Canada (Attorney General) v. Bedford, 2012 ONCA ... - York University

Page: 60working at a venue under the prostitute‟s control at which she can take steps toenhance safety.The advantages of “home field” are well understood byeveryone. The non-exploitative conduct criminalized by the living on the availsprovision and the communicative conduct criminalized by the communicatingprovision contribute in an equally self-evident manner to potential risks toprostitutes.[135] In holding that the negative impact of the legislation on prostitutes isobvious, we do not mean to understate the complexities and difficulties of thesocial problems associated with prostitution. However, those complexities andthe many possible legislative responses to them are not germane to the questionat hand. Like the application judge, we are satisfied that the current legal regime,and specifically the challenged Criminal Code provisions, interferes withprostitutes‟ security of the person.[136] We turn next to the alleged processing errors. The appellants submit thatthe application judge made three errors in the way she approached or processedthe evidence, particularly the expert evidence. First, counsel for the AttorneyGeneral of Canada argues that the application judge did not properly exercisethe role of “gatekeeper” in assessing the admissibility of some of the expertevidence offered by the respondents. We disagree. The application judge wasalive to the principles governing the admissibility of expert evidence and the risksassociated with that kind of evidence: paras. 104-113. With the agreement of all