In Western Australia, prostitution itself is legal. The acts associated with prostitution, including soliciting, procuring, living off the proceeds of, consorting and advertising are illegal.
Legislation concerning prostitution in Western Australia has always been based on myth and prejudice. Early laws mirrored those operating in the east of Australia in the late 1700s which discriminated against female convicts. They were known as vile, filthy whores with no conscience who preyed on men and spread sexual diseases (see puritanical eighteenth century English laws for influence.)
Never mind that female convicts in New South Wales were not provided with shelter and therefore traded sex for accommodation. Or that men so vastly outnumbered the female convicts that women were shipped in to keep the men under control. Or that there were few jobs for the female convicts on arrival in Australia. Facing starvation, these women had no choice but to become sex workers. Legislation was passed to condemn them for doing so. Along with thieves, drunks, the homeless and the unemployed, sex workers were identified as undesirables who could be arrested simply for being without means. The social stigma attached to being an Australian sex worker still exists.
Early days in Western Australia
Sex workers followed the miners to Kalgoorlie and Coolgardie with the gold rush in the 1890’s. Back in Perth, many of the miners’ deserted wives became sex workers to support their children. The government’s response to the expanding and increasingly more visible sex industry was realised in the 1892 Police Act. This act set a dangerous precedent for future legislation. Sex workers in Western Australia, like their New South Wales counterparts, were considered to be criminals. Police were given the power to remove “common prostitutes” from public places. Police powers over prostitution were extended further with amendments to the Police Act in 1902. Soliciting, living off the earnings of, keeping premises for the purposes of and procuring were all now indictable offences. Yet some Kalgoorlie residents wanted further action to be taken. Families had moved in alongside the single male population when miners began earning a wage from deep pit mining. ‘Respectable’ people objected to sex workers and brothels being on show, particularly in front of wives and children. The police responded and effectively restricted the sex industry to Hay St by 1910. In Perth, commercial sex was confined to Roe St by 1920. These red-light districts were controlled by the police with the support of local governments, magistrates and the medical profession under the containment policy.
Containment
This policy was not written down, nor publicly known. Operational from the early 1900’s to July 2000, containment changed the structure of prostitution in Western Australia. The police could threaten brothel owners and workers with imprisonment under vagrancy laws and therefore control their movements and operations. Previously self-employed sex workers generally moved into brothels to avoid persecution, splitting their earnings with the madam and becoming employees.
Under containment, sex workers wishing to work in a brothel were required to register with the Vice Squad and provide their name (with proof), age, marital status, address and car license plate number. A Polaroid photograph was taken. Workers were humiliated by this procedure and worried that their photographs would be used as a record or for blackmail purposes. Weekly medical tests for sexually transmitted diseases were a condition of employment. The practise was intrusive, unnecessarily frequent and discriminated against sex workers as their clients were not tested. During wartime, regulating prostitution was taken to extremes by the authorities. In 1914, several soldiers who were training at Blackboy Hill and had visited Roe St brothels developed syphilis. All Roe St sex workers were examined by the government medical officer, as instructed by the police, with no legislative basis for their actions. Workers with sexually transmitted diseases were charged under vagrancy laws.
In Kalgoorlie, sex workers were not allowed to visit hotels, swim in the local pool or attend social events. They were not permitted to have ‘relationships’ and were required to live on the brothel premises with a curfew. These conditions clearly transgress basic human rights. Liberty of movement was curtailed, as was the freedom to choose one’s own residence.
The fluid boundaries of the unwritten containment policy enabled subjective application and hence alleged police corruption. There were no provisions within the policy for any public input or review.
Containment ended in July 2000.
The Prostitution Act 2000
Responding to requests from inner city residents to curtail the activities of streetwalkers and their “kerb-crawling” clients, the government introduced new legislation. Seventeen kerb-crawling men were fined one thousand dollars each on 7th February, 2001, under the provisions of the Prostitution Act. Plainclothes policewomen acted as sex workers to catch the men, whose full names, ages and suburbs of residence were printed in The West Australian newspaper. According to the article, “ Officers say if they can take demand off the streets, they will keep the scourge of prostitution off dark street corners.” It is futile to attempt taking demand (clients) off the streets. The demand and supply of sexual services has always and will always exist. As for the streetwalkers, “… police had applied successfully for six restraining orders forcing women who repeatedly ignored move-on notices to stay out of the area for a year.”
Once again, those working in or using the sex industry have been treated as criminals. Apart from humiliating the kerb-crawling men and probably destroying a few of their families and career prospects, it is doubtful that this elaborate police sting served any purpose other than to show some disgruntled voters that the government was ‘doing something’ about street prostitution.
Mary-Anne Kenworthy, brothel owner, believes streetwalkers need safe houses, not restraining orders and fines. “ Most of these workers are drug addicts. They need to make money to support a habit. Surely it is better that they earn money on the streets rather than breaking and entering someone’s home and putting others at risk. They will get the money they need regardless.”
She believes safe houses should be made available, where streetwalkers can take clients, as is the case in South Sydney. A safe house has a caretaker, clean showers and toilets. Sex workers can shoot up in the house rather than on the streets and the workers do not run the risk of being raped and murdered in the back of cars.
Some lobby groups believe the government needs to tackle the drug problem head on, putting streetwalkers into rehabilitation programs and ultimately finding them alternative
employment. This is probably an unrealistic approach, given that streetwalkers don’t want to be ‘saved’ and there is already a high unemployment rate, amongst many other contributing factors. However, as an idea it is a great deal more positive than the familiar crime and punishment provisions found in current legislation.
