UK Sex Sells News

A senior police officer in Newport, the host city of golf's Ryder Cup, says his force tolerates brothels as long as they follow strict criteria.

Supt Julian Knight says it is better to work closely with those in the sex industry to enable proper monitoring.

He told BBC Radio Wales' Eye on Wales that the law on prostitution created a dilemma, but he had to be pragmatic.

He spoke amid the tired old bollox claims that sex trafficking from abroad could rise around the Ryder Cup, which begins on Friday.

Supt Knight told the programme: You have to be pragmatic about this. It is illegal. Society has a very Victorian moral code around this, as a result of which we find ourselves between a rock and a hard place.

The law on prostitution says that while it is not illegal to sell sex for financial gain, certain activities relating to it are. These include two or more people selling sex from the same premises.

However, rather than closing such premises down, Supt Knight believes it is more effective to work closely with those involved. The Gwent Police policy in Newport, which has been in place since 2004, is to visit brothels on an ad hoc basis, and to develop relationships with the individuals involved. No illegal drugs

I have a list of 12 premises, he said: We know not only where they are, but also the type of individuals that are there, the type of services they offer, and the gender. That allows us, with our partner agencies, to monitor them closely and to try to develop appropriate ways to get out of this lifestyle.

Eg Karen [not her real name] rents an apartment in Newport, from which she runs a business selling sex. Five women, including herself, work from the apartment at different times of the day. She told Eye On Wales that she has CCTV and a panic line through to the police station.

We've got a good relationship with the police, she said: They would rather see this happening than vulnerable girls on the street. They know we don't do drugs and that we're mature. If a man doesn't want to use a condom I ask him to leave. If he doesn't, I'd call the police and I believe they'd turn up.

Premises are tolerated as long as they do not use people who are illegal or have been trafficked, under the age of 18, have no illegal drugs, and do not generate complaints of noise, nuisance or anti-social behaviour. Failure to comply will result in closure.

As a result, he claimed there was little evidence of any trafficking in Newport, and those who work in the off-street sex industry can report instances of violent punters without fear of being arrested.

Eye on Wales was broadcast on BBC Radio Wales at 1300 BST on Sunday 26 September, and is now available on iPlayer.

Members Only by Paul Willetts is a biography of Soho porn mogul Paul Raymond.

Paul Willetts writes:

For all Paul Raymond's manifest faults and unappealing characteristics, I began to see him as an unexpectedly heroic figure. There was something admirable about the dogged yet stylish way in which he challenged the authorities and the old, often hypocritical assumptions. His first major brush with controversy came in April 1958 when he opened the Revuebar, located in the heart of Soho, an area traditionally associated with the commercial exploitation of sex. Among Britain's first strip-clubs, it cunningly sidestepped the rules on nudes having to remain static. Raymond did so by making the Revuebar a private members' club instead of a conventional theatre. Since the delights of striptease had hitherto been almost inaccessible, his club attracted a sizeable membership list before it had even opened. Its popularity was destined to bring him into conflict with the Metropolitan Police's Clubs Office which sought a pretext to close down the Revuebar.

Through his battle with the authorities, which continued for well over a decade, Raymond played a pivotal but largely unacknowledged role in the erosion of stifling censorship and the establishment of the so-called Permissive Society in Britain during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Motivated by commercial self-interest that masqueraded as staunch libertarian principle, he challenged the police, judiciary and press. Successive court cases, one of which could have led to him being gaoled, enabled him to push the skin trade — be it strip-shows, magazines or theatre shows — from the margins into the mainstream.

Just recently, a Scots detective claimed that there is no sign at all that human trafficking will increase when Glasgow hosts the 2014 Commonwealth Games.

Detective Sergeant Sandra Jamieson's claims, however, go against what other predictions suggest.

In fact, others believe that the Commonwealth Games will bring an increase to human trafficking for prostitution.

Robert Brown, who is a Liberal Democrat MSP, had previously said that he believes construction workers will increase the demand for prostitution of all kinds. Glasgow Community and Safety Services, which is a charity which manages the Trafficking Awareness Raising Alliance, has warned that the games may increase the threat of trafficking as well. The group has called for preventative measures to be taken in order to stop it.

The Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency's human trafficking coordination unit, said that they certainly have no information or indication that trafficking will increase during the games.

Just consider the British police officers featured in The Hunt for Britain's Sex Traffickers who helped carry out Pentameter Two. That operation was heralded as the largest-ever police crackdown on human trafficking, and it led to the conviction of precisely zero people for forcing women into prostitution. As one journalist has pointed out, the key witness relied on by the police officers – and by Channel 4's documentary makers – was not actually rescued by the police, but by one of her punters and his ex-wife. Yet viewers were made to believe that there is a clear link between the hundreds of raids carried out as part of Pentameter Two and the rescue of this witness (who was genuinely forced into prostitution in demeaning circumstances).

On Channel 4, the police were allowed to present themselves as knights in shining armour. There was no mention of the fact that two thirds of the 255 women rescued by police during the Pentameter raids in 2006 and 2008 quickly dropped off the radar, declining to be helped by the authorities. This led one researcher to conclude that many of these women were simply in Britain to earn money – just like other migrant workers – and just wanted to get on with it rather than be rescued. The fact is that migrants from poor parts of the world can earn a lot more money in the sex industry than in other lines of work and they would not regard being arrested in a police raid as a form of rescue. Sixteen women – alleged victims of trafficking – were deported following the Pentameter raids. How helpful.

