STATUTES AMENDMENT (SEX WORK REFORM) BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 13 June 2012.)

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD (20:24): Just as a courtesy to members, I indicate I am probably going to be about 30 minutes or so. I just thought I would inform them. It helps, sir. I would appreciate it if they did it to me when they stood up; it would be nice.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD: Just a gentle suggestion. I think it is going to be 31 minutes now.

The Hon. J.S.L. Dawkins: I think these estimates are always a bit shorter than what they eventually are.

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD: Indeed. To consider this bill we need to gain an understanding of what prostitution really is. It is often portrayed as an agreement between a willing purchaser and a willing vendor, to which there could be no objection. The truth is that the damage done by prostitution to relationships between married couples is undeniable. Women who work as prostitutes are often degraded and suffer psychological harm that they are unlikely to ever overcome. I think we would all be reviled if it was suggested that our daughters become prostitutes. Why would we permit other parents' daughters to do the same?

Some portray the world of prostitution as a glamorous lifestyle, working with respectable and pleasant people. Whilst this may be the case for a small proportion of prostitutes who operate in so-called high-class circles, for the vast majority of prostitutes, this is nothing short of fantasy.

The best way to describe the practical effects of prostitution is to read extracts from the 2006 article by Melissa Farley, a PhD who is 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'.The writer is a clinical psychologist and author and has been conducting research worldwide into prostitution since 1993. That extensive research gives her a unique insight into the realities of prostitution. There is work from other suitably qualified people, which I will refer to later in my contribution as well.

The first extract is rather lengthy. I do not wish to labour the points that I wish to make, but I have decided that the only way to accurately depict the harm that prostitution causes is to read some of these word for word. Perhaps it is a good thing that we do not know much about the reality of the world of prostitution. These extracts paint a very different picture from one that we might easily assume is the case. I quote:

U.S. prostitution can be understood in the context of the cultural normalisation of prostitution as a glamorous and wealth-producing 'job' for girls who lack of emotional support, education, and employment opportunities. The sexual exploitation of children and women in prostitution [in particular] is often indistinguishable from incest, intimate partner violence, and rape. Indian feminist Jean D'Cunha asked, 'What will be the...outcome of struggles against sexual harassment and violence in the home, the workplace, or the street, if men [usually] can buy the right to perpetrate these very acts against women in prostitution?'...In the past two decades, a number of authors have documented or analysed the sexual and physical violence that is the normative experience for women in prostitution. Today, there is a significant peer-reviewed literature documenting the violence in prostitution. Familial sexual abuse functions as a training ground for prostitution. Survivors link childhood physical, sexual, and emotional abuse as children to later prostitution. Many studies lend support to this analysis. Seventy per cent of the adult women in prostitution in one study said that their childhood sexual abuse led to entry into prostitution.

Seventy per cent. The article goes on to say:

Early adolescence is the most frequently reported age of entry into any type of prostitution. As one girl said, 'We've all been molested. Over and over, and raped. We were all molested and sexually abused as children, don't you know that? We ran to get away...We were thrown out, thrown away. We've been on the street since we were 12, 13, 14.

According to the empirical data (but not according to single-person, 'happy-hooker' narratives)—

as they are referred to—

familial abuse or neglect is almost universal among prostituted women. Of fifty-five survivors of prostitution at the Council for Prostitution Alternatives in Portland, eighty-five per cent reported a history of incest, ninety per cent a history of physical abuse, and ninety-eight per cent a history of emotional abuse. Multiple perpetrators of sexual and physical abuse were the rule rather than the exception.

Sexual violence and physical assault are the norm for women in all types of prostitution. One Canadian observer noted that ninety-nine per cent of women in prostitution were victims of violence, with more frequent injuries 'than workers in [those] occupations considered...most dangerous, like mining, forestry, and firefighting.' Prostituted women in Glasgow said that violence from customers was their primary fear. Physical abuse was considered part of the job of prostitution, with the payments sometimes determined by each individual blow of a beating or whipping.

Violence is commonplace in prostitution whether it is legal or illegal. 85 five per cent of prostituted women interviewed in Minneapolis-St. Paul had been raped in prostitution. 85%. Another study found that eighty per cent of women who had been domestically or transnationally trafficked suffered violence-related injuries.

Of 854 people in prostitution in nine countries, eighty-nine per cent wanted to leave prostitution but did not have other options for survival. Researchers have found that two factors are consistently associated with greater violence in prostitution: poverty and length of time in prostitution. The more customers serviced, the more women reported severe physical symptoms. The longer women remained in prostitution, the higher their rates of sexually transmitted diseases. When prostitution is assumed to be a reasonable 'job option' women's intense longing to escape it is made invisible.

