I don’t know about you, but I thought that yesterday’s announcement of the government’s new ‘crack down’ on the demand side of prostitution lack a little something.
Where, one has to ask, was the sound-bite?
Come on, New Labour! What the hell’s going on here?
Back in the day, when the Maximum Tone was running the show, no policy announcement was complete without it’s carefully crafted short, pithy, slogan to carry it all the way to the front page of the Daily Mail.
Remember the classics, ‘Education, education, education’ and ‘Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime’?
They seem to be a thing of the past. Now, even with the Prodigal Mandy back in the fold, all we get is Jacqui Smith shipping up the Today programme to tell us that:
“My proposal is that men should think twice about paying for sex. The reason they should do that is actually the majority of women don’t want to be involved in prostitution.”
Meh.
Where’s the snap? The sparkle? The Pizzazz?
All gone…
But it doesn’t have to be that way. In fact, if you look at what the government is planning for dealing with sex trafficking then the perfect sound-bite fair screams off the page at you - just try this for size…
BRITISH BLOWJOBS FOR BRITISH JOHNS
It’s perfect isn’t it?
It’s got just exactly the right mix of patriotic fervour and naked economic protectionism you need for a good slogan at a time when the countries heading into a recession and it fits the policy like an expensively-tailored Saville Row suit.
If visiting a foreign prostitute means taking the risk that they might have been trafficked to get here then play safe, boys, and stick firmly to our own home-grown hookers - you just know it makes sense!
—
Time To Get Serious
In deference to Sunny’s desire to keep things short and pithy at Lib Con, the full payload for this piece is situated over at the Ministry and although there’s an element of risk here in providing teaser information out of context, all you’re going to get is three brief extracts from the full article, two of which deal with the eveidence base that underpins these proposals and my own final conclusions…
So, to kick things off…
Although the Home office stopped short of implementing the Swedish system in full on logistical grounds - Britain’s sex industry is thought to be too large compared to Sweden’s at the time of criminalisation to make outright criminalisation a viable option - it’s clear from the government’s own report that it has proved influential in shaping the government’s thinking, which presents us with a significant problem as a recent critical review of the 2004 Gunilla Ekberg’s hugely influential account of the Swedish experience (Ekberg, Gunilla: The Swedish Law That Prohibits the Purchase of Sexual Services in Violence Against Women, vol. 10, no. 10, October 2004) by Vincent Clausen concludes that:
Ekberg’s article is presenting facts (spurious or not) and a normative, ideological programme at one and the same time. Given the size of the article, the ‘hard facts’ part is not substantial.
Before going on to note that:
The presentation of factual information in Ekberg’s article has been subordinated to the ends of
presenting a coherent normative formula to be applied in prostitution policy. The role of facts, spurious or not, is that of providing a footing for this ideological formula. As such, Ekberg’s article should be seen entirely as a political manifesto, touting the principles behind Swedish prostitution policy world wide, rather than an attempt at accounting for the effects of the prohibition of the purchase of sexual services.
And for your further delectation and delight…
In addition to the Ekberg paper, the government have leaned heavily on a report (’Big Brothel’) by the Poppy Project which a group of academics and researchers have described in the following terms:
The report builds a damning picture of indoor sex work on the basis of data whose reliability and representativeness is extremely doubtful and a methodological approach that would be considered unethical by most professional social researchers. It makes claims about trafficking, exploitation and the current working conditions of women and men employed in the indoor sex industry on the basis of that data. These claims cannot be substantiated in terms of the methodology, the data presented or in terms of wider, ethically approved, peer reviewed academic evidence. In short, the report does not provide any evidence concerning the current working conditions of women and men employed in indoor sex work venues in the UK.
Moreover, in much the same way that Clauser notes a distinct and rather obvious ideological bias in the Ekberg paper, so this group of academics have noted that:
The ‘findings’ of this report (Big Brothel) are framed by a pre?existing political view of prostitution.