A Blackpool  lap-dancing club has lost its licence after being linked to a drug offence. It was claimed Fallen Angels was being run by Nabil Awadi even though he was not the official licence holder.

Awadi was not considered a fit person to operate the club because of his past record which includes a conviction in May this year for possessing cocaine.

A hearing at Blackpool Town Hall also heard Awadi had been convicted of a licensing breach in 2006, and had come to the attention of the police.

A council licensing panel revoked the licence despite hearing the lease was in the process of being sold by Awadi to the venue's licence holder Andrea Law and her partner Stuart Hickman. T

They have 21 days in which to lodge an appeal.

There were also safety fears after licensing officers discovered customers using a roof-top terrace surrounded by a weak balustrade during a visit in June this year.

Other issues include claims dancers had been told to perform naked which is against Blackpool's licencing prudery.

Nick Clegg, the Deputy Prime Minister, today thanked the public for their contribution to the Your Freedom debate, which he launched on 1 July. Now that 46,000 people have left 14,000 ideas and 95,000 comments on the Your Freedom website, Mr Clegg said that it is time for ministers and officials to set to work examining every idea to see what might be feasible and how it might be brought into effect.

This phase of Your Freedom will begin on Friday 10 September, after which the site will not be accepting new comments or ideas.

Melon Farmers Suggestions

Repeal of the Dangerous Pictures Act banning 'Extreme Porn'

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repeal-the-extreme-pornography-section-of-the-safeguarding-vulnerable-groups-act

Repeal of the Dangerous Cartoons Act banning anime porn

repeal-laws-on-drawn-pornography

TV Censorship

ofcom-and-tv-censorship

r18-tv-allow-adults-to-see-r18-porn-on-tv-with-safety-controls

Video Censorship

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ammend-the-video-recording-act-now-digital-recordin-bill

repeal-the-vra

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Obscene Publications Act

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Prostitution

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ban-all-laws-controlling-the-sexual-activities-of-consenting-adults

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RIPA Covert Communications Surveillance

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Public Drinking Bans

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Blasphemy

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The planning appeal for a new lap dancing club in Bristol's Old Market has been dismissed.

The club was proposed by businessman Essie Zadeh at 42-44 West Street, but was rejected by the city council's planning committee last December.

The empty premises would have been made into a licensed café during the day and a lap dancing club at night.

But the councillors agreed 5-2 to refuse on the grounds the plan failed to contribute to the vitality of Old Market and contribute to its regeneration.

There was an appeal against that decision, but that has now been rejected by planning inspector Jill Kingaby.

She said: There is clearly a high level of local opposition to the current proposal for a lap dancing club. It seems to me that the proposal would not contribute to building a positive and attractive image introducing uses of general public interest or service to West Street as sought in saved Local Plan Policies CC1 and S6.

Labour councillor for the Lawrence Hill ward, Brenda Hugill, said: This is a victory for common sense. We must not let this area descend in a Soho sex industry ghetto, especially now that families are moving into the area. She added: We must keep fighting to keep the area safe for all.

Two men and two women were arrested in connection with a UK-wide police operation against human trafficking that resulted in the closure of 13 brothels, seven of them in Belfast.

Twelve women and three men, who were allegedly being compelled to engage in prostitution, were rescued in the operation, according to the PSNI.

Much of the focus of the crackdown called Operation Apsis was in Belfast.

A woman and the two men face charges of trafficking for sexual exploitation, controlling prostitution, brothel keeping and money laundering (ie spending the money generated). A second woman faces charges of controlling prostitution.

The government coalition has decided against endorsing an EU directive designed to co-ordinate European efforts to combat the trade in sex slaves.

The coalition is invoking a special British right on any EU justice and home affairs measures. The directive will be decided in the EU by the system known as qualified majority voting, according to which no member state can wield a veto. But Britain has the right to decide whether to opt in.

A Home Office spokesman said: Human trafficking is a brutal form of organised crime, and combating it is a key priority for the government. The UK already complies with most of what is required by the draft EU directive.

The government will review the UK's position once the directive has been agreed, and will continue to work constructively with European partners on matters of mutual interest. By not opting in now but reviewing our position when the directive is agreed, we can choose to benefit from being part of a directive that is helpful but avoid being bound by measures that are against our interests.

Law enforcement agencies estimate that 2,600 foreign women have been forced into prostitution in brothels in England and Wales. Only five people were convicted of human trafficking for sexual exploitation in the first six months of this year, according to figures from the UK Human Trafficking Centre, compared with 33 and 34 in the previous two 12-month periods.

The number of prosecutions has remained reasonably steady, at 114 in 2008/09 and 102 in 2009/10, according to figures released by Dominic Grieve, the attorney general; but the conviction rate has dropped.

