Sir, – Pamela Duncan’s article (“Call for prostitution legislation to be updated”, January 23rd) revealed that the campaign to criminalise consensual commercial sex in Ireland continues with scant regard for both the welfare of the women and men it seeks to protect and any international evidence which reveals this issue to be more complex than Ruhama would have the public believe.
Last month the report of the UNAIDS Advisory Group on HIV and Sex Work found that “criminalising the client has been shown to backfire on sex workers”. The report found that in Sweden, where the criminalisation of those who purchase sex has been introduced, “sex workers who were unable to work indoors were left on the street with the most dangerous clients and little choice but to accept them” (page 6).
It is time this debate was driven less by salacious tabloid headlines and religious ideology and more by the health and safety of sex workers and the wider community. – Yours, etc,