And finally…
If you’ve got this far then you won’t be at all surprised to find that - at the risk of offending a few people - I have but two conclusions to offer…
1. The claim, in the Home Office’s report that:
“The aim of the Review was to establish a firm evidence base on the nature of the demand for
prostitution to enable the most effective actions to be identified.”
…is, at best, an indication that the review has failed to meet one of its key objects in the most abject fashion possible and, at worst, an outright lie, and
2. This entire review has been hijacked by a unrepresentative group of feminist ideologues whose dubious ‘contributions’ to the policy making process demonstrate a complete and utter disregard for the most basic standards of academic research.
The government isn’t making law here, its participating in a socialogical experiment devised by a small and increasingly unrepresentative clique of feminist ideologues who’ve more or less successfully, thus far, hijacked the entire review process on the back of manifestly inadequate and fraudulent ‘research’ none of which provides any evidence to substantiate the proposition that criminalising the demand side of prostitution will have any overall effect in reducing the number of women involved in the sex trade.
And can I finish by making one request - I’m entirely sanguine as to whether we discuss this here or over that the Ministry, but before piling into this, please read the full article.
However inflammatory that last set of conclusions might seem when taken out context, the fact of the matter is that I can, and have, backed them up all the way with evidence in the full version, so you’ll have to forgive me if I decline to get into this with anyone who comes across in comments as responding only to the short extracts published here.
In the Guardian yesterday Angela Smith was quoted as saying that the reason they didn’t criminalise sex for cash outright was because their consultation exercise had suggested that public opinion “wasn’t ready for it”, not because of the size of the industry.
That was the second reason given for not criminalising outright, the relative size of the UK industry compared to Sweden’s being the first…
[troll]
Sadly I am now in effect banned from this site as Sunny scrambles all my comments no matter how glittering with erudition and wit they may be … .I found that article interesting if torturous to read in the traditional Unity manner. Given that this is , apparently , a feminist plot , will gentleman who prefer gentlemen be banged up for paying for it too ?
This message will self destruct when the thought police man sees it
The review cites both reasons for opting not to criminalise paying for sex generally: both the size of the “industry” and the state of public opinion. The size of the industry arguments makes little sense, of course, when on their own figures they propose criminalising 80% of the “industry” - they say (if I remember right) that 80% of prostitutes are “controlled” by someone else. Why not go to the full 100%?
I love the “British blowjobs” line, but of course it doesn’t quite work: under the plans, you can’t avoid an offence by buying British - you can still get fined if she’s got a pimp.
[troll]
Would having a Pimp include handing over a section of earnings for lap dancing etc. In the biz( I `m told ) which money is paid for which service is far from clear. In effect the girls pay a rent for being in the place and get a profit from extras.They imagine its all “wanna Partay with ma beeches “. In real life the “Pimp” may be on a spectrum shading into legal activities .
You can’t beat a british blow job in my experience.
I love you, Unity.
6.Matt- but the beating is the best part….
[7] … as Max Mosley will tell you…
Profuse apologies for the irritating pedantry, but I just can’t sit by and see “Saville Row” left up there unmolested. Unlike Jimmy, it’s “Savile”, one L.
Hi Unity,
Good piece, even if ‘government ministers cite reports which squeeze the facts to suit their argument’ is hardly unique to this area of public policy. Some questions:
1. The evidence in support of some of the bolder claims about the Swedish system does sound quite sketchy. But has there been a proper, independent evaluation of its advantages and disadvantages, with international comparisons? For example, one point you cite against it is that there was a growth in internet prostitution 1999-2004 in Sweden, but presumably same was true everywhere else? Even if Ekberg’s claims are overstated, a modified version of the Swedish system might be an improvement on the status quo here, or alternatives such as New Zealand’s.
2. The IUSW claim it will ‘drive the problem underground’, is there any research which would support that claim? Similarly, is there any research which supports the case that decriminalised and union organisation manages to help the most vulnerable women?