A spokesman for the CPS said the number of convictions varied for several reasons, including the fact that fewer cases may be brought to prosecutors for consideration, and that fewer defendants may be involved in each trial: We acknowledge that it is challenging to successfully prosecute human trafficking cases, but we are committed to bringing prosecutions when there is sufficient evidence and it is in the public interest to do so, he said.

Over the next few weeks, as students start filtering back for the new term, we'll no doubt witness the return to our streets of the dreaded slogan T-shirt. Personally, I've never quite been able to grasp this quaint custom of wearing one's heart on one's… heart. No matter how noble the sentiment, going public with your polemic leaves you open to ridicule – and the occasional slap if the dictum is provocative enough. When I was a student, such sloganeering tended to be simplistic: No to war! or Yes to peace! For the hip post-feminists of the new millennium, there was a low-cut novelty T-shirt (available in pink for that added sprinkle of irony) that pulled no punches with its These tits are real! declaration, and underneath, in italics: Touch them and see! Once, and only once, I observed the command and felt the full, stinging force of girl power, right across my cheek.

...Read the full article

The first academic research project into lap dancing has found that, rather than being uneducated young women who have been coerced into the industry, one in four dancers has a degree and has been attracted by the money.

Dancers took home an average of £232 a shift after paying commission and fees to the club, with most working between two and four shifts a week – giving them annual incomes of between £24,000 and £48,000 a year.

The researchers found no evidence of trafficking in the industry, and concluded that career and economic choices were motivations for dancing rather than drug use or coercion.

Aspiring actresses, models and artists used exotic dancing as a career strategy which fitted alongside their other work, training or studies. Unemployed new graduates – mainly with arts degrees – were also dancing because they could not find graduate jobs and found that lap dancing paid much better than bar work.

The main attraction of the work was the flexibility it offered to combine different work options and studying.

The research by Dr Teela Sanders and Kate Hardy, from the University of Leeds, found the vast majority of dancers reported high rates of job satisfaction.

However, the researchers also found dancers' welfare was often disregarded. They called for better regulation to improve dancers' safety and security, including the banning of private booths in clubs, arguing that women could be in danger when alone with customers or that standards could be lowered by women offering more than was allowed in dances. Dancers were also open to financial exploitation by the clubs who could impose charges and fines.

The preliminary findings of the year-long study, which will include interviews with 300 dancers, reveal that all the women interviewed had finished school and gained some qualifications. Most (87%) had at least completed a further education course, while one in four had undergraduate degrees.

Just over one in three dancers were in some form of education, with 14% using dancing to help fund an undergraduate degree, 6% to help fund a postgraduate degree, and 4% using it to fund further education courses.

American restaurant chain Hooters, known for its female waitresses, has received permission to license a new site in Cardiff and has filed applications to open sites in both Brighton and Bristol.

These join the only UK branch of Hooters in Nottingham, which has been trading for 12 years.

The new Cardiff branch will serve Hooters' all-American menu. Diners will be served as usual by waitresses in orange shorts and a white tank top.

Although the brand is popular in the US, with locations booming across 44 states, the proposal for its expansion to Cardiff has not been welcome by some.

The Cardiff Feminist Network, an online community of feminists has been promoting its Say No to Hooters campaign petition to fight for the image of their Wales's women.

Sally Hughes, an activist for the cause said: Hooters is an American family restaurant chain come porn-shop, lap-dancing strip club. The objectification of women is not taken seriously enough in our society.

The decision to grant a license to the Cardiff venue comes at the end of the statutory consultation period, in which the council said no valid objections were made.

The Croydon Advertiser has recently run an exposé of a sinister brothel operating in the same building as a charity for the elderly.

The quality piece of investigative journalism recounts how a fearless undercover reporter was offered sex with a prostitute for £50 at the seedy enterprise in London Road, West Croydon.

Having made absolutely certain he was being offered sex in return for cash, the hack made his excuses and left, as journalistic tradition requires.

The Advertiser notes that the establishment was advertised as 'Oriental Massage Croydon' through a card in the window of Eshop General Stores, in London Road.

Here's where the wheels come off the paper's probe, however. As the Guardian explains, the reporter could have saved himself a trip to Eshop General Stores by turning to page 52 of his own paper, which carries an ad for the very bawdy-house he was investigating.

Nutters of the Croydon Community Against Trafficking (CCAT) noted: CCAT is baffled by the utter hypocrisy of the Croydon Advertiser; on the one hand to have a front page article about sinister brothels in our midst, and then, on the other, to take money from the same brothel and help it to thrive, demonstrates an alarming degree of double standards from our local family newspaper.

The Bolton Council deputy leader has backed calls to legalise prostitution.

Lib Dem  David Wikinson, who was responding to a blog by North West Euro MP Chris Davies, in which he called on Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg to follow the example of the Dutch, says the issues would split all sections of society.

Wilkinson said: There are crime and disorder issues surrounding drugs and moral and ethical issues around prostitution and assisted dying.

My own personal view is that while I find prostitution morally offensive, I do agree that if it was to be legalised, it would allow greater control.

In his latest online blog — titled Nick, go Dutch! — Mr Davies puts forward the case for Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, whose mother was born in the Netherlands, to promote a more liberal approach to the controversial issues. He said: When it comes to dealing with controversial issues like drugs, prostitution and medically assisted dying, the Dutch are simply more grown-up.

