Statutes Amendment (Decriminalisation of Sex Work) Bill

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 13 November 2014.)

Mr TARZIA (Hartley) (16:18): I rise today to speak to the Statutes Amendment (Decriminalisation of Sex Work) Bill 2014. I rise with full respect for the member for Ashford, but I oppose the bill. I oppose it not only because of my personal beliefs and the beliefs of those I represent, on balance or on the whole, but also because I believe this is a bill which attacks the fabric of society, the fabric of society of most of my electors. I will vote against it, but not necessarily based on any legalistic argument. I urge members to give the moral and legal issues full consideration, but on the whole I will not be supporting this bill.

I do not believe in legalising prostitution in any way, shape or form, and I know that the majority of my constituents would not support it either. Prostitution is legal in regulated forms in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland, and we have seen in those examples that it has led to an expansion of illegal brothels. It is said that one in four brothels in New South Wales do not comply with the act in many respects, despite their legalisation.

Since this debate has come to the surface again, I have had many constituents write to me over the past couple of weeks and they have drawn my attention to the member's bill. The vast majority encouraged me to vote against the bill. I understand that other lobby groups support the bill and I believe sincerely that their views are a bit misguided and that there is a clear lack of understanding of its implications, should it be enacted.

I want to talk a little bit about FamilyVoice Australia and some of the material they have circulated which has assisted me in realising the possible implications of this bill. We have seen jurisdictions around the western world that have decriminalised or legalised the sex trade and it is common knowledge that the police in several states find it extremely difficult to enforce laws regarding the exchange of money for sex. I am against any commoditisation of women or men and I do not believe that this is in the best interests of my electorate or in the best interests of South Australia, not to mention the planning issues that are associated with this bill.

Before I was a member of parliament I was part of a local council, and let me just say that our local councils do a fantastic job, but the last thing they need is an extra burden, extra red tape or extra issues in trying to enforce and determine the planning issues that will result if these brothels are approved. It is going to be a massive issue. Apart from the moral issue, it is probably the biggest social issue that is produced by this bill. How will these be enforced? How will the Planning Act be regulated and incorporated to include these brothels? Where will these brothels operate?

I do not want these brothels to be operating near my community schools. I do not want these brothels to be operating in the vicinity of family spaces. This is a massive issue and, with full respect to the member for Ashford, her bill does not address these. I simply cannot support the bill. Many brothel operators appear to engage—I will be polite to them—in other illegal activity. It would seem very likely therefore that many brothels would continue to operate unlawfully.

Prostitution is often portrayed as an agreement between a willing purchaser and a willing vendor to which there could be no objection. We have seen time and time again studies that have illustrated that prostitution is certainly not the glamorous thing that some people make it out to be. I would encourage members to read a particular report that I have had a look at concerning the practical effects of prostitution. I refer to a 2006 article by Melissa Farley, PhD candidate, published in the Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, titled 'Prostitution, trafficking and cultural amnesia: what we must not know in order to keep the business of sexual exploitation running smoothly.'

There is also mass concern regarding the exploitation of children and women. Women are obviously much more vulnerable, particularly when they are put into this kind of environment. Sexual harassment is common. Sexual violence is common in these businesses when they are legalised. Do not be fooled and do not think that rape cases or HIV transmission by any means will actually decrease, because the threat of contracting HIV and the threat of rape is not at all diminished under legal prostitution.

There are many international examples where they have said to us blatantly, 'You know what? We got this wrong.' I implore members to look at the examples from overseas. Have a look at what it has done to the family structure. Have a look at what it has done to the fabric of society. Have a look at what it has done to the social platform of those countries. What you will see is that trafficking of women is still a major problem, even with the legalisation of prostitution. The case of Sweden, where police actively enforced the law, is another example I encourage members to look at.

There was an article in The Sydney Morning Herald last month that revealed some sex workers are frequently exploited and some are paid less based on other Australian counterparts. There are a number of issues, even when legalised. There are also issues concerning who owns these brothels if they are to be legalised. The member for Ashford has many answers to provide in relation to that. I have full respect for the member for Ashford and her passionate interest in this, but there are a number of issues with this bill and I simply cannot support it.

The prohibition of underage sex workers is something this bill fails to consider. There would need to be further controls on street sex workers, advertising, infected sex workers not working, licences and who enforces those licences, which office will administer those licences? This bill has none of these. Who is an approved manager? Is there a tribunal that overrides it? What are the powers of inspection?

I thank the police for providing recent consultation to members. They even say that enforcement is a massive issue. To catch one of these people in the act is extremely hard at the moment and there are a wide range of issues stemming from this bill. Planning controls and issues associated with planning controls are a massive concern, especially in residential zones, community and church areas.

Whilst I understand that the member for Ashford has a particular interest in this area, I respect her points of view, and I say this with deep respect from both sides of the argument. I implore members on both sides of the house to do their research on this issue. Have a look at it and have a look at what this bill will do to the fabric of our society if it is implemented. What will it do to the family structure? What will it do to the planning process and the social fabric that we have in our local area? Brothels appear to engage or host other illegal activity, and it would seem likely therefore that many more brothels will continue to operate if this bill comes to fruition. With those few words, I am against the bill.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (16:27): I rise to speak to the Statutes Amendment (Decriminalisation of Sex Work) Bill. I commend the speech that the member for Hartley has just delivered. Certainly, as the representative for the seat of Hammond, I will not be supporting this bill because I believe, too, that if the decriminalisation of prostitution happened it would break down society as we know it. I have been lobbied far and wide and by a lot of my local people, including my local churches and other groups.