3. I liked the paper which you linked to from the Spanish academics. I might have misunderstood the point you were making, but doesn’t that paper offer qualified support for an approach which deters “customers” from street prostitution where they are more likely to get caught and face criminal sanctions?
The paper from the Spanish Academics does offer some qualified support for legal deterrents targeting punters in relation to street prostitution, which is why I threw it into the pot - well that and the fact that they successfully reasoned their way to the flaw in the Swedish research and suggested the correct alternative response.
What the reliable evidence is telling us is that:
a. you cannot eradicate prostitution, no matter how much Julie Bindel might wish to believe otherwise, and
b. different types of prostitution require different policy responses.
As that paper indicates, the negative externalities of prostitution are minor to none existent in high value and home-based prostitution, controllable in brothel prostitution if well-regulated and a major issue in street prostitution, hence you apply deterrents to the latter in order to displace prostitution into the realms of the much safer and less problematic alternatives, licence and regulate brothel prostitution and more or less leave the rest alone but for the public health side of things.
I’ll look into the question of internet prostitution but I doubt there’s anything specific to Sweden because they basically done a Dubya, declared victory and ignored anyone who’s suggested that things aren’t all they’re cracked up to be, but there’s certainly some data on the impact on sex tourism in neighbouring countries, which I;ll have a crack at digging up.
I’ll also hunt around to see if I track down any information on our other questions.
As for using a modified system, the Spanish paper neatly lays out what looks to be the optimum policy response;
1. legalise high value and house prostitution
2. legalise and closely regulate brothels
3. collect the tax revenues, and
3. spend the money on a range of measure to target street prostitution, unlicensed brothels and trafficking.
In that last category, criminalising the punters and zero-tolerance policing does appear to have a marked deterrent effect, so investing in that plus exit programmes, drug treatment programmes and specialist investigation/prosecution teams to deal with trafficking and violence against prostitutes appears to be a sound investment.
I don’t see how the New Zealand examples compares to the UK. Its much easier to traffic women to the UK than it is to NZ, given the supply and the ease of access. I don’t buy the argument that the example is enough.
Sunny:
What New Zealand provides is a methodologically sound evidence base, much of which challenges some of the core assumptions that underpin the government’s proposals, not least in terms of its significantly lower incidence of both coercion and drug use.
The important question to ask is why the New Zealand evidence differs so markedly from what being claimed for the UK, and one of main reasons is that decriminalisation has enabled the Kiwis to obtained reliable information on the off-street market, in which conditions are very different to those experienced by street prostitute where, if you look at the UK ‘evidence’ what you’ll find, right across the board, is that data drawn only from studies of street prostitution is being presented as though it relates to the generality of prostitution.
Eaves Housing, which is the organisation behind the Poppy Project, produces that it laughably calls a ‘factsheet’ on prostitution the first page of set out seven claimed “facts” about prostitution, e,g,
Up to 95% of women involved in prostitution are problematic drug users,including around 78% heroin users and rising numbers of crack cocaine addicts.
If you check the primary source for each of those ‘facts’ you’ll that they are based only on data relating to street prostitution as in the example where the source, a Home Office consultation paper, actually states that:
Nearly every study of women involved in street-based prostitution shows a very close relationship with Class A drugs. As many as 95% of those working on the street are believed to be problematic drug users.
Now, if we look at the data from New Zealand, what we find is that 52% of street prostitutes cited a drug or alcohol habit as having been a reason for becoming a prostitute against only 14% of brothel workers and 19% of house prostitutes, and 45% of street prostitutes cited servicing a drug or alcohol as a reason why they remained in the trade, against 10.7% of brothel workers and 13.5% of house prostitutes.
Making general claims about prostitution based on data which only relates to street prostitution massive inflates the number - by around 3-4 times if the NZ data is anything to go by.
