during much of our work we have identified many areas where systems policies and practices are creating barriers for sex workers trying to access meaningful supports. it is our hope that systems who do engage with the sex industry will begin an audit of current polices and procedures related to the protection of, enforcement against and the stability of the sex industry and then engage in an inclusive process to capture or design best policies and practices for sex industry engagement to ensure fair treatment and that the barriers of the past are eliminated.
people could in theory begin this work now. budgets are not really required in my opinion this work could be initiated by the governmet bodies responsible such as;
canadian border services
police services municiple,provincial and federal
corrections canada
health authorities
NGO's providing support to sex industry workers
tax and revenue canada
victims serivces departments- provincial and federal
municipal staff in business licensing departments, social planning, housing,etc
housing authorities;
it could be something like this;
policy and procedure mannual revisions
in the past, sex industry workers have experienced unitended bariers to accessing supports when they are a victim of a crime, when they are seeking financial support,exiting support, support in the form of information related to our work, information on government programs availible or have been unintentionally negatively impacted by enforcement actions;
Goals
for all government departments and divisions who engage the sex industry to work towards;
- Increasing and improving incident reporting
- Identifying predatory offenders
- Increasing numbers of sex industry workers accessing supports
- Improvement of communication between sex industry workers and government agenicies incharge of their protection
- Creating professional development materials about the sex industry for government employees
- Facilitating greater success in the prosecution of those who commit violence against sex industry workers
- Improving direct outreach to the sex industry
Overall objective
To undertake an evaluation of existing policies and practices that are associated with the sex industry.Ultimately, to identify the strategies currently in use by government systems and supports and those recommended by other stakeholders, to create a best practices document and facilitate increased safety for the sex industry community.
Specific Objectives
- to design and host a series of workshops with all stake holders including sex industry workers; residents and local businesses impacted; staff of government department) to identify thepolicies and practices that are currently use.
- The workshops will outline the practices in use, any challenges faced by government or support staff, and any institutional constraints affecting meaningful access to supports and protection for sex industry workers . In addition, we will identify unintended impacts of policies and practices in use on the sex industry community and provide a venue for discussion on how to address both the needs of the govenrment/support agency and the needs of sex industry workers.
this could allow for an inclusive process for identifying and correcting the problems of the past and could allow people to begin to move towards protection of sex industry workers now. many of these policies are not directly related to the criminal code provisions but more related to systematic bias against sex industry workers trying to access support.
remember, inclusion is key and i believe sex industry workers and/or prostituted people hold the key to meaningful and sustainable solutions to filling the gaps created by past policies and procedures. only if all sides engage will we be able to design better approaches the reflect the experiences of all workers and government support staff who also express frustration at some of the limitations caused by current policies and practices in use.
what do people think?anyone willing to try?