Lyra McKee – The Justice Hack – Voices of Justice Magazine 2021

#VOICESOFJUSTICE 

LYRA MCKEE 

#VOICESOFJUSTICE

PACE SOCIETY’S LYRA MCKEE 

PAGE 22

WE BELIEVE 

THAT LIVED 

EXPERIENCE IN 

THE COMMUNITIES 

THAT WE’RE 

SERVING IS 

INVALUABLE TO 

PROVIDING THE 

BEST SERVICES 

POSSIBLE FOR 

OUR MEMBERS 

Lyra McKee is Co-Executive 

Director of PACE Society. 

Can you tell us about PACE 

Society? 

PACE stands for Providing 

Advocacy, Counselling and 

Education. We are a for, by and 

with sex workers organization 

that was founded in 1994. We’ve 

always been open to sex workers 

of all genders, and we take a 

very broad definition of what sex 

work is. That includes escorting, 

camwork, stripping, sensual 

services, pretty much anything 

the term can commonly be used 

to define. We provide support 

services to sex workers primarily 

in the Downtown Eastside, but 

also Greater Vancouver. 

#VOICESOFJUSTICE

Why do you believe the by and for sex 

workers model is advantageous? 

We prioritize hiring sex workers and 

community members with lived experience 

in a variety of categories such as BIPOC 

sex workers or community members, and 

trans, non-binary and two-spirit community 

members, because we believe that lived 

experience in the communities that we’re 

serving is invaluable to providing the best 

services possible for our members. We use 

the word members to be more inclusive than 

clients. All of our services are delivered better 

when peers are involved in the creation and 

delivery of those services. 

How might the individuals you serve face 

barriers to access to justice? 

Up until 2013, sex work was criminalized 

more directly, and then once Bedford 

happened, the Supreme Court case turned 

over those sex work laws and the Harper 

government instituted the Protection of 

Communities and Exploited Persons Act. Sex 

work is now asymmetrically criminalized, 

meaning sex work itself is not criminalized, 

but many aspects of the work are, such as 

purchasing sex. Clients, advertising and 

third parties procuring are all criminalized. 

There’s a criminalization aspect that prevents 

sex workers from organizing together, from 

protecting each other, from accessing full 

labour rights and unionizing. And then 

there’s also stigma in society on sex work and 

sex workers that impacts access to justice 

and compounds with other types of stigma 

and marginalization, such as racism and 

transphobia and entrenched poverty. 

A variety of compounding barriers – including 

criminalization, stigma, lack of access to the 

financial means to get legal representation, 

and lack of access to information or resources 

– prevent access to full labour and human 

rights for many sex workers. 

Can you elaborate on some of the specific 

challenges involved in accessing legal 

representation? 

I think it really depends on who you’re talking 

about. Not all sex workers face economic 

marginalization. Some sex workers have 

other jobs, or some sex workers earn quite a 

bit of income from sex work, but a lot of sex 

workers, especially street-based sex workers, 

often face a high level of isolation and 

marginalization, as well as a lack of steady or 

sufficient income to access legal services. 

Because of criminalization and stigma, sex 

workers may have a lack of information about 

their legal situation and the details of the 

sex work laws that are used against them. 

There’s an element of secrecy or isolation 

that’s involved with the work. I would say 

that it’s also a barrier that resources just 

aren’t always readily available. Some streetbased 

sex workers don’t even have access to 

the internet, or the space and time to do the 

research to find the right lawyer or find the 

services they need. 

What is PACE’s Gender Self-Determination 

Project? 

The Gender Self-Determination Project is 

open to anyone who approaches us and wants 

to get their name, legal name, or legal gender 

A VARIETY OF COMPOUNDING BARRIERS – INCLUDING CRIM 

MEANS TO GET LEGAL REPRESENTATION, AND LACK OF ACCE 

FULL LABOUR AND HUMAN RIG 

PAGE 24

markers changed in British Columbia. We 

provide the fees associated with name 

changes, and support on filling out all the 

different forms and letting people know 

where to send them. It’s a really exciting 

project, and it definitely works to mitigate 

some of those barriers that some sex workers 

face, or community and trans community 

members face, to getting name changes, and 

gender marker changes. 

It may seem small, but if you’re getting a job 

somewhere, all of the documents that your 

employer sees have your legal name and 

gender marker on them. It’s a matter of not 

just safety, but also comfort for people in 

terms of employment, in terms of accessing 

social services. These days, these little 

things that most people take for granted are 

really, really vital and inform every aspect of 

people’s lives. 

Could you address what Canada v. 

Downtown Eastside Sex Workers United 

Against Violence and Bedford v. Canada 

were about and any ongoing advocacy or 

research related to them? 

PACE was able to intervene with a number 

of other organizations, along with Sheri 

Kiselbach – who used to work at PACE – in 

Bedford V. Canada, which was challenging 

the previous sex work laws that prohibited 

solicitation and bawdy-houses and all these 

different prescriptions against sex work. 

Sheri was able to get standing to file 

a challenge to the sex work laws as a 

former sex worker, and then she joined 

the Bedford case because it was already 

going on in the Supreme Court. Those laws 

were struck down, which was definitely a 

victory. Unfortunately, it was a conservative 

government that then instituted some new 

laws that, it could be argued, were just as 

harmful as the previous ones. 

We continually look for advocacy possibilities 

at the municipal, provincial and federal 

levels, both toward the government and 

to health authorities and various different 

organizations and entities. We’re part of 

several research projects ongoing and 

looking at new ones as well, and continually 

look for different ways to advocate for 

decriminalization of sex work. There are 

some new developments coming up that I 

can’t really talk about yet, but exciting things 

are happening in the law reform advocacy 

area. It just kind of never ends for us. 

Can you elaborate on how those new laws 

could arguably be just as harmful? 

Even though, technically, sex work is not 

criminalized, pretty much every aspect of 

work is criminalized. So it prevents sex 

workers from ensuring each other’s safety, it 

prevents sex workers from screening clients 

appropriately before taking dates, it prevents 

sex workers from having rights for the refusal 

of dates that seem risky. They can’t file taxes 

for fear of the government wanting to know 

who their clients are or where their money 

comes from. It’s very complicated, but I 

would say that, because so many different 

aspects integral to how the work progresses 

are criminalized, usually, it’s really just as 

bad as it was when prostitution itself was 

criminalized. 

INALIZATION, STIGMA, LACK OF ACCESS TO THE FINANCIAL 

SS TO INFORMATION OR RESOURCES – PREVENT ACCESS TO 

HTS FOR MANY SEX WORKERS 

#VOICESOFJUSTICE

Lyra McKee – The Justice Hack – Voices of Justice Magazine 2021

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