As for trafficking, that’s a separate issue but as far as NZ goes, its had no recorded incidents of trafficking in recent years but takes the view that if it did crop up it would be dealt with a policing matter under its kidnapping and slavery statutes.
Trafficking is already illegal in the UK anyway and, quite frankly, any measures designed simply to make the UK market less attractive to traffickers will only move the problem on to somewhere else - its a policing and borders issue and needs to be dealt with in that context.
Sunny: I don’t see how the New Zealand examples compares to the UK. Its much easier to traffic women to the UK than it is to NZ, given the supply and the ease of access. I don’t buy the argument that the example is enough.
But Sunny, you could just as easily say that New Zealand is a small far-away country of which we know little; just as MacTaggart argued earlier this year:
Opponents of this approach claim New Zealand’s decision to legalise prostitution offers a better model. I do not accept it as a good comparison. New Zealand is too far away from the main markets for sex traffickers to generate profits in the way they can in Britain. As a small country, where people know each other well, there are strong social forces that protect prostituted women from the violence that is all too often their fate in Britain. Unfortunately, we are more like Holland where legalisation led to a massive growth in criminality, trafficking and violence associated with the sex trade.
In other words, she conveniently dismisses a counter-argument by claiming the country in question is too piddling to bother with (and I can’t see how the UK can be comapred to Holland when they went for legalisation, and the UK still hasn’t). I don’t see any evidence that she actually bothered with any research.
Incidentally, you’re ignoring the argument that decriminalisation enables consenting adults to buy/sell sex, while reserving the full force of the law where consent does not apply, which would include trafficked women (though the definition of ‘trafficked’ seems to be vague; being brought into the country illegally is not the same as being coerced into sex work).
Unity - I am less confident that we can characterise the NZ data as “methodologically sound”.
We simply do not have adequate information (about the study design) to makes such claims - the limited snippets that are made available raise even more questions.
Even the authors admit that “a cautious approach should be taken to these findings given the retrospective nature of the survey and the variable level and quality of Police information on the sex industry. For instance, Police from the Counties-Manukau District were unable to provide estimated numbers of sex workers, therefore figures for this district were extrapolated from figures based on New Zealand population statistics”.
I also note that a Nun was a member of the research panel - I just can’t get my head round a Nun interogating a prostitute at “asianbabes.co.nz” (one of the providers cited in the study) about whether or not she was a regular consumer of crack, for example.
I do agree with you fully, however, that we would take any claims made by McTaggart & Co with a very large pinch of salt.
I’m just wonder will it ever be possible to capture reliable data on ALL of the activities that take allegedly place in the sex industry, personally I have my doubts.
I admire Unity for the depth of research but not for construction of the argument. Ms Smith’s proposals are that punters should be prosecuted if they knowingly use a prostitute who has been trafficked or is being coerced. As AllyF commented at Ministry of Truth, pimping and trafficking are offences in themselves.
Creating new laws for existing offences is an obsession of recent government. If a punter knowingly has sex with a prostitute who is being coerced, the punter is committing rape. If a prostitute has arrived in the UK illegally or pays a pimp, those scenarios are covered by existing law. In what way is protection being provided to abused women that cannot be provided by enforcement of existing law?
Opposition to Ms Smith’s proposals should be very simple:
1. They do not address illegal behaviour that is not already covered by existing laws.
2. They require that punters (who will still be participating in a legal business) become investigators. Everyone knows that the bloke who offers you a cheap camera in a pub may be dodgy, because we have a public market in which cameras are sold and can thus establish the circumstances of trade. Prostitution is not a public market.
Unity presents some great information about how prostitution might be legally controlled, but I’d keep the arguments separate. When the Home Secretary is acting in gut response mode, don’t overcomplicate things.
Partly this might be symbolic, to make some noise that clarifies the existing laws and puts more people off. In itself that may not be a bad thing.