The article goes on to say:

Prostitution can be lethal. A Canadian commission found that the death rate of women in prostitution was 40 times higher than that of the general population. 40 times higher. A study of Vancouver prostitution reported a thirty-six per cent incidence of attempted murder. In prostitution a woman does not stay whole. She loses her name, her identity and her feelings. Over time the commodification and objectification of her body by pimps and [so-called] johns are internalised. Portions of her body are numbered and compartmentalised. Eventually she also views her body as a commodity rather than as an integral part of herself. Trauma and torture survivors commonly experience this profound disconnectedness.

Still quoting from the same article:

Reviewing four studies of disassociation among women in prostitution, researchers concluded that disassociation is a common psychological defence in response to the trauma of prostitution. The disassociation necessary to survive rape, battering and prostitution in adulthood is the same as that used to survive familial sexual assault. Disassociation has been observed as a consequence of torture and a means of surviving it. Most women report that they cannot prostitute unless they disassociate. When they do not disassociate they are at risk of being overwhelmed with pain, shame and rage. One woman explains: 'It's almost like I train my mind to act like I like [prostitution] but not have any thoughts. I have the thoughts like, "What is this doing to my body and my mind and my self-esteem?" a few days later but not as it's happening...Even though the guys are paying me for it, I feel like they're robbing me of something personal. And I wonder, "Why are they doing this?"'

Post-traumatic stress order (PTSD) commonly occurs among prostituted women and is indicative of their extreme emotional distress. PTSD is characterised by anxiety, depression, insomnia, irritability, flashbacks, emotional numbing and hyper alertness. In nine countries, we found that sixty-eight per cent of those in prostitution met criteria for a diagnosis of PTSD, a prevalence that was comparable to battered women seeking shelter, rape survivors seeking treatment and survivors of state-sponsored torture.

Across widely varying cultures on five continents, the traumatic consequences of prostitution were similar. Vanwesenbeeck noted comparable symptoms among women in legal Dutch prostitution. Results from two studies of prostituted Korean women reflect the women's intense psychological distress, with PTSD prevalence rates of seventy-eight and eighty per cent.

Most people who have been in prostitution for any length of time have difficulty with sexual intimacy. Sex becomes a job rather than an act of love or passion. It's difficult to see one's chosen partner as anything but a john.

In Chicago, for example, the same frequency of rape is reported by women in both escort and street prostitution. Although some studies report greater violence in outdoor prostitution, the difference is trivial when contrasted with most people's assumptions of what constitutes reasonable physical and emotional risk. For instance, while women prostituting on the street in Glasgow were almost twice as likely to experience violence than women prostituting indoors, forty-eight per cent of the women prostituting indoors were subject to frequent and severe violence. Among women prostituting in South Africa, while there was significantly more physical violence in street prostitution as compared to brothel prostitution, there was no difference in the women's emotional distress resulting from either street or brothel prostitution.

The Stockholm syndrome is a psychological strategy for survival in captivity. In inescapable situations, humans form bonds with their captors. The traumatic bonds established between women and prostitution and their pimp/captors is identical to those battered women and their batterers. In the absence of other emotional attachments, women appear to choose their relationships with pimps and may be psychologically at home with men who exercise coercive control over them. In order for a woman to survive prostitution on a day-to-day basis, she must deny the extent of harm that pimps and johns are capable of inflicting.

Both survivors of prostitution and johns explain that pornography is prostitution with a camera. Pimps make more money from johns when they advertise women in prostitution as 'adult film stars' who are available as 'escorts'.

Prostitution is advertised online, where it is indistinguishable from pornography. The Internet has expanded the reach of traffickers and it has intensified the humiliation and violence of prostitution. Pornography is one specific means of trafficking women for the purpose of selling women into prostitution. On pornography/prostitution websites, women are for rent and for sale. They are moved across town, across the country, and from one country to another.

Women in prostitution are described as escorts, hostesses, strippers, dancers, and sex workers. Sometimes these words are used by women in prostitution in order to retain some dignity. The term sex worker suggests that prostitution is a reasonable job for poor women, rather than a violation of their human rights. The words sex worker imply 'order, hierarchy, and accountability...It says board of directors...and marketplace niche.' In that one word—work—we lose ground in the political struggle to understand prostitution as violence against women.

In legalised prostitution, the state assumes the role of pimp, collecting taxes and regulating the practice of prostitution. Decriminalised prostitution is a radical removal of any and all laws regarding prostitution (including laws against pimping, pandering, purchasing and procuring) so that the buying and selling of people in prostitution is considered the legal equivalent of buying candy.

Although advocates allege that legalising prostitution would remove its social stigma, in fact, women in legalised prostitution are still physically and socially rejected, whether they are in rural brothels ringed with razor wire or in urban brothels walled-off from the city. Zoning of the location of legal or state-tolerated prostitution is a constant source of legal battles, since no-one wants prostitutions taking place in his neighbourhood. Legalisation is not only ineffective in removing the stigma of prostitution: it also fails to protect women from violence.

