An Examination of the Impacts of the Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act on Community-Based Organizations
In Canada (AG) v. Bedford (Bedford Ruling), the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) ruled that three of the provisions included in Canada’s Criminal Code, ones that criminalized certain acts related to prostitution, violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms (the Charter). The SCC determined that the Government of Canada (GoC) needed to make some fundamental legislative changes in order to bring Canada’s prostitution laws into harmony with the Charter. If the GoC failed to make legislative changes within one calendar year, the provisions in question would have been stricken from the record. The GoC successfully made legislative changes within the designated timeline by passing The Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act (PCEPA). Little research exists that shows the impacts of the PCEPA on the Community-Based Organizations (CBO) who were actively involved with the consultation phases of both the Bedford ruling and the development of the PCEPA. This thesis seeks to fill this gap by offering a qualitative exploration of how the operations of sex worker-focused CBOs were impacted by the implementation of the PCEPA. To accomplish this, the researcher used qualitative research methods to explore whether or not participants’ day-to-day operations, funding streams, and delivered programs and services changed to conform to the PCEPA. The conclusion is reached that the PCEPA is a problematic response to the SCC’s ruling, one which potentially made the assisting sex workers more difficult for CBOs. The PCEPA has undermined the field of Canadian sex work advocacy, eroded the forms of capital available to CBOs, and created an environment of anxiety, and legal uncertainty.
Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research, University of Regina