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

Page: 70turning more directly to the argument that there exists a broad legislativeobjective of eradicating or discouraging prostitution.[161] In our view, this court‟s decision in Mara is not determinative of theobjectives of the prostitution legislation. We say this for two reasons.[162] First, Mara did not deal with prostitution offences, but rather, with theindecent performance provision in s. 167 of the Criminal Code. Section 167 isfound in Part V, which is titled, “Sexual Offences, Public Morals and DisorderlyConduct”.The prostitution provisions are found in Part VII, which is titled,“Disorderly Houses, Gaming and Betting”. The court in Mara held that the kind ofactivity carried on in the tavern in that case, although falling within the terms ofs. 167, was also a form of prostitution. It therefore referred to the reasons ofLamer J. in the Prostitution Reference as an aid to interpreting s. 167. It was notan authoritative comment on the objectives of the prostitution provisions. Whilethere was a constitutional challenge to s. 167 in this court, the challenge was onthe basis of vagueness and the part of the reasons relied upon by the AttorneyGeneral of Ontario was not part of the constitutional analysis.[163] Second, when the Mara case reached the Supreme Court, the court found,at para. 37, that the harms associated with prostitution were only marginallyrelevant to a determination of what constituted indecency.In the SupremeCourt‟s view, the degradation and objectification of the female performers was