Many women in prostitution tell us that legalised prostitution will not make them any safer than they were in illegal prostitution. Thus legal brothels in the Netherlands may have as many as three panic buttons in each room. Dutch, South African, and Australian pimps have commented on the extreme physical violence that johns inflict on women in prostitution, and some Australian women in prostitution are advised to take classes in hostage negotiation. When rapes occur, however, women in legal strip clubs are told to keep silent or be fired. Women in prostitution speak constantly of its violence.

Although 'health checks' of prostituted women occur in legal prostitution, the purpose of the screening is to provide the buyer with an HIV-free commodity. The health check is not aimed at protecting the woman in prostitution from HIV transmitted to her by johns.

Because sexual harassment and sexual violence are intrinsic to legal as well as illegal prostitution, and because rape is a primary means of transmission of HIV, the threat of contracting HIV is not at all diminished under legal prostitution.

A Nevada legislator stated, 'Condoning prostitution is the most demeaning and degrading thing the state can do to women. What...[Nevada] do[es] as a state is essentially put a US-grade stamp on the butt of every prostitute. Instead, we should be turning them around by helping them get back into society'.

The article asks:

What is a better solution? In 1988, Andrea Dworkin suggested that prostitution should be decriminalised for the prostitute while at the same time criminalising johns, pimps and traffickers. Today such a law exists in Sweden. Recognising that prostitution deserves abolition, the Swedish government criminalised the john's and pimp's and trafficker's buying of sex but not the prostituted person's selling of sex. The law made clear that 'in the majority of cases...[the woman in prostitution] is a weaker partner who is exploited,' and it allocated funding for social services to 'motivate prostitutes to seek help to leave their way of life.' Two years after the law's passage, a government taskforce reported that there was a fifty per cent decrease in the number of women prostituting and a seventy-five per cent decrease in the number of men who bought sex. Trafficking of women into Sweden has also decreased.

There are also progressive legal developments in Korea where buying and selling sex acts is criminalised. In 2004, following an educational campaign by women's and human rights groups, the Korean government enacted laws authorising the seizure of assets obtained by trafficking in women, increased penalties for trafficking and prostitution, established supports and resources for prostituted/trafficked women, and provided funds for public education campaigns about prostitution. The passage and enforcement of these laws has been credited with a thirty-seven per cent reduction in the number of brothels in Korea, a thirty-to-forty per cent decrease in the number of bars and clubs (which comprise eighty per cent of the sex industry in Korea), and a fifty-two per cent decrease in the number of women prostituted in brothels.

A Florida state law provides civil remedies for damages that johns and pimps inflict on prostituted women. Women who are coerced into prostitution via exploitation of social and legal vulnerability can sue johns and pimps for damages. Coercion is defined as restraint of speech or communication with others; exploitation of a condition of developmental disability, cognitive limitation, effective disorder, or substance dependence; exploitation of prior victimisation by sexual abuse; exploitation during the making of pornography; and exploitation of the human needs for food, shelter, safety, or affection.

A new consciousness about the harms of prostitution in the United Kingdom is evident in political commentary suggesting that men should be charged with rape even when they have sex with women who are intimidated into having sex with them, even if money is paid for that sex act.

Two international agreements strongly oppose prostitution and trafficking. The United Nations 1949 Convention declares that trafficking and prostitution are incompatible with individual dignity and worth. The Convention addresses the harms of prostitution to consenting adult women, whether transported across national boundaries or not. Viewing trafficked women as victims, not criminals, the 2000 Palermo Protocol makes consent irrelevant to whether or not trafficking has occurred and encourages states to develop legislative responses to men's [usually] demand for prostitution. The Palermo Protocol establishes a method of international judicial cooperation that would permit prosecution of traffickers and organised criminals. It addresses a range of other forms of sexual exploitation including pornography.

A 2006 report by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights Aspects of the Victims of Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, noted that prostitution as it is practised in the world 'usually satisfies the legal elements for the definition of trafficking' and therefore, legalisation of prostitution is 'to be discouraged.' The Special Rapporteur observed that 'the issue of demand is of crucial importance in addressing trafficking,' noting, '[b]y engaging in the act of commercial sex, the prostitute-user is...directly inflicting an additional and substantial harm upon the trafficking victim, tantamount to rape, above and beyond the harmful means used by others to achieve her entry or maintenance in prostitution'.

The paper concludes:

Postmodern descriptions of prostituted women as sex workers promote an acceptance of conditions that in any other employment context would be correctly described as sexual harassment, sexual exploitation, or rape. Women's experiences of violence and their psychological response to it cannot be theorised away. Postmodern analysis of prostitution that considers it to be 'just acting' or that views women's traumatic dissociative responses as proof of 'an exceptional control of the inner world' trivialise the existence of real violence against real women in prostitution.