Denise D'Courtenay who has been landlady of the Queen Anne pub in Vauxhall for over 30 years was murdered while on holiday in the Dominican Republic at the end of July.

The Queen Anne was for many years the only strip pub south of the river and has been presenting striptease for nearly 50 years.

And on the subject of London strip pubs, some thoughtful soul has created a google map showing most of the ones in London, see maps.google.co.uk

Sex workers and their support groups have condemned a police operation to out prostitutes even when they have not been convicted of any crime.

Six street-based sex workers in Newham, east London, were named on the Metropolitan police website. Police posted their photos, full names and dates of birth.

In a second case, two Polish women who were selling sex from their home in Aldgate, east London, were raided by City of London police as part of Operation Monaco.

Operation Monaco was launched in May 2009 but police have admitted that just one charge of controlling a prostitute for gain has been made, as well as 52 charges for placing cards in phone boxes advertising sexual services.

Police took photographs of the Polish women, who were not charged. Last Sunday, photos appeared in News of the World. The women said they were distressed by the police raid and the lack of warning that their pictures would appear in a tabloid newspaper. Vicky, one of the two women said:

Why have the police done this to me?  I work as a childminder and a cleaner and do some sex work to make ends meet. I pay tax and national insurance and am not doing anything illegal. A lot of people know me, and even though the News of the World blocked out my face I'm still identifiable by my hair, clothes and jewellery.

The police were looking for money and found £50 from a customer. We never use drugs and are always sober when we're working. The police kept asking us over and over again if we'd been trafficked. We haven't been, and we signed a piece of paper to say that.

The women lodged a complaint with the newspaper, which removed their images from its website.

Prostitutes are expected to flood south Essex during the 2012 Olympics, a Thurrock nutter group has claimed.

So called 'experts' at the South Essex Rape and Crisis Centre have already begun investigating what can be done to discourage an influx of prostitutes and protect women from being trafficked into the area.

Sheila Coates, director of the centre, based in Thurrock, said: Research has shown that during large sporting events, sex crime actually increases because of the large number of participants and a lot of people travelling from country to country. Sadly, pimps see that as a way of increasing their income and we will see women trafficked to the area.

We are going to start looking at research available from the winter Olympics in Canada and the World Cup in South Africa to see what the impact may or may not be. In Vancouver it looks like it wasn't as big a problem as anticipated because they planned for it and planned it out. [or maybe those 'anticipating' the big problem were making bollox claims to forward their own anti-prostitution ends].

A spokeswoman for Essex Police said the force had not been made aware of any expected problems.

Meanwhile in Brent

Based on article from harrowtimes.co.uk

A nutter Brent councillor has called for politicians and police across the capital to work together to tackle the 'problem' of prostitution.

Authorities are expecting a sharp rise in the number of brothels and prostitutes in London to coincide with the 2012 Olympic Games, as millions of people flow into the capital.

Councillor Ann John, leader of Brent Council, led a review while in opposition into the amount of brothels and street prostitutes operating in the borough and what measures should be taken to tackle the 'problem'.

John said she had not appreciated the impact and scale of the problem of prostitution before undertaking the council study, and called on others to take it more seriously than it has been in the past. She said: Perhaps we should be rethinking our attitude towards it. It's not legal so why are we tolerating it? I have asked for it to be a policing priority, I have asked other services to make sure we get support to exiting prostitutes.

John's study called on all newspapers to ban adverts for adult services, or at least take more editorial control over what is printed, but she said this advice has not been adopted. She said: I am a bit disappointed nothing has happened about that. It is difficult to get hard evidence, and difficult to survey punters, but one of the reasons advertising in local newspapers is so high [in Brent] is because of the sporting venues, and other boroughs don't get as much.

She added in one week she counted more than 100 adverts offering adult services in the two local newspapers still carrying them, including some which mentioned race as part of the deal – something which is banned.

Work on tackling prostitution in Brent has now been taken up by the crime prevention strategy group, in conjunction with the borough's police.

The Press Complaints Commission (PCC) upheld a complaint against the Sunday World over two articles which exposed a shocking new sex craze (known as bukkake) which was taking place in Ulster.

The complainant was the organiser of sex events. He was concerned that the newspaper had used subterfuge as part of its investigation into his (legal) business activities: the newspaper's coverage included stills from footage shot using a hidden camera by an undercover reporter who had attended part of one event. He also said that various claims made by the newspaper (including that he charged an entrance fee for people to attend the events and made big money from them) were untrue.

The newspaper argued that the coverage could be justified in the public interest: a senior medical officer had claimed that the participants were at risk from sexually-transmitted infections. The complainant disagreed, and said there were no public health issues.

In its ruling, the Commission made clear that, although the newspaper was entitled to report on, and comment robustly about, the sex industry in its local area, it was not free to pursue any journalistic approach to do so. The filming and the published images constituted a serious intrusion which required a high level of public interest to justify. In the Commission's view, the defence put forward by the newspaper did not justify the use of the hidden camera: the newspaper could have exposed the existence of bukkake parties (and any attendant health risks) without undercover footage of this type.

