To Decriminalise Sex Work And Prioritise Safety

To: UK Government

• The tragic murders of five young women in Ipswich caused an unprecedented outcry. Each of us deserves to be safe regardless of gender, occupation, sexual preference, race, age, nationality, immigration status or lifestyle.

• Prostitution is a survival strategy to deal with poverty, debt, rape, low wages, homelessness, unemployment... Most sex workers are mothers or young people; often they are both. Many have been in care or have had their children taken from them.

• Criminalising consenting sex – targeting sex workers, clients or both – pushes prostitution underground. It deters women from reporting violence & exploitation. Fines & ASBOs force women into isolated, less well lit areas.

• When prostitute women are not safe, no woman is safe. Serial rapists & killers often have a history of attacks on partners & prostitutes. (The conviction rate for reported rape is a shocking 5.7%. Over 200 women are murdered each year.)

• Raids on premises increase street prostitution which is 10 times more dangerous.

• Criminal records prevent sex workers from getting other jobs.

• "Rehabilitation" for drugs or anything else doesn’t work if it is compulsory.

• New Zealand has successfully decriminalised prostitution, improving health & safety.

We demand:

1. The decriminalisation of prostitution. Sex workers must have the same rights and protection as other workers.

2. An end to Community Rehabilitation Orders, Acceptable Behaviour Contracts and Anti Social Behaviour Orders which reintroduce prison for street offences through the back door.

3. The enforcement of laws against domestic violence, rape and other violence against women and children must be a priority.

4. An end to the use of anti-trafficking legislation to deport immigrant sex workers. Trafficked women must have the right to stay so they can report violence.

5. Viable economic alternatives to prostitution. Voluntary drug services, affordable housing, benefits, training, pay equity.

Sign the Petition

Closes
9th July 2008

Open Up! We know you have horror fans inside

Withdraw section 6 of the Criminal Justice Bill

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Withdraw section 6 of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill, 2007.

or see http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/extreme-images/

If this Section becomes Law, it will create a 'thought crime' as described by George Orwell in the book '1984'. If enacted, it would remain lawful to own and to display publicly extreme, violent images intended to sell (advertising), to excite (video games), to entertain (gore/ horror films), to inform (TV news) and to be worshipped (crucifix). Ownership of only one category of extreme imagery would become a criminal offence meriting three years in prison; material intended to arouse sexually. That is, a state of mind of the user/ owner would become illegal. Actions and effects on others are valid reasons for the State to punish individuals. Thoughts and feelings are not.

   
Unites nutters and censors

Join us at www.secularism.org.uk

Have you ever noticed how many natural born censors also seem to be religious nutters? Perhaps the world would be a more tolerant place if those who preach intolerance were a little less well supported.

Every little helps when disparaging nonsense beliefs but a well organised group can better target people's efforts not to mention getting them aired on TV etc.

The National Secular Society have an excellent website to keep up to date with nonsense going down in the world. The weekly newsletter is an excellent read

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Allow R18s on TV and to be sold from ordinary shops

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to improve child protection by legalising R18 sex films on satellite TV and limited sales in ordinary shops, thus undermining totally unregulated backstreet sales which include material that would never be granted an R18 certificate and is sold to under-18s.

or see http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/R18-Control

Submitted by Melon Farming contributor, Beau Nidl

In reality explicit sex DVDs are widely available without proper controls. It is illegal to show R18 explicit sex films on Sky, cable or terrestrial TV. It is also illegal to sell R18 in ordinary shops or by mail order. For 90% of people it is impractical to visit a licensed sex shop in person. There is a thriving underground market - local newspapers openly advertise discreet motorcycle delivery via untraceable mobile phones. Unregulated retailers have every incentive to maximise profit and no incentive to observe R18 boundaries or to check the ages. They are already breaking the law and have no licence to loose. Some include rape, torture porn and worse in their stock. Some include religious hate material. If R18 material was widely available, the unregulated market would shrink drastically, and unregulated sellers would go out of business. Allow sales in legit video stores, which check age, limited to 10% by stock level and by £ sold. This will improve protection for under-18s.

Update: Result

Closed with 42 signatures

Closed

   
So that those who choose this profession can work in safety

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Legalise licensed prostitution and licensed brothel keeping.

or see http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/prostitution

Since long before the tragic Ipswich murders, women (and men) have put their safety at risk by selling their bodies for money. Whilst it is accepted that many are forced into the industry through economic or other needs, nevertheless people should be free to choose this profession (of their own free will) and to work within the industry in safety.