A false distinction between prostitution and trafficking has hindered efforts to abolish prostitution. The word trafficking has been used by sex industry promoters to separate 'innocent' [so-called] victims of trafficking from women who choose prostitution. In reality, no such line exists. Understanding the realworld link between prostitution and trafficking is crucial to developing effective laws against trafficking. Since prostitution creates the demand for trafficking, the sex industry in its totality must be confronted. Unless existing prostitution laws are integrated into the newest state antitrafficking laws, we will not be challenging sex trafficking as it operates in the world.

That concludes my extensive reading of a number of extracts from the worldwide research papers of Melissa Farley PhD. One might well ask: 'Is prostitution in Australia like the very grim situation that she describes?' I suggest that there is no reason to think that prostitution here is any different to prostitution in the other countries mentioned. Indeed, her study includes Australian cases. In case anyone has the impression that these findings are reliant on any one particular viewpoint, I quote from lesbian feminist scholar and political activist Sheila Jeffries. She is a professor of political science at the University of Melbourne, and in a paper she presented in New York she says:

I shall suggest today that the social experiment of legalising brothel prostitution which took place in Australia in the 1980s and 1990s has failed in all of its objectives i.e. stopping the illegal industry and police corruption, reducing the harm to women, stopping street prostitution.

She goes on to say:

In fact these harms have increased and significant new harms have joined them, such as traffic in women. Australian legislation has been used as a model by those countries who have recently legalised, such as the Netherlands, and those who are considering it e.g. New Zealand. It is very important then, to look at how this experiment has failed lest other countries hope to alleviate the harms of prostitution by going down the same legislation track.

The article concludes:

The idea that men's prostitution behaviour is inevitable suggests that prostitution should be understood as a harmful traditional practice. It fits UN criteria for harmful traditional/cultural practices very well. It harms the health of women and girls, it creates stereotype sex roles, it is for the benefit of men [usually], arises from the oppression of women and is justified by tradition.

There is one Australian organisation that has a great deal of contact with prostitutes and is able to give us an accurate account. I am referring to Linda's House of Hope, which operates in Perth. It is run by Linda Watson, who was a madam in brothels for over 20 years. She saw that prostitutes were unable to escape their situation, and she decided to make a complete change in her own life. Since then, she has devoted herself to offering prostitutes hope and giving assistance to those who want to leave the business.

From her 13 years of running Linda's House of Hope, Linda says that 98 per cent of the prostitutes have an addiction to alcohol, drugs and, in particular these days, ecstasy. Linda's work has resulted in her house being firebombed, shot at and its front windows smashed. She has been stalked and threatened, but she continues her work because she knows firsthand of the desperate plight of the prostitutes. I will read an extract of her submission to the Western Australian Attorney-General on prostitution law reform. It states:

Are you aware that a new recruit in the sex industry is often introduced by the promise of earning large sums of money? We have all seen advertisements in the media which state that girls can earn big dollars. The girl is also told that she has to choose a new identity. (Ironically the madam can retain hers as she is in power.) If the girl cannot choose a name, she will be given one. Sadly some girls [after a while] have not heard their birth names for some time and some have even forgotten what their names are. These girls are also warned not to give customers their real name and address because of the risks of stalking which can result in them or their families being harmed. That should tell you how safe this industry is.

She goes on to say:

Are you aware she is also warned about the dangers of violent customers? For example, The Ugly Mugs Program warns the girls of characters to look out for that target prostitutes. Paradoxically madams also fine girls for refusing drunk, abusive and even sometimes very elderly men. I am aware of [several] young 18 year old girls who have had sex with men old enough to be their grandfathers (and even great-grandfathers). I have even seen firsthand how some girls actually come out vomiting after one of these encounters. Perverts [can] roam the streets where private operators or brothels are located. Paedophiles seek children from prostituted mothers. Clients who are paedophiles like sex workers to dress up as children and they want them to pretend to be 10 years old or younger. Some want them to wear nappies and put a dummy in their mouth.

These are her words, not mine. She goes on to say:

Are you aware that drug dealers pose as clients to introduce new recruits to drugs? Drugged girls earn more money for madams. I have heard madams say that 'girls are a dime a dozen'. Drug dealers use brothels as targets for making their drugs for organized crime. The list of damage is endless.

This is from a women who was herself in the industry for 20 years and who has been trying to help people for the following 13 years.

I now turn specifically to the question of human trafficking. The United Nations' body UNIFEM (now called UN Women) was the United Nations arm dedicated to advancing women's rights and to achieving gender equality. In 2011, it reported as follows:

Women and girls comprise 80 percent of the estimated 800,000 people trafficked annually, with the majority (79 per cent) [of the 80 per cent] trafficked for sexual exploitation

Australia is part of this problem. As to human trafficking in Australia, Wikipedia states:

The extent of human trafficking in Australia is difficult to quantify. However, it has been estimated that the number ranges between 300 and 1000 a year. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime lists Australia as one of the 21 trafficking destination countries in the high destination category.

In February last year, a media release from the Hon. Kate Ellis, my local member for the federal parliament and the federal Minister for the Status of Women, stated:

Some 83 per cent of trafficking victims identified in Australia are women working in the sex industry.

