Vancouver reveals final FIFA human rights action plan

The City of Vancouver has released its final human rights action plan for the FIFA World Cup next month, but some anti-homelessness advocates still have concerns about displacement and undue enforcement.

The plan highlights a range of priorities, from worker rights, sex worker safety and child protection to preventing displacement, alongside the city’s role and actions to address them.

This is the first FIFA tournament that has required host cities to include sustainability and human rights standards in its bidding process for the matches, according to the action plan.

The report noted that community members have concerns for vulnerable people living in neighbourhoods such as the Downtown Eastside

Senior city staff said much of the plan builds on what Vancouver is already doing.

“From a day-to-day kind of operational perspective, we are not changing how we are approaching and working with vulnerable communities simply because FIFA is here,” said deputy city manager Sandra Singh.

But the city said it will fund additional, focused outreach for some groups and is adding new spaces for vulnerable people to rest on match days.

“We’re kind of enhancing the services that are already out there in the community,” Singh said.

The report indicates the city has funded community-led peer worker outreach for safety patrols during match days, as well as several gender safety organizations for expanded outreach during the event period.

Vancouver will also extend programming at three of its indoor spaces in the downtown area as a “respite space” for people experiencing homelessness and housing precarity. The spaces will show FIFA matches throughout the tournament.

The action plan also lays out ways people can report non-urgent concerns and complaints at FIFA events. If a concern happens at a specific FIFA event venue (such as B.C. Place, the Fan Festival, or a training site), the complaint would go through FIFA’s reporting process.

“FIFA will operate a tournament app with a reporting portal for individuals to file human rights-related complaints,” said the report. “FIFA will perform an initial assessment of the complaint, and where they determine a human rights violation to have taken place, will assign a case manager to investigate.”

FIFA will try to find a remedy for a reporter “based on the situation and wishes of the victim,” according to the report, but if it does not have the jurisdiction to provide a solution, it will refer the case to the city’s host committee.

Singh said people can lodge a complaint or concern in various ways. She said people can also report issues to the city or a different agency depending on what happened and where.

People can find more information at the city’s “Know Before You Go” web campaign, she said.

Before the final draft was officially released, homeless advocate Fiona York told CBC’s The Early Edition that she still has concerns for vulnerable people in the city.

She said the action plan reiterates policies that are already in place, such as one that allows for people to shelter overnight in parks.

“That’s already the case, and so … nothing new is being offered there, and it doesn’t really offer any assurance that there won’t be any undue surveillance and enforcement.”

She added that there has already been extra policing on the streets and noted there are ongoing “street sweeps,” referring to when city workers and police clear sidewalks, including of people’s belongings or temporary shelters.

“It’s really hard to kind of take that at face value, when the city is saying that nothing will happen and people will continue to be able to exist as they are, when we already are seeing this ongoing displacement and sweeping.”

Vancouver will host seven of the 104 World Cup matches.

After the seven matches are complete, the city will report back on a summary of the event, although its scope is still to be determined, according to the action plan.