Canada SC lifts restrictions on prostitution
Prostitution supporters gather at the Canadian Supreme Court in Ottawa
Canada’s Supreme Court struck down three of the country’s anti-prostitution laws on Friday, including bans on brothels and street solicitation, finding that they violated the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and violated sex workers’ safety.
The unanimous 9 to 0 decision will go into effect in one year, allowing Parliament to provide other avenues to regulate sex work.
Prostitution is not illegal in Canada, though it has been deemed against the law to live off the avails of another’s prostitution, as was street soliciting and operation of brothels. Opponents of the laws said they created a dangerous climate for sex workers. The court found these restrictions were too broad and disproportionate to the law’s goals.
Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin said a law banning “safe havens” for sex workers – who often did not have a choice but to work in the sex trade – puts them in danger.
“The impugned laws deprive people engaged in a risky, but legal, activity of the means to protect themselves against those risks,” she wrote. “It makes no difference that the conduct of pimps and johns is the immediate source of the harms suffered by prostitutes.”
One current prostitute and two former sex workers spurred the challenge, saying such work would be safer if they were allowed to screen clients and operate in brothels with bodyguards.
One of the plaintiffs, former dominatrix Terri Bedford, said the decision was a “great day for Canada, for Canadian women from coast to coast,” according to media. Another plaintiff, Valerie Scott, said the ruling humanizes those in the sex trade.RT News
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