xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil Waututh) / Vancouver BC – On January 30, 2025, the BC Civil Liberties Association (BCCLA) alongside three individual plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against the City of Vancouver to challenge the city’s daytime ban on outdoor sheltering. This ban is cruel, dehumanizing, and deadly. It violates sections 7, 12, and 15 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. 

In 2009, the BCCLA intervened in Victoria v Adams, when the groundbreaking decision by the BC Court of Appeal established the right to shelter outdoors. When there is a lack of adequate alternative shelter, the Charter guarantees the right for people to protect themselves from the elements in public spaces, at least overnight. Since then, this principle has been recognized by courts in cities throughout BC and across the country. While this trend has been a positive step in advancing the rights of unhoused people to protect themselves at night, the law so far continues to leave them vulnerable during the day.  

Across the country, the housing crisis is putting a strain on the lives of all Canadians. Failures of government policy have made rent unaffordable, homeownership unattainable, and for some, have meant finding ways to survive with no housing at all. Unhoused people deserve to have their government treat them with dignity and respect. Instead, many municipalities choose to enforce bans on daytime sheltering with callous cruelty by forcing people to either carry their belongings around all day or be violently decamped if they try to shelter. Here in Vancouver, unhoused people are subjected to constant harassment, surveillance, and violence by state actors (including City workers, Park Rangers, and the VPD). When it comes to housing in this city, the government is failing all of us, but no one feels this failure more than people who are unhoused.  

Today, we’re taking the City to court to challenge a number of Vancouver Bylaws that make it illegal for unhoused people to shelter outdoors during daytime hours.  

• Section 7: The BCCLA argues that the absolute ban on daytime sheltering in Vancouver puts the safety, security, and very survival of unhoused people at risk, violating their Section 7 Charter rights.  
• Section 12: To enforce this ban, the City engages in daily street sweeps, and larger decampments, destroying peoples’ homes and seizing their tents, sleeping bags, medicine, family photos and other things they need to survive, regardless of the weather or their health. This is in violation of Section 12 of the Charter which protects against cruel treatment by the state. The City’s approach is a callous act of extreme cruelty.  
• Section 15: For people with mental and physical disabilities, it is simply impossible to set up and take down their shelter day in, day out, and then carry all of the things they need for their survival around with them throughout the day. Women and gender-diverse people are made more vulnerable to dangers like gender-based violence when subjected to a daytime sheltering ban. This violates their equality rights under Section 15 of the Charter.  

Zee, individual plaintiff:  

“Imagine just being alive and everywhere you go, every moment of the day, you are getting a very clear message that there’s no space you can exist in. You will have the police called for literally sitting on a step or putting your bag down for a minute because you’re so physically exhausted you can’t carry it. It would wear anybody down. 

There were days where I would wake up in pain, cold, and immobile and the City would drop my tent down on top of me. Once, I was surrounded by ten park rangers and ten police, mostly male. I would love to say it didn’t break me, but it definitely broke me down. It felt like it just wasn’t a survivable situation.  

If you want to keep people trapped in poverty, the City is doing a great job. Decampments are a waste of resources. They’re inhumane and cruel and just make no sense. These bylaws kill people.” 

Jason, individual plaintiff:  

“Every time someone’s home and stuff gets taken by the City, it turns their life upside down. Imagine someone coming into your house, attacking you, taking your stuff, then destroying your house, and saying “have a nice day”. That’s how it feels. I don’t want people to worry about their makeshift housing when they have so much to worry about already. 

Getting the right to shelter during the day would make a huge difference. It would be the first step in getting your dignity back…to getting your life back. Look at me: I went from living on the streets to having my own place. It can happen to anyone. I did it my way, not the city’s way. We should have the choice about how we solve our own problems. We have to find a better way.” 

Brittany, individual plaintiff: 

“They take tents, clothes, everyday use stuff like backpacks, hygiene stuff – things that are replaceable but that are tedious or hard to keep having to get. Especially being on welfare or disability – you don’t have money to go and buy things over and over and over again. It makes it super hard to be able to go on to the next day.   

I was at CRAB park for 3 and half years. It wasn’t perfect but I became part of a community there. Everybody worked together to keep it moving – people came to ask for help, stay for a week, and then move on. People who had nowhere to go, had somewhere to go until they could get housing. 

I hope that this case gives us the right to shelter during the day. I showed kindness in a place where people didn’t expect it anymore and it went a long way. We made a community come together and to me that’s a huge thing.” 

Vibert Jack, Litigation Director for the BCCLA: 

“Our city’s approach to outdoor sheltering is costly, ineffective, and inhumane. We can’t stand by as our government kills people under the guise of public safety. Instead of continuing to violate the rights of their constituents, our government needs to work with unhoused people to find real solutions. It’s long past time we come together as a city to hold our representatives accountable for the cruelty they’ve displayed against our fellow residents. With nowhere to stay, and nowhere to go, the ban on daytime sheltering keeps people trapped in a cycle of poverty and City-caused violence. Shelter is the foundation from which people can begin to move forward with their lives.”   

Tim Dickson, Counsel for the plaintiffs: 

“Every person needs access to adequate shelter during the day as well as at night. Given the chronic shortage of housing and shelter space, the prohibition on daytime sheltering in public spaces denies unhoused people their basic right to shelter and imposes on them severe, needless suffering. This case aims to affirm the basic constitutional right to shelter during the day as well as night and to uphold the safety and dignity of unhoused residents of Vancouver.” 

The BCCLA and individual plaintiffs are represented by Tim Dickson of JFK Law, Julia Riddle of Arvay Finlay, and Alexander Kirby of the BC First Nations Justice Council