It is proposed to legalise licensed prostitution and brothel keeping, in suitable areas, providing sex workers with safety and an opportunity to offer them help to overcome the factors that have made them choose the industry if they wish to leave it. Sex workers should be regularly health screened to maintain their individual licence, Brothel Keepers subject to similar licensing laws and screening as the drinks and gaming industries, and the proceeds of the industry taxed whilst maintaining the illegality of public solicitation, kerb crawling and unlicensed prostitution or brothel keeping.

Update: Result

The petition closed with 215 signatures.

Closed

   
to ban videogames

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Restrict the powers of the BBFC with regard to the banning of videogames.

or see http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Manhunt2/

The BBFC have recently refused to rate the videogame "Manhunt 2". As such, adults in this country will never be allowed to play this game. Adults should be allowed to make their own decisions with regard to what videogames they want to play. We all understand that this game is extremely violent and unsuitable for children. As such an 18 rating should have been applied.

Update: Result

The petition closed with 3006 signatures and received the following government response:

The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) considers all works - whether film, video or game - submitted to it against a set of guidelines (available on its website - www.bbfc.co.uk). The guidelines take into account the law and also public opinion. This means that the guidelines can and do change periodically, reflecting changing public opinion.

The BBFC considered Manhunt 2 and concluded that, within the current guidelines, it could not be given a classification. The BBFC takes its responsibilities very seriously and it uses its powers to reject works extremely rarely. Details can be found on its website.

There is an appeals procedure which the game's producers are apparently pursuing.

The Government is satisfied with the BBFC's procedure and with the provisions for appeal, and will not be intervening in this process.

The Government has recently announced a review aimed at helping parents ensure that their children are protected from exposure to inappropriate material in games. This is not intended to restrict the choice of material available to adults.

Closed

   
and don't exempt MPs

We, the undersigned, believe that Members of Parliament should be subject to the Freedom of Information Act, with no special exemptions, and call on all political parties to support this position.

or see http://www.ourcampaign.org.uk/foi

On Friday 18th May, Conservative and Labour MPs voted to exempt Parliament from Freedom of Information laws, creating one law for MPs and Lords and one law for everyone else.

The Bill - introduced by a Conservative MP - will now go to the House of Lords, where it can still be stopped from becoming law.

How you can help to defeat this Bill

Sign the petition and/or Write to a member of the House of Lords and ask them to vote against the Freedom of Information (Amendment) Bill. You can contact a Lord by using the Random Lord button at www.writetothem.com/lords

Update: One Law for MPs and one law for everyone else

On Friday 18th May, Conservative and Labour MPs voted to exempt Parliament from Freedom of Information laws, creating one law for MPs and Lords and one law for everyone else.

That was the bad news. Now the good news: the Bill then went to the House of Lords, where not a single peer was prepared to back it.

Closed

   
Petition sponsored by the Sexual Freedom Coalition

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to authorise a full and independent re-examination of the findings of the Home Office Department Committee on Obscenity and Film Censorship (Williams Committee) published in 1979 with a view to revising or scrapping the current legislation concerning censorship, much of which was originally based upon false or unprovable premis

or see http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/OpposeCensorship/

Censorship is prohibition by another name. History has proven that prohibition is ineffective, all it does is drive up the price and place the distribution of the prohibited commodity in the hands of organised crime. The imposition of censorship for adults upon the written word or images (still or moving) produced with the full informed consent of the participants is both an affront to the notion of a free society and an insult to the intelligence of the electorate. Censorship was originally brought in by the ‘upper class’ because they feared that if the ‘common man and woman’ was exposed to such material they would sink into such national depravity that the workforce would cease to be viable and the country would descend into sexual anarchy. The advent of the Internet over the past 20 years has meant that all of those images have been available, the social experiment has been conducted and no such sexual disaster has ensued. Censorship laws are redundant–repeal them.

Update: Government Response to Sexual Freedom

The petition closed with 379 signatures but received a Government response:

Government policy is that controls on published material should aim to strike a balance between freedom of expression and protection of the public, and should be proportionate to the potential harm that might be caused. At the extreme, there is material which we believe should not be published at all, which is covered by the criminal law. The Government considers that criminal sanctions should be reserved for material featuring indecent photographs of children, which are covered by the Protection of Children Act 1978, and for the publication of other material which is considered by the courts to be likely to cause harm, in that it is likely to "deprave and corrupt" persons "likely to see, hear or read it", which is covered by the Obscene Publications Act 1959 (OPA).

The general test of obscenity is flexible, allowing the courts to reflect society's attitudes towards pornographic and other material. We continue to believe that the OPA is a flexible tool with which to tackle a wider range of obscene material according to the standards of the day. There are no plans to re-examine legislation in this area.

