft spot for the patrons of this violent criminal industry. The day after these new federal protections came into force you held a press conference to discourage Ontarians from abiding by the laws, and police from enforcing them. As a result, sex trafficking continues, unabated, in this province, and impacts untold numbers of minor-aged victims.
Mr. Naqvi, when you were about to take up the portfolio of Attorney General, I was called to your office to provide guidance for Ontario’s 2016 Strategy to End Human Trafficking. I insisted that that you take steps to reduce the inflow of new sex trafficking victims. Because that did not happen, the demand for girls remains high and the industry is booming. To make matters worse, I’ve discovered that police agencies are being actively discouraged, by your Crown Attorneys, from charging sex buyers. Mr. Naqvi, your so-called plan to end human trafficking won’t even slow it down. Instead, you’ve created a make-work project that ensures police and social workers will have an endless supply of broken girls and women to rescue and restore.
Ms. Wynne and Mr. Naqvi, you were given a golden opportunity to protect Ontario’s young and vulnerable from human sex trafficking. Your failure to do that has resulted in an unacceptable human toll. The June 7th general election will bring new opportunities to address this important human rights issue. Whatever the political landscape, from that point on, I hope and pray we will have learned from our negligence, and, as a province, finally get it right.