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Memorandum submitted by David Livermore (PC 36)
Dear Sir/Madam,
I believe I have written to most of you individually to express my profound concern regarding proposed changes to the laws on prostitution, but am sending to the Scrutiny Committee as a whole lest I have missed anyone. If you have now received this letter twice, please accept my apologies, but it is a reflection of how strongly I feel on these issues.
My concerns are detailed in the letter below but can be summarised succinctly:
It will potentially criminalise consensual behaviour, insofar as 'controlled for gain' is not clearly defined to include coercion.
It will lead to the closure of good brothels (=massage parlours) that look after their women, as well as exploitative ones; this will destroy the protection for the prostitutes who chose to work there and will lead to additional harm.
It is based on statistics that are demonstrably bogus.
As such it is illiberal, contrary to human rights, damaging to prostitutes as well as their clients, and is based on invalid analysis.
I would urge you to amend the proposals so clients are criminalised only if they have sex with a prostitute who is controlled for gain against her wishes (exactly as proposed in the Executive Summary of Tackling Demand) and so that the brothel closure orders can be used only where prostitutes are demonstrably working under coercion or duress.
I would urge you also to have the Govt's Statistical Office to investigate the data included Tackling Demand. If these are the best numbers the Home Office and Govt ministers, between them, can come up with, someone should be sacked...
LETTER:
Policing & Crime Bill: Prostitution I write to you in your capacity (as I understand) a member of the Scrutiny Committee reviewing the above Bill. I wish to express my profound concern and protest about the Bill's clauses on prostitution, and about the bogus statistics used to support them. I have corresponded with my MP (Andrew Dismore, Hendon, ref L08/01/260) on this matter and, via him, have received an unsatisfactory response from the Home Office (Alan Campbell, ref M24724/8, dated 14 Jan 2009). I will forward these on request.
I would raise the following issue with you:
1 It is proposed that if a client, knowingly or not, has sex with a woman controlled for someone else's gain he will commit a 'strict liability offence subject to a £1000 fine' This is objectionable on many grounds. Most obviously, a client cannot know all the detail of a woman's circumstances. He can ask her, but must take her answer on trust and, anyway cannot prejudge the outcome of any court case against her alleged 'controller'.
And, what is 'controlled for gain'? Evidently the woman with a coercive pimp is controlled for gain. But, is any girl working for an escort agency or massage parlour of her own free will to be construed as 'controlled'? Logic says not since, she generally has more working flexibility than a 9-5 employee; moreover, HMRC tax her as self-employed [see 2.1.3/4 on http://www.taxrelief4escorts.co.uk/Isittaxable..html]. However, a court may take the contrary view, contending that she is controlled for another's gain to the extent that the parlour or agency arrange her advertising, bookings and, maybe, accommodation and, to cover this, take a percentage of her income (typically the same 40-50% as a nursing agency takes from a nurse's pay).
If the law does decide that she is controlled, then her client is criminalized, even though his 'victim' agrees that he had done no harm. This is iniquitous and a breach of human rights- it should be no business of the law who has sex with whom, so long as it is not under duress and both parties are over the legal minimum. Whether the sex is for love or money is a private matter.
It is iniquitous in a 'free' country that the bill has proceeded to the present stage without clarity on the meaning of the work 'controlled' from the Home Office - see answers to question put by John McDonnell MP on 26/1/09; Hansard 244924, available via. http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2009-01-26b.244924.h&s=prostitution
This aspect could be resolved as proposed in the Executive Summary of The Home Office Tackling Demand Report (p4, para 3, opening sentences) i.e. 'criminalise those who are found to be paying for sex with a person who is being controlled against their wishes for someone else's gain.' The inclusion of the three underlined words captures the purported intent of the law- i.e. to protect women from being exploited, whilst not criminalizing a client solely because he books a prostitute via an agency rather than as an independent [note that the same woman may work via agencies and as an independent: surely it cannot be intended that the client is criminalized solely according to how he books her: that would be absurd.... Surely!].
2 The police will be given new powers to close brothels. If these are establishments where enslaved women are forced to work there is no objection. But why close brothels where the prostitution is voluntary and where the women have a degree of protection? Note that a 'brothel' may simply comprise two women working together for company and security. Why discriminate against such women in favour of those who work independently? I understand (and I am not a lawyer) that forcing workers to work alone and without contact with their fellow workers is in contravention of the Charter of Human Rights article 23.
The Home Secretary is quoted in the Observer of 16 Nov (http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2008/nov/16/prostitution-women-lapdancing) as saying she had "ruled out a universal ban on paid sex because some women argued they did it out of choice and it's not my job to criminalise the demand for that"... If this straightforward statement is an honest representation of Government thinking, it should then not be an issue whether the woman works as an independent, via an escort agency or in a brothel, so long as her occupation is voluntary and so long as the brothel does not constitute a public nuisance
I would urge the committee to consider
amendment of the legalisation to allow small-scale brothels as in
3 Statistics used to justify this legislationOver the past month I have read or heard the following figures cited by the Home Office or Ministers as background justifying this legislation
· There are 80000 prostitutes in the UK (Home Office Tackling Demand Review,) · UK prostitution has a turnover of £1 billion p.a. (Tackling Demand) · Up to 70% of the prostitute women are 'enslaved' (e.g. Harriet Harman, Ch 4 7PM News 19 Nov)... though Tackling Demand says 4000 = 5%! · These enslaved women are forced to service up to 30 clients per day (Harriet H, as above) · 10% of men pay prostitutes (Tackling Demand)
These numbers are mutually incompatible and therefore defy belief. I calculate: Firstly, 80000 women and a £1 billion p.a. equal £12500 per woman per annum. If we assume £60 per liaison (the typical half-hour charge in a massage parlour), this equates to c. 200 clients per woman per annum or about four per week, vastly fewer than cited for the unfortunate 'sex slave', who therefore cannot be representative. Secondly, 80000 women, 70% of them forced, seeing 15 (let alone 30) clients per day would mean 80000 x 0.7 x 15 = 840000 clients per day, to which we must add those (4 per day, say) seen by the remaining 30% = 80000 x 0.3 x 4 = 96000... This totals nearly a million clients per day. If 10% of the adult male population (i.e. about 2.5 m men) go with prostitutes, then each must do so 2-3 times per week. This is beyond even the most elastic credulity, even if we compensate for demand from visiting businessmen!
Figures of 80000 prostitutes and £1 bn turnover are compatible with lots of part timers --- students avoiding grant debt, receptionists seeking extra income etc., but not with an industry of sex slaves. This fits with both my experience as a client and the Police Operation Pentameter, which has sought to find and free 'sex slaves'. From considerable effort it identified fewer than 200 cases, amounting to a quarter per cent of the claimed number of prostitutes
The BBC have looked into this numerical
fiasco and I would draw your attention to
There are many sassy, independent foreign
escorts to be found in the
David M Livermore
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