The Commission also found a breach of Clause 1 on the basis that the newspaper had not provided sufficient evidence to support its assertion that the complainant was making big money from bukkake events; nor had it provided any evidence for two further claims related to the complainant and his wife.

PCC Director Stephen Abell commented: The Editors' Code of Practice enforced by the PCC contains strong provisions to protect people's privacy, especially in regard to the use of images taken in private places. The Commission has always rightly set a high bar for the use of material from hidden cameras, and the newspaper's justification did not reach that level here.

Ministers are to ban Jobcentres from advertising for strippers, lap dancers and topless barmaids. The Unemployment minister, Chris Grayling, will order government-run agencies not to offer jobs in the adult entertainment industry, after nutters claimed that such ads validate the idea that sexually exploitative work is an acceptable career.

The Government wanted to bar all adult adverts but were successfully challenged in court by the lingerie firm Ann Summers in 2003. The new ban will cover only jobs involving the sexual stimulation of others, allowing Jobcentres to accept adverts for shop staff or cleaners in bars, but not performers, either on stage or online.

The policy change will be followed by a change in the law to prevent another court battle.

Fifty years after the Lady Chatterley obscenity trial gave novelists total freedom to explore love and lust, many are finding their sexual imaginations flagging

Andrew Motion, the former poet laureate, had the unenviable task of reading through 138 novels to help determine the longlist for this year's Booker prize, announced last week. Among his conclusions about the state of the British (and Commonwealth) novel was that no one was writing much about sex any more.

He had a theory to explain this. It's as if they were paranoid about being nominated for the Bad Sex Award, he said, referring to the Literary Review's annual giggle at the most purple description of carnality in the year's fiction.

...Read full article

A leading expert on prostitution has insisted that Britain would have fewer murders if the sex industry was decriminalised.

His comments come after Prime Minister David Cameron said it may be time to look again at the UK's sex laws, in the wake of three killings in Bradford.

Professor Basil Donovan, the head of the Sexual Health Department at the University of New South Wales, has seen the effect of legalising sex work - the Australian state decriminalised prostitution 15 years ago.

New South Wales has around 300 council approved brothels, 200 of them in Sydney. He said making the industry legal, makes it safer for all those involved.

Decriminalisation results in a healthier sex industry, which means that if your son or your husband sneaks off to the brothel at night, he's far more likely to come home healthy.

The cases of sexually transmitted diseases and HIV have fallen, with prostitutes able to get condoms for free through government agencies.

Professor Donovan told Sky News sex workers are more likely to cooperate with police investigations, if they are not threatened with prosecution.

You couldn't get a Steve Wright situation in New South Wales, he said. Wright murdered five women in Ipswich in 2006. Prof Donovan said the Wright case was made worse because you had an industry which was terrified of the police and gave them criminal status. The professor continued: One of the things criminal status does is it depersonalises people. People lose their rights to protection by the state.

On Wednesday 23 June, Hanna Morris was charged with managing / keeping a brothel after she reported a serious attack. She faces up to seven years in prison.

Her colleague is charged with assisting in the management of a brothel and her partner who had nothing to do with the business, is charged with handling criminal property.

Last September, without hesitating, Ms Morris dialed 999 to report a serious attack into a flat used by her escort agency. Two identifiable men, one with a sawn-off shotgun up his sleeve, barged in, threw petrol about threatening to torch the premises and to hold the woman there against her will.

Ms Morris did all she could to help the police on the understanding that the information she gave would be used in the pursuit of the assailants. The attack was initially taken so seriously that helicopters and sniffer dogs were brought in, and the next door shopping precinct cordoned off. But within hours Ms Morris and her partner had been arrested; another colleague was subsequently arrested.

Nine months later, not only are Ms Morris and her colleagues being prosecuted, but the case against the violent assailants has been dropped. Ms Morris comments:

It used to be rare that I would hear about robberies in the area, we worked as part of a close community and were always looking out for one another. Now there isn't a month that goes by when I'm not hearing that a place has been robbed or a girl attacked, it's becoming more and more common, and everyone is too scared to report it. There have been six robberies in the last two months, none of which were reported, and that's just those that I have heard about. It's really quite frightening.

We have told the CPS that by prosecuting sex workers who report attacks instead of their attackers, police and Crown Prosecution Service are making women more vulnerable. The Bradford and Ipswich murders took place after police crackdowns drove sex workers further underground and into more danger. Women didn't report attacks for fear of arrest and violent men knew they could act with impunity. Surrey has shockingly low conviction rates for reported rape – nearly half the already disgraceful national average rate of 6.5%.

Why is Ms Morris being prosecuted? Is it proceeds of crime?

The Sexual Offences Act 2003 made brothel keeping a lifestyle offence, prosecutable under Proceeds of Crime legislation. Raids and prosecutions have become profitable: the police keep 50% of any assets confiscated both during raids and 25% from subsequent prosecutions, with the Crown Prosecution Service keeping another 25% and the Inland Revenue the rest. Ms Morris's and her partner's home and assets have all been frozen. A substantial amount of cash put on one side to pay for income tax was taken in one of the police raids. No receipt was given.

The CPS is supposed to bear in mind the following considerations when prosecuting.

