SEX WORK SHOULD BE DECRIMINALIZED, REPORT SAYS

Legal society calls for same rights and protections for sex workers as for others

KEVIN TILLEY THE PEAK SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY

BURNABY (CUP) — Prostitution should not only be decriminalized, but sex workers should be afforded the same rights and protections as other employees, says a report from Vancouverbased Pivot Legal Society released June 20.

Entitled “Beyond Decriminalization,” the report examines the legal ramifications of decriminalizing sex work in B.C., and proposes that sex workers be entitled to employment insurance, have the right to unionize, and be subject to all health and safety regulations currently in place for other employees in the country.

Katrina Pacey, a lawyer with the Pivot Legal Society and one of the authors of the report, argues that the proposal of decriminalizing prostitution in Canada was insufficient because “we realized that there was a whole wide range of legislation that would become applicable because [sex work] wouldn’t be a black market anymore.”

Rather than impose a heavy licensing scheme and restrict sex work to a “red light district” — as in Amsterdam — the authors of the report advocate for a more liberal program where brothels would operate like other businesses and sex workers like other employees.

The society claims that this would offer greater protection for both sex workers and their clients.

This is the Pivot Legal Society’s second report on sex work and law reform. In 2004, they released a report arguing that sections of the Criminal Code concerning prostitution should be repealed because they violate the human rights of people involved in sex work.

“Our laws are killing people [because] they’ve created the social and legal milieu in which predatory, misogynist men can prey on women,” said John Lowman, one of the authors of the report and a professor in criminology at Burnaby’s Simon Fraser University.

Lowman pointed to the steady rise of deaths in the sex industry in the last few decades as evidence.

Robert William Pickton, who has been charged with killing 26 women from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, is one of the manifestations of this trend. Sex-industry serial killers are suspected to be operating in Edmonton and Niagara, and hundreds of women are missing from the Prairie Provinces. According to Lowman, violence against sex workers continues to be a problem across the country.

“I think the urgency is so overwhelming in terms of the extraordinary situation we’re seeing in many Canadian cities . . . We’re beyond the words ‘urgent action is needed,’” said Lowman.

While numerous models exist around the world in terms of dealing with sex work, the Pivot Legal Society is looking specifically to the model recently introduced in New Zealand as the one closest to the ideal.

“It’s a model that is being strongly supported by sex workers internationally. [New Zealand] decriminalized it in 2003, but didn’t impose really heavy regulation as a result of the law reform,” explained Pacey.

The result, they say, has been an environment that is relatively safe and open to monitoring, while protecting the human rights of the sex workers at the same time. The need to look for alternate models with regard to sex work is all the more urgent given the 2010 Olympics, which will be held in Vancouver.

Other Olympic host cities such as Athens experienced an upsurge in sex work during the games, while the 2006 World Cup in Germany has attracted a reported 40,000 sex workers into the country to meet the increased demand during the event.

The authors of the report were puzzled by Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan’s conspicuous absence from the launch of the report, especially given his claim that sex work would be one of his primary issues as mayor.

Should the report fail to elicit the appropriate response from government, Katrina Pacey and the Pivot Legal Society have an alternative strategy in mind: “One thing we’re working on is going before the court with a group of plaintiffs and constitutionally challenging the criminal laws in Canada [concerning prostitution].”

A successful constitutional challenge would have the courts strike down the sections of the criminal code concerning prostitution.