Other reports indicate that many of these trafficked women caught up in prostitution in Australia are Asian women who have had their passports taken from them and are thus captive to the brothel owner. Any doubt about the fact that sexual slavery exists in Australia has been dismissed by a Four Corners investigation that was aired on 17 October 2011. It is valuable to hear the summary given at the introduction of the program, and again I quote:

Tonight's program is about some of those brothels, under the cloak of official licence acting illegally behind closed doors, engaged in human trafficking and sexual slavery.

It is also about a clear lack of concerted action at Federal and State levels to derail this trade in human misery and degradation; a trade that has been linked to crime syndicates operating globally.

This special Four Corners investigation conducted in tandem with the Fairfax Newspapers has exposed a practice where some Asian girls and women are tricked into coming to Australia as students and then held captive in brothels.

Others agree to come as sex workers but are then effectively enslaved.

The story also takes a close look at the vicious bashing outside a Melbourne brothel of a young man who is believed to have gone there to try to free his captive girlfriend, and the police decision not to prosecute his killer—a man with a criminal record who has been connected to a sex trafficking gang.

The program graphically showed how sex trafficking and sex slavery worked and the consequences for anyone who dared to cross the serious criminals who are conducting the business. It explained the purchase of women overseas, the false promises of education and work in Australia and how the women arrive here and have their passports confiscated, being told they must work off their debt through prostitution.

Two former sex slaves interviewed described how they were rostered to work up to 15 hours a day, seven days a week, servicing as many as 10 men per shift and performing degrading sex acts and unprotected oral sex. One had sex with more than 400 men in her first 12 months. Recently, on 10 July, a report appeared in The Australian newspaper about sex trafficking in Queensland. It said:

...officers in Mount Isa and across other Queensland mining towns were increasingly dealing with 'women and girls who cannot speak English, or who have a very low level of English, and a very low level of education, who are basically being trafficked for sex, from one mining town to the next'.

'They are working on a fly-in, fly-out basis, two weeks here, two weeks in the next town and so on; they are being advertised as available in the local newspapers, and they are coerced or threatened into doing it,' he said.

'They are being told they cannot go to the police because in the countries they come from, the police might even be part of the problem.'

'Threats are being made against their families. And whenever we have an operation to target them, they come into the station and you can see that they are being controlled mentally and physically and it's very difficult to get them to open up to authority and enable us to help them.'

That is the end of a quote from a serving police officer in Queensland.

I would now like to examine the situation of the law itself. Looking at the legal position in the other states of Australia and the practical effects of the various legislative regimes in particular, this is very helpfully covered in Research Paper No. 32 by our own parliamentary library, dated 29 February 2012; that is, earlier this year. It considers several states and also some other countries, and it states:

The New South Wales approach is an example of decriminalisation rather than legalisation (as in Queensland and the Netherlands) or criminalisation (as in Sweden). As of 1995, in NSW brothels are able to operate like other businesses. Brothels do not require special licenses and are only limited by council planning laws. Councils regulate brothels through Local Environmental Plans (LEPs) and Development Control Plans (DCPs), made in accordance with the [Environmental Planning and Assessment] Act. Councils can prohibit brothels from being located in certain areas (e.g. in residential zones); and they can specify the standards that apply to development applications for the use of premises as brothels in other areas...

However, despite the decriminalisation of the sex industry in NSW, there is still a rampant illegal industry. For example, in 2007 the Adult Business Association NSW reported that there were 775 illegal brothels operating in NSW. This revelation prompted a change in the law to allow local courts 'to order that gas and water supplies be cut off' so that councils could shut down these illegal brothels. The continued existence of an unregulated industry ensures that crime and corruption is still present in the sex industry in NSW.

Of course, that is where prostitution is decriminalised. As to the position in Queensland, the paper states:

Prostitution in Queensland became legal under the Prostitution Act 1999. The act was prompted by the 1987-1989 Fitzgerald Inquiry, and concluded that there was an intrinsic relationship between organised crime, police corruption and illegal prostitution. Fitzgerald argued that regulating prostitution would bring benefits to the community, through its control and the mandating of health checks, and to sex workers who could be offered protection through legitimate police involvement.

It also states that the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission 2011 concluded that:

...although the licensed brothel industry in Queensland is well-regulated...it exists alongside a legal but relatively unregulated sole operator sector and an illegal industry. While we reported some concerns about the impact on community amenity of sole operators working in some residential areas, for the most part there have been no problems identified with the sole operator sector. However, there has been significant concern expressed throughout this review about the ability of the illegal operators to masquerade as sole operators. The fact that this part of the industry is unregulated is set to contribute to that ability.