• To prevent people leading or forcing others into prostitution. But all women were working consensually independently. There was no force, coercion, violence or trafficking.
• The age of the prostitute and the position of those living off the earnings will clearly be relevant. All women who worked with Ms Morris were over 20 years of age. She was widely known to be good to work with, placing women's health and safety foremost. That she reported the attack on one of the women is testimony of that.
• To penalise those who organise prostitutes and make a living from their earnings. Like millions of others, Ms Morris ran a small private business, not a big exploitative company. Both she and her partner are now destroyed. The family, which includes small children, is facing having to rely on state benefits.
• Generally, the more serious the incident the more likely that a prosecution will be required. The serious incident was AGAINST Ms Morris, not BY her. So why is she being prosecuted?

The laws which criminalise sex workers must be abolished. Safety comes first.

The English Collective of Prostitutes asks

Please write to Neil Sweet, District Crown Prosecutor, Surrey neil.sweet@cps.gsi.gov.uk 01483 468 224 asking why women's safety is being endangered in this way.

Please copy your letter to us and to Portia Ragnauth, Surrey Chief Crown Prosecutor portia.ragnauth@cps.gsi.gov.uk 01483 468 205

Ms Morris is available to be interviewed. Contact: English Collective of Prostitutes Tel: 020 7482 2496 Email: ecp@allwomencount.net

Here's the (unofficial?) list of award winners for 2010.

Congratulations to all.

Best stand in the Show - Fever
Best R18 DVD - Fallen - Wicked Pictures
Best gay R18 DVD - Young British Hoodies 2 - Rentboy UK
Best Adult Product - We-Vibe II
Best Consumable - ID. Glide
Best Film Brand - TVX
Best Gay Film Brand - Eurocreme
Best Sex Toy Brand - Fetish Fantasy
Best Erotic Book Brand - Excite Books
Best Erotic Clothing Brand - Cottelli
Best R18 DVD Distributor - Erigo
Best Erotic Goods Distributor - Net 1 on 1
Best Overseas Distributor - Scala
Best Lingerie Distributor - Blue Moon
Best Retail Chain - Nice N Naughty
Best Individual Store - Soho Original (Brewer St)
Best Online Retailer - Love Honey
Best Online Resource - Melonfarmers.co.uk
Best online Affilate Programme - Net 1 on 1
Innovation in Adult - Sex in the Shower
Best Sales Team - ABS
Services to the Industry - Jane Bowles

A mean new sex establishment policy for Bournemouth seeks to restrict the numbers and locations of sex shops and lap dancing clubs.

The draft policy states that an area of Holdenhurst Road, from the junction with Northcote Road to the Richmond Park Road junction, should contain no more than two sex shops. The Triangle is considered an appropriate location for just one shop and that should be a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender lifestyle shop.

And the town centre is deemed appropriate for a maximum of three sexual entertainment venues.

The draft document has been considered and amended by the council's licensing board and will need final approval from the chair and vice chair of licensing.

It will then go out to public consultation, when residents will be invited to make comments.

Melon Farmers Frank and Alan showing off the goodies

The Melon Farmers are well chuffed to have won the ETO Award for Best Online Resource.

The awards are voted on by trade association members including many of UK's retailers, film producers and film distributors, both online and on the high street.

The Melon Farmers would like to thank everyone for all the support, and all those who participated in the evening's fun.

Oxford nutters have lost their appeal at Oxford Magistrates to overturn the variation of a licence to run a lap dancing club 50 yards from their church.

The Rev Vaughan Roberts, Rector of St Ebbe's Church, lodged an appeal after Oxford Council's Licensing Committee granted the variation last December to Greene King to run Thirst Lodge.

Roberts said: We still feel that granting a variation of the licence to permit lap dancing at this sort of establishment was totally inappropriate because of its proximity to the church and because these types of clubs can make women feel vulnerable—there are hundreds of young female students who live nearby and women who park their cars in the nearby Westgate Car Park. We wouldn't be keen to see such a club anywhere because lap-dancing degrades God's gift of sex.

A petition signed by 800 people and several hundred letters were received by the Court prior to the hearing. Roberts told the Court a further concern was the site of the club, which he described as adjacent to one of the gateways into the university city.

He added: We are obviously disappointed about the decision because it doesn't fit with the council's intention to regenerate this area of the city and doesn't take into account that women should be able to feel as safe as possible when they are out at night.

The church was supported in its action by the Christian Legal Centre. Its founder and director, Andrea Minichiello Williams, said the licence granted would have to be reviewed after one year because Oxford City Council had adopted a new regime which changes the way that lap dancing clubs are licensed.

The Christian Legal Centre is urging supporters to ask their councils to adopt the new regime that gives more powers to local authorities to protect the culture of their town centres. It is important to oppose these clubs not just on a legal basis but on a moral basis, she said: It is vital that local churches stand up for Christian values in the public square and we are grateful to St Ebbe's Church for taking this lead.

A fourth lap dancing club will open along Birmingham's Golden Mile after city licensing chiefs dismissed supposed fears it would be a magnet for rowdy stag parties.

The Boujee Rooms on Broad Street, currently an upstairs nightclub, can now put on strip, pole and lap dancing shows 24 hours a day.

