Sex workers speak out against criminalisation of clients

Statements from women working in various areas of the sex industry.

Cindy -- working from premises

I started working because I couldn’t live off benefits. Doing this work I wasn’t having to worry every day how I was going to pay my bills.

A women like me who works for herself, whether on the streets or in premises, classes her situation as a business not a burden.  A lot of women have repeat clients and build up a rapport and a trust. Not only do the women provide company and maybe sexual favours but they become a counsellor and even a friend!!  Criminalizing clients would scare these men away.  We would be pushed further underground forcing us to take more risks by having to find ways of contacting clients secretly.  Women will be left on their own because you don’t want to expose yourself by working with others. 

Prosecuting a man would mean that the women’s job would come to light.  The media coverage would affect her family in many ways as it did with mine. Years later this is still a major strain on me. I had to move home and change my children’s school as I didn’t want what I did to provide for my children to tarnish them.  And people judge you long term. It is even worse if you get prosecuted and end up with a criminal record.  What chance then do you have to get out of prostitution.                                                                               

 Michaela – convicted as a “trafficker”

I’ve been a victim of sexual abuse and domestic violence and believe every woman should be protected.  I come from a poor rural area of Brazil.  At age 12, I was forced to work as a domestic servant to help support my family. I was repeatedly sexually assaulted by two sons in the family.

 I came to Britain to marry, after many years the relationship broke down, and I became a sex worker to get an independent life for me and my children. The wellbeing of people around me has been the focus of my life.  That is why I opened a place to work indoors where it’s safer.  I saved to open a health club in Manchester. I had all the health and safety checks by the council, and a receptionist to make sure women who worked there would be safe.  I had a few women who came from Brazil and other countries.  All were over 25 years, had been working in prostitution and were in no way forced.  But because I am a woman of colour, and from another country, I was targeted. 

 I was arrested in October 2005, and convicted of trafficking.  I pleaded guilty because the police threatened to charge my 18 year old daughter if I didn’t, and because my solicitor and barrister strongly recommended it.  They told me that because the trafficking law does not require proof of force or coercion, only evidence that you helped someone from another country come into the UK who then works in the sex industry, then I was guilty.  

 The judge agreed I had treated the women “kindly”.  He accepted “none of the women was coerced by you into acting as a prostitute . . . none was actually deceived as to the nature of the work they would be required to undertake . . .each had previously worked as a prostitute . . . You treated them in a kindly and hospitable way, inviting them to your home and social occasions.  The police often frequented the premises and went out socially with women working there.  The judge used this against me saying that it “undermined the public’s confidence in the police” as if I should be punished for the police’s behaviour. I was convicted because the police and CPS wanted to look like they had cracked a big criminal case -- to get promotions and build careers. 

 For this, I was put in prison for nearly three years and separated from my children, the youngest was only six at the time.  Children at that age need their mother’s protection. I was terribly distressed, and my children were deeply affected.  Their behaviour changed, and they are still recovering from that separation.  My ex-partner tried to deny me the right to see my youngest, and has tried to get custody.  I was also prosecuted under the Proceeds of Crime Act.  We lost everything – our home, savings, even personal gifts and belongings – which I’d worked so hard for.  I’m 45, a single mother with two children to support, having to start again with nothing. Me, my family and friends were vilified by sensational and false reporting in the local press before trial. Any friends who tried to help me were either charged or threatened with charges by the police.  My address was put in the local paper, and my daughter had to move home and could not attend college.  Now the Home Office wanted to deport me.  Legal Action for Women found me a good lawyer to try and stop the deportation. My British citizenship was revoked, yet I’d never committed a crime.

All I did was run a flat where women were able to work safely – why is that a criminal offence, did I deserve to spend three years in prison for that and to have my life and my family’s life ruined

Chloe – working as a lapdancer

 “I’ve worked all around the country.  I do three minute dances which cost the guys £10.  I pay towards the cost of the venue, security and the DJ; after that, whatever I earn is my own.  We work as a collective and prioritise safety.  We have a good support network of door and bar staff.  Someone always knows where I am.  I take a lot of responsibility for the new girls as I’ve been around a long time. 

 “I can earn £250 for four hours. Worse case, I walk out with £50 and that’s still more than I would earn in a day job at £5 an hour.  Nine out of 10 women turn to prostitution or lap dancing because there’s not enough money to survive.  I work with students, mothers and all kinds of other women.  Recently my mum couldn’t afford a pair of school shoes for my brother and sister.  When I worked a day job I couldn’t help her, but now I can.  If the government is offended by the work we do, then give us the financial means to get out of the industry.