As to the Netherlands, the parliamentary research paper states:

However, the Government also notes that the trafficking of women is still a major problem even with the legalisation [of prostitution]. According to Sheila Jeffreys, the 'legalization of the prostitution industry makes trafficking in women more profitable' and estimates of prostituted women in the Netherlands are reported to be at least 50 per cent. The problem, as Jeffreys articulates, is that legalisation drives up demand and results in demand for prostitutes to be met by trafficked women. She continues that this may also affect local young Dutch women:

'Where trafficking of women fails to meet the demand, then local "loverboys" or pimps will increase their practice of "turning out" teenage girls that they romance and then coerce into prostitution. A recent report suggests that this is what is taking place in the Netherlands in 2007 as boys of Moroccan and Turkish descent "turn out" Dutch girls into the industry, tattooing the girls' arms with their names.'

As to Sweden, the paper states:

The 'Swedish Model' which was enacted in 1999 through the Prohibiting of Sexual Services Act criminalises the buying rather than the selling of sex. In doing so the law targets men as the main consumers of commercial sex, recognising the ever-present gender divide in prostitution.

The Swedish government is explicit in its understanding of prostitution and why it chooses to implement the criminalisation of the consumer model:

'The Swedish government and parliament have, through the implementation of the Legislation pertaining to the Protection of Women, defined prostitution as men's violence against women... No prostitution can be said to be voluntary.'

That is the Swedish government's view. According to the paper, the results of this approach are that some argue that prostitutes feel less protected, but the paper goes on to state:

Advocates challenge these views and argue that the Swedish model has important benefits. As evidence of the success of the approach, they cite reduced rates of prostitution, dropping by 30-50 per cent, a relative halt to the new recruitment of women in prostitution and comparatively less cases of trafficked women. Proponents of the Swedish model argue that the provisions have reduced the number of buyers of sex, dropping by around 75 to 80 per cent...

For completeness, I mention that prostitution is allowed and regulated in the ACT and the Northern Territory. In Tasmania a person must not be a commercial operator of a sexual services business which is a business providing sexual services for fee or reward. Western Australia prohibits all forms of prostitution. In 2008 Western Australia enacted legislation to legalise prostitution, but it has not come into effect and it appears that it will not do so, given the new government there.

What about legal and illegal brothels? I wish to say a few words about the practical consequences of having either legal or illegal brothels. Some suggest that the best approach is to legalise brothels, because then they can be controlled. I emphasise that this is not what is proposed in the bill on which I am making this speech. The bill simply makes every brothel legal without controlling mechanisms at all.

Even if control mechanisms were proposed, the argument that brothels can be controlled by legalisation is inherently wrong. It stands to reason that if brothels are legalised and licensed, then operators will want to save costs—as they are currently—and avoid regulation if they can operate illegally. Also, if hardened criminals wish to make money out of brothels, they will not qualify for a licence so they will operate illegally. If brothels are legal, it can only be a minor offence to operate an illegal one, anyway.

What do we find where brothels are legalised and supposedly regulated? As reported in The Daily Telegraph of 12 November 2011 late last year in New South Wales, a report by the government Interagency Brothels Taskforce concluded:

The statistics show 150 illegal brothels operate in the state, with hundreds more believed to be going unreported. Several industry figures estimate that there are at least 10,000 sex workers in New South Wales alone—putting the state on a par with Amsterdam. The European sex capital is now winding back its legal brothel numbers due to major problems with organised crime and people trafficking.

Another report in The Daily Telegraph of 18 May 2009 states:

An investigation by The Daily Telegraph has revealed illegal brothels and escort services outnumber licensed establishments by four to one and the gap is growing...The Adult Business Association estimates the number of illegal sex services in the metropolitan area has blown out to exceed 400.

The Daily Telegraph report of November 2011, referred to earlier, also states:

'There's no probity checks done in NSW. Any Tom, Dick or Harry can own a brothel, irrespective of their criminal background. You can be a murderer or a crime boss and legally own a brothel authorised by council.'

Acting Lord Mayor of Parramatta, Mike McDermott, agreed councils did not have the ability to stop the spread of brothels: 'We've been powerless to stop brothels starting up in our area.'

Councils are unable to control illegal brothers. That is the simple fact. Another article in The Daily Telegraph dated 8 April 2011 says, referring to one local council in the Sydney area:

[One legal brothel owner] was frustrated the Oriana Bath House continued to operate in the wake of the ICAC revelations and a report in The Daily Telegraph last November.

'The council has known the Oriana Bath House has been illegally providing sex for years,' she said.

Council general manager Nick Tobin defended the council's record, saying it was a difficult process to close illegal brothels: 'Closing a brothel can take up to six months and cost more than $10,000 per instance.'...The council has spent more than $13,000 in the current financial year just trying to close Oriana, he said.

I would now like to make a brief comparison with the Victorian act and consider the position of Victoria in some detail. A good summary appears in the parliamentary paper to which I referred earlier and it says as follows:

Prostitution in Victoria is controlled through a combination of planning processes and a licensing system. Consumer Affairs Victoria, Victoria Police and local councils each respectively enforce the licensing, criminal and planning requirements of the act. The licensing and registration scheme is administered by the Business Licensing Authority...The Sex Work Act 1994 (Vic) also establishes an Advisory Committee to advise the Minister on the prostitution industry in Victoria (section 67). Its legal framework is one of partial legalisation.

