Red Light Labour: Chapter 8, ‘Misrepresentations, Inadequate Evidence and Impediments to Justice: Human Rights Impacts of Canada’s Anti-Trafficking Efforts"

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Authors: Dr. Tamara O'Doherty, Dr. Hayli Millar, Alison Clancey (SWAN), Kimberly Mackenzie (SWAN)

"[In this chapter we] expose some of the main consequences of a single narrative and exaggerated representations of human trafficking, not only for SWAN and the immigrant and migrant sex workers it supports, but also in relation to the ability of the criminal justice system to successfully prosecute human trafficking cases and to adequately respond to all trafficked persons."  

Barriers to Justice for Migrant & Immigrant Sex Workers: A Community-Led Research Project

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Author: Kimberly Mackenzie 

"The findings are indicative of the many barriers to accessing the criminal justice system im/migrant sex workers experience, and show a variety of concerns and disadvantages to reporting these kinds of violence." 

Im/Migrant Sex Workers, Myths & Misconceptions: Realities of the Anti-Trafficked

Authors:  Kimberly Mackenzie & Alison Clancey  

"Over the past decade, we have seen a re-framing of im/migrant sex work as human trafficking. The re-framing did not emerge from im/migrant sex worker; rather, it has been imposed on them, alongside a variety of oppressive and stigmatizing characterizations. With this advocacy toolkit, we hope to educate various groups about the realities facing the women we support, and about the negative impacts of well-intentioned anti-trafficking efforts."

The Palermo Protocol & Canada: The Evolution and Human Rights Impacts of Anti-Trafficking Laws in Canada (2002-2015) 

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Authors: Drs. Hayli Millar & Tamara O'Doherty

in collaboration with SWAN Vancouver Society

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"The prevalence and need for pressing attention devoted to combatting human trafficking in Canada was a political theory that received institutional approval and was subsequently assigned to Crown counsel and police departments to enforce — or create."

Chinese Sex Workers in Toronto & Vancouver

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Author: Dr. Julie Ham

"Fear of law enforcement and fear of arrest are the two most commonly reported reasons for not seeking assistance from law enforcement. Ninety-five percent of all respondents stated law enforcement would not be a strategy they would use to seek assistance."

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Do Evidence-Based Approaches Alienate Canadian Anti-Trafficking Funders?

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Authors: Dr. Julie Ham, Noushin Khushrushahi & Alison Clancey 

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"SWAN's relationship to anti-trafficking funding remains ambivalent, particularly given the history of anti-trafficking measures that have jeopardized the rights of sex workers."

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Criminalising Clients Endangers Asian, Immigrant and Migrant Women in Sex Work - Brief to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee on Bill C-36

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Author: Dr. Julie Ham 

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"Our first objective is to remind the Committee of the stereotypes and racialized assumptions that continue to harm Asian women in sex work. The first is the false notion and highly racialized stereotype that Asian women are often trafficked into sex work or are in the country as undocumented migrants. Our experience and recent research with immigrant, migrant and racialized sex workers in Vancouver strongly disputes these stereotypes."