Thank you very much.
I'm Dr. Gillian Abel. I'm a professor of public health at the University of Otago in New Zealand. I've been doing research in the field of sex work for around 25 years, and I'm considered a global expert in this field.
Sex work in New Zealand was decriminalized in 2003, but I did my first project in the late 1990s, when sex workers' activities were still criminalized in New Zealand. The research demonstrated that criminalization of sex workers' activities was responsible for a number of harms. Street-based sex workers experienced more and more severe forms of violence than indoor workers. They had no time before getting into the car to assess whether a client was safe, as they were scared they would be spotted by police and charged with soliciting.
In addition, we found that sex workers in massage parlours were working working under extremely exploitative and coercive conditions. They couldn't fight for better working conditions, and they couldn’t report crimes committed against them to the police without exposing themselves as being involved in an illegal activity. In addition, police used the presence of condoms within parlours or the carrying of condoms as evidence for prostitution-related activities, which created a disincentive for their use.
All of this made them extremely vulnerable. People know they can get away with coercion, exploitation and violence when their victims have little access to legal and human rights.
The evidence we obtained in our research was valuable in strengthening the case for a change in the way that sex work was legislated in New Zealand. In 2003, all laws that criminalized sex work activities were scrapped. The argument for decriminalization in Parliament was that sex work was not inherently dangerous but that the laws created the danger. Decriminalization was argued for as a harm minimization strategy. The Prostitution Reform Act was enacted, and its stated aims are, “safeguards the human rights of sex workers and protects them from exploitation: [and] promotes the welfare and occupational health and safety of sex workers:”
I conducted a large study five years after the act was passed, which included a survey of 772 sex workers and in-depth interviews with 57 of them. We also did an estimation of the number of sex workers in five cities in New Zealand. This study was funded by both the Health Research Council of New Zealand and the Ministry of Justice.
I was contracted by the Ministry of Justice to produce a report for the evaluation of the act. The prostitution review committee, set up by the Ministry of Justice, concluded that the act had been effective in achieving its purposes and that most sex workers were better off than they were when their activities were criminalized.
Since then, I have carried out many other studies, looking at experiences of sex workers exiting sex work, interactions between social workers and young street-based sex workers, employment practices in brothels, work practices and safety of Internet-based sex workers, migrant sex workers' experiences of working in New Zealand and street-based sex work in the community.
It will be 20 years next year since sex work was decriminalized in New Zealand, and I can categorically state that sex workers are far better off than they were when I undertook that first study in the 1990s. There is no political will to change the status quo. Anecdotally, members of Parliament who voted against decriminalization in 2003 now say that their concerns were unfounded and they would not support change.
There's exploitation in many forms of employment—it's not confined to sex work—but previously, unlike other workers, sex workers had no recourse to justice. They're now aware of their rights, which has resulted in a shift in power between brothel operators and sex workers. Some sex workers have taken operators to the human rights tribunal when they have tried to impinge on their rights. Other cases have been settled through mediation. They have the right of refusal to provide commercial sexual services, and consent can be withdrawn at any stage in the transaction. They indicate to operators the services that they're prepared to offer clients, and clients are informed of this before they book a particular sex worker. This reduces the chance of a client resorting to violence because of unmet expectations.
Street-based sex workers welcome well-lit areas and CCTV cameras as making their workplace environment safer. They are able to take their time in assessing whether the client is sober, has no obvious weapons in the car and has nobody else hiding in the back seat. They can also negotiate what services they are prepared to provide before getting in the car.
The relationship between police and sex workers is much improved and they are no longer seen as the enemy. Sex workers are more proactive in reporting incidents to the police and there's a better dialogue between them. This has been helped through collaborative initiatives between police and the New Zealand Prostitutes Collective, which is the sex workers organization in New Zealand.
This is not to say that things are perfect. One aspect in which the Prostitution Reform Act has failed is section 19, which deals with the application of the Immigration Act. It stipulates that no permit can be granted to a non-resident who provides or intends to provide commercial sexual services or who intends to operate or invest in a commercial sexual business.
Migrant sex workers are potentially easy targets for violence and exploitation—