A strange contradiction to a another recent response where rather than saying that there are no plans to re-examine the OPA, they say that they are planning to increase the maximum penalty from 3 to 5 years

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Last chance to sign petition opposing ID Cards

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to scrap the proposed introduction of ID cards

or see http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/IDcards/

The introduction of ID cards will not prevent terrorism or crime, as is claimed. It will be yet another indirect tax on all law-abiding citizens of the UK.

Update: Result

The petition raised nearly 28,000 signatures and was immediately cast aside by Tony Blair

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Don't let this happen to you, nor your family, nor your friends. Please sign the petition

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Abandon plans to make it a criminal offence to possess 'violent pornography'

or see http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Violent-Porn

This proposed law would create a Thought Crime making it illegal to possess "sexual images" that, in the subjective opinion of members of the Home Office, show activities "liable to cause serious injury or death" even if the participants were consenting adult actors.

Update: Result

The petition was signed by 1800 people with the following response from 10 Downing Street

Thank you for the e-petition, dated 17 November 2006, about the Government's proposals to make it illegal to possess a limited range of extreme pornographic material.

The proposals are aimed at tackling the circulation of extreme pornography which would be likely to contravene the Obscene Publications Act 1959 (OPA) if it were published within the UK. The Government takes the view that criminalising the possession of extreme pornographic images, the publication and distribution of which is already illegal in this country under the OPA, is a necessary step.

With the development of modern technology the current law is no longer able to control such material and this has created a gap which the proposals are intended to fill. If such material is already being published and distributed such action is illegal under the law at present. The aim is not to bring additional material within the scope of the law but to criminalise its possession as well as publication and distribution.

The Government's response to the consultation, published last August, states that the proposed new offence would have to meet two thresholds. First it would apply only to pornographic material, by which we mean material that has been solely or primarily produced for the purpose of sexual arousal. This would be an objective test for the jury in any prosecution.

The second threshold would also be an objective test for the jury in respect of actual scenes or depictions which appear to be real acts. We would aim to cover activity which can be clearly seen, leaves little to the imagination, and is not hidden or disguised. By actual scenes or depictions which appear to be real acts, we intend to catch material which is genuinely violent or conveys a realistic impression of fear, violence and harm.

More information on what would be covered by the new law is available at: www.homeoffice.gov.uk/documents/cons-extreme-porn-3008051

Whilst I understand that you have many reservations about the Government's proposals, they are not aimed at any particular part of society. The consultation was not concerned with the legal consensual material which already circulates and which does not already breach the OPA. The fact that some extreme pornographic material may in fact be consensual while appearing to be otherwise, does not mean that it falls outside the criminal law.

Closed

   
To comment on the Dangerous Pictures Bill

From Phantom on The Melon Farmers Forum

David Cameron has a weblog where he invites issues for his comment.

There is a post asking Cameron to comment on the extreme porn proposal on there...

I think it's definitely worth voting for... apparently Cameron comments on the top five... given the numbers required that's easily achievable...

What are your views on the proposed legislation on ' violent pornography ' will you and your party be voting for or against it. As the legislation stands possession of images of sexual violence or simulated sexual violence would mean prosecution and a possible 3 years prison sentence. If images are taken and kept involving two consenting adults for private use they could be prosecuted under the legislation. Would you vote for or against?, what are your reasons. What evidence is there to prove a link between viewing violent sexual pornography and committing a violent sexual criminal act. Articles 8&10 of the European Convention on Humans Rights would be breached .

Update: Cameron Beyond the Pale

The question reached the 2nd spot and was therefore posed to David Cameron who responded:

"I think most people would agree that the pornography the Government wants to tackle is well beyond the pale. The kind of thing they say they are talking about is violence which is life threatening or likely to result in serious, disabling injury.

[Note, paragraph deleted, see below]

At the moment, everyone is able to report to the Internet Watch Foundation computer pornography which is criminally obscene and which is hosted in the UK.

But as you say, the Government now wants to legislate to ban the possession of extreme pornography, for example off the internet on sites from overseas. The Bill has yet to be introduced to Parliament but, once it is published, we will obviously consider the proposals very carefully. The Government says it has looked at things like human rights considerations. But with any new legislation, we will need to make sure it is necessary and that it will work properly and fairly before we decide whether or not to back it.

Update: Cameron Edited

The paragraph in David Cameron's response was later deleted with a note to highlight that it had been changed:

I know that people like Liz Longhurst, whose daughter Jane was murdered in 2003, have done a huge amount to raise awareness on this issue.

Of course Graham Coutts is charged with the murder but the retrial has yet to reach the courts