In the context of the bill, I want to refer to some notes from Ngaire Button, Deputy Mayor of Christchurch, New Zealand, who has issued a blunt warning to South Australians, especially in respect of members of this house who are debating this bill. The deputy mayor indicated that Christchurch has been going through tough times since the huge earthquakes wrecked the central business district. New Zealand's Prostitution Reform Act 2003, which is basically the same as Steph Key's Sex Work Reform Bill, has only added to the city's problems, including financial problems. Ms Button spoke to Family Voice Australia leaders who were visiting Christchurch last week. She said:

It's really hard to get somebody that's employed to do traffic enforcement and enforce conditions on resource and building consents to go out and do enforcements around brothel compliance. It's a specialised skill. What we've found is that this whole thing has taken up so many resources. And who's paying? The ratepayer!

This (South Australian) bill will have an impact on rates, on the efficiency of how cities run, because it is staff time and not police time. The sex industry…because it is so fraught with so many criminal facets, it really is a law and order issue, not a local government issue. A parking officer who enters a brothel wouldn't necessarily know what to look out for.

Our staff have spent hours, weeks, months, over the last few years trying to manage prostitution in the city. We had 300 submissions from various groups in the city about signage. We had a big stack of submissions, hundreds—asking us not to allow brothels in their area. We can't do anything about street prostitution.

The street walkers fight about possession. They yell at each other across the road and argue, make a racket, and the cars are stopping…and there's the mess in people's yards, because there are no toilets. So they've been using people's yards as toilets. Then there's the condoms and needles and other things in people's front yards and around the property and on the streets. And husbands being solicited in their driveway as they come home from work.

Pimping has been an issue too. A council colleague has been to Manchester Street to talk to some of the girls. There are guys behind them with baseball bats. The exploitation has caused great problems with drug addiction.

Ngaire Button also indicated that the Christchurch council has tried to limit the placement of brothels, but was taken to court by a man who owned three brothels. The council lost the case. She said, 'It cost ratepayers $100,000. It's put a huge burden on us to manage brothels within the city.' She also indicated that she was not aware of any prostitute murders before the sex industry was decriminalised in 2003, but since that time three Christchurch sex workers have been murdered, yet the law was supposed to make it safer.

I think just this one case of what is happening in Christchurch, New Zealand indicates how wrong it is to decriminalise this industry. In putting the onus of control back on local government, which is already overstretched, especially with a lot of functions that have been passed their way from state governments in the past, you have parking inspectors and other council inspectors having to take over the role of the local police force essentially. It becomes a local government matter and then it becomes a ratepayer matter. As we have seen in this case, when there was a contest about where brothels could be located, it cost the council $100,000. This just should not happen.

From what was indicated in that submission, you can just imagine the problems with the street walkers accessing people's homes and yards, and the lack of control that people have on where these brothels will be located. They could be right next door or right next to the school that your children go to.

I will refer to a few quotes from a joint submission from Abolish Prostitution Now, Nordic Model Australia Coalition, Collective Shout, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women Australia, Amnesty members against the decriminalisation of pimps and punters, Adopt Nordic WA and SPACE International. In their submission they say that they are writing to make us all aware that the proposal in this legislation is actually a strategy to deregulate the sex industry. They say:

Pimps and other prostitution entrepreneurs stand to profit from the deregulation of their market sector, which will allow them to expand and diversify their businesses in an environment of lax regulation.

Survivors of prostitution in Australia—

who are members of some of these organisations I quoted earlier—

oppose any further deregulation of the sex industry. Their experience of the Australian sex industry has been one of violence, degradation, intimidation and harassment. Pimps and sex industry customers already enjoy high levels of impunity in their sexual use and abuse of women through prostitution businesses in Australia, and any proposal to legislatively guarantee the privacy of their activities further threaten those who are sold in the sex industry.

The submission also states that it is the wish of these organisations that:

People in prostitution should attract no legal penalty, and laws punishing these people should be removed from the South Australian statutes. However, these laws can be removed without any need to decriminalise pimps and sex industry customers. People who financially and sexually profit from the prostitution of others should continue to be criminalised. Their actions inflict harm on individuals, as well as society at large.

It is interesting that across the world a number of governments have removed laws against people in prostitution while still retaining criminal sanctions against pimps and sex industry customers. These include Sweden, South Korea, Norway, Iceland, Canada and Northern Ireland. In their submission, this group encourages our parliament:

to alternatively investigate the examples set by these governments in implementing what is known as the 'Nordic model' of legislation.

It is to be noted that:

The NSW government deregulated that state's sex industry in the 1990s, and the results of this laissez faire prostitution environment in metropolitan Sydney were recorded in a report published in 2012. These results included the following:

identification of 400 premises that were 'probably brothels' in Sydney's greater metropolitan area alone (and this number does not include escort agencies, street prostitution or strip clubs)

'A realistic estimate of numbers of sex workers working within 20 kilometres of Sydney's CBD within any one year might…[be] between 3,000 and 4,500. It is also known that there are a number of brothels operating in Western and South-Western Sydney and some NSW regional centres…numbers in these locations add…one or two thousand to the annual total'

'Two thirds…of the sex workers…were from Asian…or other non-English speaking countries…and nearly half…rated their English skills as 'Fair' or 'Poor'

'11% of the Asian women…reported that they were unhappy about being involved in sex work'

'8% of…participants reported being assaulted by clients, 10% threatened by clients, and a third…reported being pressured by a client to do something they didn't want to do'

I think this shows that decriminalising prostitution does not work. It has not worked in making prostitutes safer under the police who have been conducting oversight of brothels in the situation that already exists in South Australia.

Certainly, in light of all the information that has been given to me, and in my representation of my seat of Hammond, I will not be supporting the bill.

Debate adjourned on motion of Ms Digance.