 “There is no pressure to have sex with men, only opportunities.  I could go to a nightclub and have 10 times more of an opportunity to sleep with a man than I do in my workplace.  In any case, if I want to have sex with a man, and if he wants to pay me, then so what?  If I had kids and sleeping with a man for money meant my children could have food in their mouths, I would do it.  And tell me one woman that wouldn’t. 

 “I haven’t met any women who were forced to work in clubs.  Some women from other countries come here for salvation and help because it is terrible for them back home.   

 “They say we are degrading ourselves.  Actually no.  The issue is what kind of protection we get from the police and courts.  My friend was raped in a supermarket car park.  Some one very close to me was abused as a child.  The cases got thrown out of court.

“If you bring in more regulations and criminalize the sex industry, you make it harder for women to work.  Girls can’t insist on good working conditions or their rights.  The industry will go underground and it will be much worse.”

Another woman complains:

“If the re-branding goes through, the stigma will increase and some women will be forced out of work or underground into the hands of pimps.  

“Until two years ago, clubs were individually licensed with owners required to get health, safety and criminal record checks.  Relaxing the licensing laws was a New Labour ploy to raise revenue.  Why not demand a return to the previous system? 

“Renaming clubs as sex encounter establishments is completely inaccurate and will set things back decades.  You might as well re-brand night clubs as drugs and alcohol encounter establishments.  What about sex scandals and immoral behaviour in parliament? 

“If people want to get on their soapbox find a better target than other women’s livelihood.”

guardian.co.uk, Wednesday September 17 2008

“I am an off-street sex worker. I don't live a Belle de Jour-type existence, but nor am I the trafficked/drug-addled/pimped victim . . .

I am a single mother with two young children aged 4 and 6. Prior to doing this job – and it is a job – I was employed as a PA in a large, city-based firm. My job was a typical 9-to-5 – which, as everyone who has ever worked in such a job will know, means 7:30am to 6:30pm by the time you take into consideration travelling and (unpaid) overtime. I was dropping my children off at breakfast club at 8am and collecting them at 6pm, by which time we would all be completely knackered. The children go to bed at 7:30pm, meaning we were left with precisely 90 minutes to prepare and eat our evening meal, have baths, get ready for bed and read bedtime stories. It was like we were living in a whirlwind. I felt I never saw my kids – let's face it, I didn't (much) – there was certainly never much time for playing or talking or simply just sitting cuddling on the sofa. The guilt was getting to me. I was unhappy. I hoped they weren't, but I was never sure. Yet, despite the long hours I spent away from home, I was earning just enough to make ends meet. Sure I could pay the mortgage, but we'd never had a family holiday. By the time my monthly pay packet came around, I would have literally just a few pounds in the bank.

It was by no means a desperate existence – we always had enough food, and the house was always heated – but it was quite empty from my point of view. My children are fantastic human beings and I wanted to spend more time in their company without us suffering financially, it was as simple as that. I wanted a job which would allow me to work flexible hours to fit around the children's schooling, fewer hours, but without taking the drop in wages which a part-time office job would have lead to. Escorting seemed like the natural solution. I say "natural" because it felt natural to me. I am well aware that this is not a job everybody could do. But as a sexually-aware and sexually-experienced woman in her mid-30s, the thought of having sex with strangers did not terrify me. I remember thinking that I might even enjoy it (and that has proved to be the case).

I work from a flat on which I pay the mortgage – I do not have any landlord to worry about. I charge £150 per hour and I get enough enquiries to enable me to choose my own working hours. In a typical day I drop my children off at school at 9am, return home, shower and get changed into my alter-ego, Lara (we never use our own names). I then might have an hour's appointment at 11am and another at 1pm, leaving me with a break of an hour in between to shower and refresh myself. I then fetch myself a late lunch and am at the school again to collect my children at 3:30pm. It works. I never see more than two clients a day; most days I see only one; on other days none at all. Yet in just three hours' work I can earn the same as I used to earn in a week working at the office.

. . . My clients are on the whole middle-aged businessmen. I have never been treated with anything less than respect by any one of them. I have not been physically or sexually abused by any of them. Of course I have my security systems in place should anything go wrong, but so far nothing has. My children have their mother now, and not just on a part-time basis. I have time with them to enjoy their childhoods, without any of us suffering financially. I am not making big bucks – but I am earning a little more money to boot.

. . . Criminalisation [of men] would only serve to drive the industry further underground, leaving the women who are victims of trafficking even more vulnerable.

. . . making criminals of all men who pay for sex would result in myself and thousands of other women who choose to work in this industry becoming unemployed, and thus instead of contributing to the state (through our taxes) we would be taking from the state in the form of income support, housing benefit and so on. This is how we make a living; it's an industry that prevents many, many women and their children from living on the breadline. If you are going to take our livelihoods from us, the consequences will be devastating.”

Wed 19, November 2008 @ 17:53