London Abused Women's Centre

Published purpose

This 30-month project with the London Abused Women's Centre will develop and implement an intervention practice that will include trauma-informed support, services and resources for victims and survivors of human trafficking for sexual exploitation. This will advance knowledge and enhance empowerment supports for at-risk populations and survivors of human trafficking in London-Middlesex, Ontario, including sexually-exploited/trafficked women/girls from vulnerable groups (at-risk youth/Indigenous, racialized/LGBTQ2S+/homeless/street-involved/poor/living with disabilities). This will be achieved by establishing and consulting a Survivors’ Advisory Committee; collaborating with community agencies; providing survivors and victims of trafficking with supports to assist them in accessing the criminal justice system, victim compensation/other funding, and therapy or resources, and in taking social justice action to help recover and heal. This will also be achieved by developing resources to share with other service providers to help victims of human trafficking. At the end of the project, the organization will have supported victims/survivors in accessing the justice system and/or alternatives; provided supports/resources/tools to empower them to heal, recover and rebuild their lives; ensured that survivors were an integral part in the development, implementation and evaluation stages; developed and disseminated resources demonstrating successful intervention practices. The project will include an external evaluation that will look at the success and scalability of the promising practices. Supplemental funding will be used to 1. develop a Journey to Justice guide; 2. further demonstrate the need for comprehensive supports for survivors of trafficking through project activities described above; and 3. gather additional evidence of the success and scalability of project’s promising practices.