The proposal in the bill now before us that has been presented to this chamber by the minister is simply to remove the laws that make prostitution illegal. In contrast, when you look at the legal position in Victoria, the Victorian Sex Work Act 1994, which goes for 194 pages, has provisions concerning all of the following issues:

1. Underage girls as sex workers.

2. Controls on street sex workers (and it makes it illegal).

3. Controls on advertising. Persons must not describe the services offered or advertise on radio or TV.

4. Infected sex workers must not work.

5. Banning notices can be issued. Persons found by police committing offences must not stay in the area.

6. Brothels must be licensed with the Business Licensing Authority. This prevents criminals from operating brothels and enables the authorities to know where all legal brothels are located.

7. Requirements for applications for licences are set out in the legislation.

8. A licensee is responsible for control of brothel premises.

9. There are provisions for an annual fee and statement to be provided by the operator.

10. Approved managers are required to be named.

11. A tribunal has disciplinary powers.

12. Powers of inspections are set out.

13. Orders can be made requiring supply of information and answers to questions by operators.

14. Powers of entry by authorities are specified.

15. There are specific planning controls, and matters to consider are specified.

16. No brothels are permitted in residential zones at all.

17. Persons may not have an interest in more than one brothel, licence or permit at all.

All these issues are dealt with in the Victorian act.

An editorial in TheSydney Morning Herald of 13 October 2011, concerning prostitution in Victoria and entitled 'Legalising prostitution has not made women working safer', stated:

Prostitution was legalised in Victoria in 1984 to tackle three problems: illegal prostitution and police corruption, harm to women and street prostitution. More than 15 years later, these problems have grown worse, not better. Estimates from police and the legal brothel industry put the number of illegal brothels at 400 in Victoria, four times the number of legal ones, and legal brothels are being used as fronts for illegal operators and criminal activity. Brothel owners have been caught bribing local government officials to warn them of licence checks.

The editorial concludes:

If legalising prostitution hasn't eliminated the problems of the sex industry, what will? We need to look to Sweden for the answer—

it says—

The Swedish government criticises countries such as Australia that allow legal prostitution on the basis that it generates demand for the criminal activity of traffickers and organised crime. Swedish bureaucrats understand that prostitution and trafficking are two sides of the same coin. In 1999 they made pimps, traffickers and prostitution 'clients' [so-called] liable for criminal prosecution.

A detective inspector with Sweden's National Police Board notes that, since 1999, the country has become unattractive for traffickers, because they can no longer 'earn as much money as they want to'.

However, the bill we are debating at the moment has none of the safeguards found in the Victorian act—the 17 I have just read, and, of course, there are others. Problems of illegal brothels, sex trafficking, criminals and corruption have continued in Victoria, notwithstanding the very forthright or supposed regulation they have.

In South Australia, the bill we are debating means that a brothel could be operated by serious criminals and there would be no power of any authority whatsoever to prevent this. The authorities would not even know with any certainty where brothels were located and therefore would not be able to regulate them in any meaningful way. The bill does not propose any scheme of regulation whatsoever; it is simply open slather for prostitution.

In terms of town planning considerations, no planning controls are proposed in this bill we are debating other than the minimal provisions that brothels are not to operate within certain distances of churches and schools. Presumably, brothels could be established in residential areas with impunity, subject to council development plans, one assumes, which are always couched in vague terms anyway as to what is permitted and what is not. If brothels were legal, would a homeowner be entitled to object to one next door? Would brothels be permitted in local shopping centres zones, for example, near playgrounds perhaps, or near sports grounds or clubhouses which may be, and indeed are, frequented by children?

A submission by the Law Society of South Australia, dated 29 June 2012, just a few weeks ago, commented on the 2011 bill and the bill we now have before us and we are currently debating. It stated:

Firstly, in relation to section 10(1)(a) of the 2011 bill, we regard 200 metres to be too close in proximity to a children's facility for a premises to be used for the purposes of sex work. We note that section 29 of the 2012 Bill has retained 200 metres as the prescribed distance from which a premises may be established from a 'prescribed children's service'; reduced to 50 metres in the central business district. We regard—

this is the Law Society—

50 metres and 200 metres as being too close.

The submission also points out that in the 2011 bill a brothel cannot operate within 200 metres of a children's playground, but there is no such prohibition in the current bill, which is most unsatisfactory. We also need to ask: if brothels are so undesirable that we should hide them from children, why should we allow them at all? The Law Society's submission also states:

Thirdly we raise concern of there being no provision in the 2012 Bill to make it a specific offence for children to be present or living at the premises at any time during the operation of the sex business. The 2012 Bill again omits to protect children who may be present or reside in a premise used for sex work.

