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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-02-29 Daily Xml
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BIKINI GIRL MASSAGE CAFE

The Hon. S.W. KEY (Ashford) (15:30): It is interesting to note that Bon Levi from the Bikini Girl Massage Cafe on South Road has withdrawn his application to the Marion council to run that business. Members of this house would remember that I have regularly reported on the local campaign waged against the establishment of this business. I have also said that constituents, both the primary school community and the other businesses providing services to children, have felt that the location of the massage service was inappropriate.

I would like to congratulate the community for their campaign, including a Facebook campaign, a petition and demonstrations by parents out the front of the business of mention. I would particularly like to acknowledge Amanda Exindaris, who was the originator of the Facebook campaign. The Black Forest Primary School council also needs to be acknowledged for its role in the campaign and the Marion council staff who worked closely with me and residents to try to resolve this issue.

The Marion council lodged legal action against Mr Levi in the Environment, Resources and Development Court in June of last year after he failed to apply for the appropriate development approval to use the premises for a massage service. This service was a change of usage, so he was in breach of those regulations.

One other issue that may seem trivial but proved to be a real problem was the pink balloons and pink signage out the front of the massage service. This was a real drawcard for children, who wanted to get a balloon and go into the pink coloured service to see the girls in their pink bikinis. I think I have told the house before that one young person told me that she was very disappointed when she did see a worker from that service that she was not in a pink bikini at all, she seemed to be in very boring underwear. I am not sure about the validity—

Ms Bedford interjecting:

The Hon. S.W. KEY: How boring, did you say, member for Florey?

Ms Bedford interjecting:

The Hon. S.W. KEY: For how long was she in—I do not know. This is just a story I am telling you second hand. There are a couple of fundamental points that have been raised by this whole campaign. First of all, in speaking to the parents and business owners, I said to them, 'Look, I need to make it very clear to you that it's my intention to introduce a bill to decriminalise the sex work industry in South Australia, so I need to say that to you,' but that was not the problem for parents and businesses. Their issue was with the location of the business.

Bon Levi, who has a number of businesses, as I understand it, has always emphasised that this was a massage service, that sex work was not provided at this premise. I do not want to get into that debate, but I think what it does emphasise to us is that we need to look at the provision and location of personal services. We also need to look at the fact that sex services are provided in this state and that, in my view, it needs to be decriminalised.

I note the parliamentary library has just put out an excellent summary looking at the different models and approaches by South Australian parliaments with regard to sex work, so I commend it for that work. I think that will be very instructive to the debate we will have again this year in this place about this issue. I hope that members will have a look at those models and support me when I introduce a bill to decriminalise sex work in South Australia.

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