Key to the club winning the approval of Birmingham City Council's licensing committee was the lack of police objection, making a claim it would increase anti-social behaviour hard to support.

Boujee Rooms now follows the established Rocket Club and Legs 11 nightspots and the recently opened Cyclone club next door offering lap dancing.

Owner Sidney Taylor, who owns nine licensed premises including the Legs 11 club, said: I am delighted. We work with police and council to ensure our clubs are well run and trouble-free.

His lawyer, Sarah Clover, had earlier told the committee that there have never been formal complaints or objections to any of Taylor's other premises. She said: There is no evidence for the objections. They are all based on the claim it will lower the tone.

Business and residents groups including the City Centre Partnership, The Broad Street Bid and the City Centre Neighbourhood Forum opposed the club.

Gordon Keen, manager of the Walkabout bar and chairman of Broad Street Pubwatch, said: If you increase the number of lap dancing clubs, you increase the number of males coming to the Street. It might be good for business in some ways but it will increase public order problems. We have tried to encourage more females and students and stopped promotions at weekends to reduce this element.

Update: Birmingham More Appealing

19th October 2010.  See article from birminghammail.net

Business leaders have lost a legal battle to stop another strip club on Birmingham's Broad Street.

A judge decided the Boujee Rooms could continue to run a 24-hour lap dancing operation – the ninth sex establishment in the Golden Mile entertainment quarter – after rejecting Birmingham City Council's appeal.

The decision was condemned by directors of the Broad Street Business Improvement District (BID), who brought the appeal claiming the seedy nature of strip clubs encouraged prostitution and crime.

Already many of our members, who are made up of the bars, restaurants, offices and hotels, have told us they are dismayed at the decision. We have reconfirmed our opinion that any further matter will be pursued within the framework of the current law.

An inquiry into sex trafficking in Scotland is asking punters who use prostitutes to talk to them - in secret.

Baroness Helena Kennedy, who is heading the probe, said men who buy sex can help build a realistic picture of the extent of the trade.

Kennedy said: I want to hear from these men. I need to hear directly from people who have experiences of trafficking. I think if you want to have a proper sense of the problem, it is better to hear from witnesses themselves directly.

It might be they are men who have used prostitutes and they have had an experience where they have been with a woman who was clearly coerced into prostitution. We need help to understand the scope of the problem but those who can do that are often the very people who, through shame or fear, don't want to step forward. We will guarantee them absolute anonymity.

The probe will focus on Scotland but will have an impact on policy across the UK. It is the most far-reaching study of trafficking in Britain.

It will look at ways in which the country can tackle the hyped problem of trafficking, from policing and border control to how well victims are supported when they are found.

Kennedy and her team have talked to police, voluntary organisations and experts but want to widen their evidence-gathering over the coming months to punters and the victims of trafficking themselves.

The inquiry is being run by the Equality and Human Rights Commission Scotland and, although all trafficking will be covered, the emphasis will be on the women and children brought in for sex.

Police have reported an increase in the demand for foreign women from men buying sex. She said: Senior police officers do think that there has been a shift. Perhaps because men are travelling much more, certainly on stag weekends and buying sex abroad. They are experiencing sex in a more exotic way, activities that they don't participate in with their wives and partners. It becomes something that they want here.

Kennedy said that, contrary to speculation, the inquiry wasn't rooted in Scotland because we have a disproportionate scale of trafficking. She said: The truth is, we just don't know the size of the problem because this hasn't been done before. And what makes it a substantial problem? Fifty, 100 women? If we were talking about the sexual abuse of children, we would never consider any number acceptable. If this is happening at all and it is, we have to ask, how do we prevent it?

A final report from the probe will be out next year.

The state has crept further and further into people's homes and their private lives under the cover of pretending to act in our best interest. That needs to change, says Nick Clegg:

During their 13 years in power, the Labour Government developed a dangerous reflex. Faced with whatever problem, legislation increasingly became the standard response. Something needs fixing? Let's pass a new law.

And so, over the last decade, thousands of new rules and regulations have amassed on the statute book. And it is our liberty that has paid the price. Under the cover of pretending to act in our best interest, the state has crept further and further into people's homes and their private lives. That intrusion is disempowering. It needs to change.

The Coalition Government is determined to restore great British freedoms. Major steps have been taken already. ID cards have been halted. Plans are underway to restrict the storage of innocent people's DNA. Schools will no longer be able to take children's fingerprints without their parents consent.

But we need to do more. The culture of state snooping has become so ingrained that we must tackle it with renewed vigour. And, especially in these difficult times, entrepreneurs and businesses need our help. We must ensure we are not tying them up in restrictive red tape.

So today we are taking an unprecedented step. Based on the belief that it is people, not policymakers, who know best, we are asking the people of Britain to tell us how you want to see your freedom restored.

We are calling for your ideas on how to protect our hard won liberties and repeal unnecessary laws. And we want to know how best to scale back excessive regulation that denies businesses the space to innovate. We're hoping for virtual mailbags full of suggestions. Every single one will be read, with the best put to Parliament.

It is a radically different approach. One based on trust. Because it isn't up to government to tell people how to live their lives. Our job is to empower people, giving you the freedom and support to thrive. That belief is right at the heart of this Coalition. And both coalition parties recognise that Whitehall doesn't have a monopoly on the best ideas.