Clearly, this is unsatisfactory and the Law Society has spelt out a number of problems.

There is no restriction whatsoever proposed on advertising either by this bill. Presumably, advertisements on building and billboards could display pictures of the services offered, only subject to the laws of decency that monitor these sorts of things. Explicit advertisements could be placed anywhere, even near schools, playgrounds, churches or wherever, and presumably TV and radio advertising could also occur and, no doubt, would occur as it has in other states. There is no authority charged with overseeing, regulating or controlling prostitution under this bill. Who will monitor the extent to which prostitution results in crime, drug addiction, trafficking of women or regulated illegal activities? Whose responsibility will it be to take action to control these things?

What about enforcement? If a brothel is found to be operating illegally in some way, such as being involved in people trafficking, who will be prosecuted: the owner, the manager, who? There is no official record of any licensee or manager of a brothel under this proposed bill. If a person is prosecuted, what is to stop that person from continuing to operate the same or other brothels illegally? Will bikies and criminal gangs be allowed to continue in this profitable line of business? Can we expect turf wars between criminal gangs competing for territory in which to operate brothels? Will others be stood over and forced out of the business?

Since there are to be no inspectors under this bill, will police have any special powers at all—certainly there are none mentioned in the bill—such as to require entry into brothels, or to question workers about their conditions? Will this be left to SafeWork SA or WorkCover or anyone else not specified in the bill? What will happen to prostitutes who contract a sexually transmitted disease? Again, not specified. Are they permitted to continue working or are we to pretend that the fact that the bill provides that condoms must be used will solve all these problems?

The bill provides that in certain circumstances soliciting is illegal. Section 25 of the Summary Offences Act presently prohibits soliciting in public and also prohibits loitering for the purposes of prostitution. The new replacement section 25 will not prohibit loitering in a public place for the purposes of prostitution—will not prohibit it. In order to prove an offence, a policeman would, at the very least, have to reach an agreement with the prostitute for her services, including the price. Police observing a woman blatantly dressed as a prostitute and loitering in a known haunt for prostitutes would be insufficient to prove an offence; more proof would be needed under this bill. The bill will not prevent street prostitutes and, indeed, it does not seek to. The fact that prostitution will be legalised will increase the number of street prostitutes.

When you put all this together, prostitution hurts women, it hurts men, in fact, and it certainly hurts families, and I believe it hurts society. Family First will strongly oppose any bill that seeks to make prostitution more available and, in particular, Family First will oppose this bill which does not include any safeguards or protections virtually whatsoever.

I have a couple of final remarks. Members may recall that I asked the minister a question on this topic yesterday in this chamber. This is not a criticism of the minister in any way; I respect that people have different views on different topics. However, I did want to address her answer in some way at least. In the minister's answer to my question she referred to the New Zealand model of prostitution, where prostitution is legalised, and she gave it as an example of where things appeared to be working well, or something to that effect.

I have a couple of very recent newspaper articles from New Zealand that I came across only today dealing with this issue. I will not read them out in full but I will quote small sections. One is from the New Zealand Herald dated 19 May 2010 and it states:

A sleazy, under-age sex trade has been found in Christchurch after a police swoop netted several young prostitutes including a 12-year-old from the city's streets.

The article later goes on to state that the police swoop was part of promised action on the teenage prostitution problem after a noticeable increase in the number on the streets. The concern for prostitutes had grown since the murder of prostitutes Suzie Sutherland (who was 36) and a 24 year old who has had her name suppressed. Children's Commissioner, Cindy Kiro, said the situation also existed in South Auckland. She said:

It is unacceptable that people use those services and it is unacceptable that children may see that as a possible profession.

I quote from another article from New Zealand, held up as a model of success of legalised prostitution, also from the New Zealand Herald, by journalist Josh Gale. It was published on Friday 11 June 2010 and is entitled 'An underage prostitute working in Auckland's CBD'. I quote in part:

Police are worried by a rise in underage prostitution in downtown Auckland, where girls as young as 12 are selling themselves for sex. Senior Constable Mark Riddell of the Auckland central police youth action team said that in the past six weeks operation City Door had identified at least 13 girls under 16 as active prostitutes.

Further down in the article it says (and this I think is a particularly offensive):

'Young meat earns a lot of money,' said Ms Baker. 'Under-age prostitution has always been a problem, but there is an increase. We are seeing more and more young girls out there.'

I could quote in more detail, but I will not. I use those examples just to highlight the fact that New Zealand is no example of legalised prostitution working well at all; if anything it is an example of its not working, according to its own media.

My final comment is this: I have given a lengthy contribution tonight, and I thank members for their patience. If this bill were to pass the negatives substantially outweigh any perceived positives. There are real problems with this bill. There are no safeguards and I think, unfortunately, women will be the losers, as will families, and even men will be the losers if this bill passes.

Debated adjourned on motion of Hon. J.M. Gazzola.