For example, I was for the criminalisation of forced marriages even though the laws already exist around the issue to prosecute people (coercion, kidnapping etc).
But the point is, firstly the police sometimes don’t take it seriously enough because its not a direct law or sometimes they don’t press charges for the same reason. There is an incredible lack of knowledge regarding laws, even among the police. So sometimes it helps to clarify stuff, especially for the people at the CPS who decide whether to press charges.
Secondly, I still don’t buy the NZ comparison. The percentage of drug taking may be exaggerated, but I can’t see how you could compare whether trafficking will increase with NZ and UK. The supply near here is much bigger. Where are they going to trffic women in from easily? Australia? There’s like 10 people in Australia!
Ms Smith’s proposals are that punters should be prosecuted if they knowingly use a prostitute who has been trafficked or is being coerced.
TFTFY.
The proposal is for a strict liability offence, such that knowing doesn’t enter into it.
Sunny: Partly this might be symbolic, to make some noise that clarifies the existing laws and puts more people off. In itself that may not be a bad thing.
For example, I was for the criminalisation of forced marriages even though the laws already exist around the issue to prosecute people (coercion, kidnapping etc).
So why not have a publicity campaign instead - oh, sorry, they tried that (I even think Unity covered the campaign over at his blog).
You pass - or reform - laws in order to achieve an end, not as a means of ‘raising awareness’ (that’s what you do to get the law changed, introduced, or properly enforced). Otherwise it’s like saying ‘people who drink extra-strength lager and drive will be faced with tough jail sentences’, when everyone already knows that drink driving: (a) shouldn’t be encouraged, (b) is illegal over a certain limit, (c) runs the risk of being busted by the police, and where the government regularly runs campaigns to remind people of those three facts.
Sunny, the review was of the laws relating to prostitution, not people-trafficking. The fact that the government seemed to be highly selective in not just which reports and models they looked at, but also whom they chose to listen to, reveals much about their policies, priorities and mindset - as Unity neatly demonstrated.
“What New Zealand provides is a methodologically sound evidence base, much of which challenges some of the core assumptions that underpin the government’s proposals, not least in terms of its significantly lower incidence of both coercion and drug use.”
In your dreams, that is just not true,
NZ is a model for pro-prostitution nutters (which is what we sorely have),
because the other examples were discredited each in their turn, how did thelegalized era begin, sale of breast milk?
Brothel Prostitute Sells Her Breast Milk
A prostitute at a brothel in New Zealand is offering her own breast milk for patrons. Her son is 6 weeks old. The massage parlor in Hawera states that they …
http://www.shortnews.com/start.cfm?id=31691 - 59k - Cached - Similar pages
It was something like that.
Frappola
the A&E Charge Nurse:
“Unity - I am less confident that we can characterise the NZ data as “methodologically sound”.
We simply do not have adequate information (about the study design) to makes such claims - the limited snippets that are made available raise even more questions.”
The full text of the NZ report can be found here:
http://www.justice.govt.nz/prostitution-law-review-committee/publications/plrc-report/report.pdf
What is noticeable is that this document deatials the members of the review panel, the methodology employed, the situation existing prior to the Prostitution Reform Act (PRA) becoming law, an examination of the various legislative models that have been adopted by other countries, differentiates between the various sex markets &, unlike our good Home Secretary, does take into account submissions by those who disagree with its findings.
For those interested, a critique of the, much publicised, evidence in support of the Swedish Model, as presented by Gunilla Ekberg, Can be found here:
http://www.sexworkeurope.org/site/images/PDFs/ekberg_kritik.pdf
Unfortunately, the official review of the Swedish legislation is currently underway, but it should be noted that those carrying out the review have been instructed that they are not allowed to conclude that the law criminalising payment for sex has failed & should be abolished.
So because you don’t agree with selling breast milk, and generally have completely non-empiracle beliefs on this subject, you’re going to discount the entirely factual statement above? Good going!
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
- direct link -
Mike Killingworth