So, finally, after years in the wilderness, freedom is back in fashion. This is our chance to redraw the boundaries between citizen and state. It's your chance to have your say.

...See yourfreedom.hmg.gov.uk

Some Early Suggestions

Thanks to emark

Repeal of the Dangerous Pictures Act banning 'Extreme Porn'

repeal-section-63-of-the-cjia-2008-extreme-porn

section-63-of-the-criminal-justice-and-immigration-act-2008

Repeal of the Dangerous Cartoons Act

repeal-laws-on-drawn-pornography

You can vote, and leave comments.

Update: Suggestions

3rd July 2010. Thanks to emark and simcha

TV Censorship

ofcom-and-tv-censorship

Video Censorship

repeal-most-of-the-video-recordings-act

Gail Porter is hosting a new investigative documentary about prostitution for Current TV.

The programme is part of the celebrity-fronted On Series, which will feature investigations into contentious issues such as drugs and the legalisation of prostitution.

Porter will research the effects of the UK's current legal stance on sex workers, examining the arguments for decriminalisation, legalisation and banning the world's oldest profession.

Porter will interview prostitutes from brothels in Soho, members of vice squads and visit red light districts in Amsterdam, Auckland and Stockholm to see how they differ from the UK.

The On Series will air on Current TV in the autumn.

The proposed crackdown on lap dancing venues has been thrown out by MSPs despite winning the support of the government.

SNP backbencher Sandra White wanted to give local authorities the power to introduce a special licensing system which would allow them to ban strip clubs.

Injustice Secretary Kenny MacAskill gave his backing to the move, but Labour, the Liberal Democrats and Tories opposed it and the proposal was defeated by 76-45.

The decision was welcomed today by campaigners against the crackdown.

But Labour said it now plans to take its own look at the issue and bring forward proposals if the party returns to power at next year's elections.

Liberal Democrat Robert Brown said Ms White's proposal would introduce a dual licensing system, where venues needed a separate licence in addition to their liquor licence. He said there was no real evidence of a problem with the current powers.

Tory John Lamont said he had met a politics student who worked as a lap dancer in order to help her pay for university. He said: She was, quite frankly, insulted by the claims that lap dancers were either prostitutes being exploited or their work was demeaning.

Sarah Vernon, a former dancer who has just completed a PhD in striptease and strip club culture in Scotland, welcomed Ms White's defeat.  Vernon, who spent seven years carrying out field work as a participant-observer in two Edinburgh clubs as part of her research, had warned curbs on adult entertainment would hit Scottish tourism. She said: The parliament has made the right decision, particularly at this time for Scotland's economy. It shows Scotland is a tolerant and progressive country and does take account of the views of the nation and not just special interests.

Nutters against a planned lap-dancing club in Newcastle's gay quarter are celebrating victory.

Members of the city's gay community fought Trafalgar Leisure's application to turn an empty warehouse on Marlborough Crescent into a bar and lap-dancing venue.

City council officers granted planning permission for the club, despite receiving 16 letters of objection.

A Save Our Scene group set up on social networking site Facebook attracted more than 150 members and a protest website was also set up. Protesters claimed opening a strip club would damage the reputation of the area, popular with the city's gay community, as a safe place to party.

Now Trafalgar Leisure has said that due to the level of opposition the company will not pursue the idea of a lap-dancing club and will instead apply for a licence to run the premises as a bar.

Westgate councillor Nick Forbes, who campaigned against the plans, said: I'm delighted he has decided to reconsider. It shows he has been willing to listen to the community and think of alternative plans. I'm very grateful to everyone who put forward their views and I think it shows what we can achieve as a community if we work together.

MSPs have been discussing law reforms defined in the Criminal Justice and Licensing Bill.

The Scottish Parliament has passed its extreme porn laws. No surprise there.

But on the other hand, the Parliament actually did a decent job of rejecting a bunch of other stupid laws. Sandra White's lap dancing regime got rejected (only the SNP supported it), and attempts to ban all prostitution, and also to introduce the English strict liability offence for using 'controlled' prostitutes were both rejected (only Labour supported them). So some bad, but some good also.

Interestingly, the Police (particularly in the form of ACPOS) were fairly pivotal in providing cover for rejecting the prostitution laws. They basically said they didn't want or need them, and that they might well make things worse, which made it a lot easier for the parties to reject them.

Update: Extreme Lack of Debate

6th July 2010. See also parliament debate from scottish.parliament.uk

There was little debate about extreme pornography in this session but one substantive comment was made.

Patrick Harvie (Glasgow) (Green): I am sorry to ask to lower the temperature just a little, but I wonder whether the cabinet secretary will say a little more about one of the measures that has had less debate and attention but which involves some contention—the measure that he mentioned on extreme pornography. He will be aware that themeasure that exists in England and Wales is having no effect in reducing the production of genuinely violent or abusive images, but is being used just as a top-up charge in a small number of cases in which the most serious offence is rape or sexual assault, which attract a higher sentence. If we end up in a similar situation—with the charge being used in a similar way in Scotland, as a mere top-up—will we not have to look again at whether it serves any purpose?