{"id":247331,"date":"2020-03-07T00:33:17","date_gmt":"2020-03-07T05:33:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=247331"},"modified":"2020-03-07T00:33:17","modified_gmt":"2020-03-07T05:33:17","slug":"ontario-announces-human-trafficking-strategy-pledges-additional-202-million","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/03\/07\/ontario-announces-human-trafficking-strategy-pledges-additional-202-million\/","title":{"rendered":"Ontario announces human trafficking strategy, pledges additional $202 million"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_194519\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-194519\" style=\"width: 1920px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/47573918_1955533541234267_1104190036867284992_o.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-194519\" src=\"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/47573918_1955533541234267_1104190036867284992_o.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/47573918_1955533541234267_1104190036867284992_o.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/47573918_1955533541234267_1104190036867284992_o-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/47573918_1955533541234267_1104190036867284992_o-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/47573918_1955533541234267_1104190036867284992_o-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/47573918_1955533541234267_1104190036867284992_o-20x13.jpg 20w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-194519\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Premier Doug Ford says the money will fund a variety of measures, including an expansion of the provincial police force&#8217;s child exploitation unit and a public education campaign. (File <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/FordNationDougFord\/photos\/a.647221798732121\/1955533534567601\/?type=3&amp;amp;theater\">Photo:<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/FordNationDougFord\/\">FordNation\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>CATHARINES, Ont. &#8212; Ontario says it will spend $202 million more over the next five years to fight human trafficking in the province.<\/p>\n<p>Premier Doug Ford says the money will fund a variety of measures, including an expansion of the provincial police force&#8217;s child exploitation unit and a public education campaign.<\/p>\n<p>He says part of the money will also be dedicated to victims&#8217; services, including supportive housing for human trafficking survivors.<\/p>\n<p>The Progressive Conservative government says about two-thirds of\u00a0Canada&#8217;s police-reported human trafficking violations take place in Ontario.<\/p>\n<p>Ford says human traffickers make an estimated $50 million annually by targeting children, adding the average age of recruitment for victims is 13.<\/p>\n<p>Describing the practice as \u201cmodern-day slavery,\u201d he said the additional funding is necessary to protect families.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt&#8217;s a tremendous amount, but as far as I&#8217;m concerned it can never be enough,\u201d Ford said of the new funding during a news conference in St. Catharines, Ont., on Friday. \u201cNo child should ever live in fear of violence or exploitation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Tories promised to develop a strategy to address the issue last November, and the new funding comes in addition to $105 million the province is already spending to combat human trafficking over the next five years.<\/p>\n<p>Ford said the strategy will also involve looking at legislative tools for prosecuting such cases.<\/p>\n<p>He said he intends to raise the need for tougher penalties and stricter bail conditions with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at a meeting next week.<\/p>\n<p>This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 6, 2020<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CATHARINES, Ont. &#8212; Ontario says it will spend $202 million more over the next five years to fight human trafficking &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":194519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-247331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=247331"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247331\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":247332,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247331\/revisions\/247332"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/194519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=247331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=247331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=247331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}