The Prostitution Act fails sex workers, brothel owners, clients and the public on many levels. Promoting employment in the prostitution industry, for example, is illegal. Yet if you flip though the back pages of The West Australian newspaper, you’ll notice that brothels and escort agencies freely advertise job vacancies. The newspaper publishes these advertisements, does not incur the $50 000 penalty and is committing a second crime by living off the earnings of prostitution.
The police can detain and take anything as evidence from a client or sex worker whom they suspect of committing a prostitution-related offence. Therefore, anyone carrying a condom could be charged under this provision. Furthermore, police can stop, detain and search a suspect without a warrant. This powerful provision leaves room for entrapment (particularly of drug users and dealers) and fraud.
Allowing a child onto the premises where sex work is taking place is illegal. Yet many sex workers believe that sharing premises and childcare is a safe and sensible option.
The Prostitution Act expires on July 28th, 2002.
Decriminalisation
All sex work is a criminal offence, according to the Prostitution Act and previous West Australian legislation. Prostitution needs to be decriminalised and regulated.
The Prostitutes Collective of Victoria definition of decriminalisation is “that activities are no longer crimes and participants are not subject to criminal penalties … prostitutes and prostitution businesses will operate under the same civil laws as other individuals and businesses.”
Sex work should not be seen as a moral issue, continually needing harsher penalties and greater police control over workers and clients. The protection and health of the vulnerable and politically invisible sex worker is of paramount importance. Workers’ lifestyles can only improve when sex work is seen as a valid occupation and employees have the same rights as other taxpayers. Prostitution should be regulated by social services, industrial relations and health legislation.
Prostitution is not going to stop. It is unrealistic to attempt to wipe it out and unfair to punish those who provide or use sexual services (unless children, violence or coercion are involved, obviously). An open, honest approach by the government should include consultation with sex workers and brothel and escort agency owners. It must not be politically motivated nor prejudiced against the industry. Decriminalisation is the answer to the age-old question of how to deal with prostitution.
Legislation concerning prostitution in Western Australia has always been based on myth and prejudice. Early laws mirrored those operating in the east of Australia in the late 1700s which discriminated against female convicts. They were known as vile, filthy whores with no conscience who preyed on men and spread sexual diseases (see puritanical eighteenth century English laws for influence.)
Never mind that female convicts in New South Wales were not provided with shelter and therefore traded sex for accommodation. Or that men so vastly outnumbered the female convicts that women were shipped in to keep the men under control. Or that there were few jobs for the female convicts on arrival in Australia. Facing starvation, these women had no choice but to become sex workers. Legislation was passed to condemn them for doing so. Along with thieves, drunks, the homeless and the unemployed, sex workers were identified as undesirables who could be arrested simply for being without means. The social stigma attached to being an Australian sex worker still exists.
Early days in Western Australia
Sex workers followed the miners to Kalgoorlie and Coolgardie with the gold rush in the 1890’s. Back in Perth, many of the miners’ deserted wives became sex workers to support their children. The government’s response to the expanding and increasingly more visible sex industry was realised in the 1892 Police Act. This act set a dangerous precedent for future legislation. Sex workers in Western Australia, like their New South Wales counterparts, were considered to be criminals. Police were given the power to remove “common prostitutes” from public places. Police powers over prostitution were extended further with amendments to the Police Act in 1902. Soliciting, living off the earnings of, keeping premises for the purposes of and procuring were all now indictable offences. Yet some Kalgoorlie residents wanted further action to be taken. Families had moved in alongside the single male population when miners began earning a wage from deep pit mining. ‘Respectable’ people objected to sex workers and brothels being on show, particularly in front of wives and children. The police responded and effectively restricted the sex industry to Hay St by 1910. In Perth, commercial sex was confined to Roe St by 1920. These red-light districts were controlled by the police with the support of local governments, magistrates and the medical profession under the containment policy.
Containment
This policy was not written down, nor publicly known. Operational from the early 1900’s to July 2000, containment changed the structure of prostitution in Western Australia. The police could threaten brothel owners and workers with imprisonment under vagrancy laws and therefore control their movements and operations. Previously self-employed sex workers generally moved into brothels to avoid persecution, splitting their earnings with the madam and becoming employees.
Under containment, sex workers wishing to work in a brothel were required to register with the Vice Squad and provide their name (with proof), age, marital status, address and car license plate number. A Polaroid photograph was taken. Workers were humiliated by this procedure and worried that their photographs would be used as a record or for blackmail purposes. Weekly medical tests for sexually transmitted diseases were a condition of employment. The practise was intrusive, unnecessarily frequent and discriminated against sex workers as their clients were not tested. During wartime, regulating prostitution was taken to extremes by the authorities. In 1914, several soldiers who were training at Blackboy Hill and had visited Roe St brothels developed syphilis. All Roe St sex workers were examined by the government medical officer, as instructed by the police, with no legislative basis for their actions. Workers with sexually transmitted diseases were charged under vagrancy laws.
In Kalgoorlie, sex workers were not allowed to visit hotels, swim in the local pool or attend social events. They were not permitted to have ‘relationships’ and were required to live on the brothel premises with a curfew. These conditions clearly transgress basic human rights. Liberty of movement was curtailed, as was the freedom to choose one’s own residence.
The fluid boundaries of the unwritten containment policy enabled subjective application and hence alleged police corruption. There were no provisions within the policy for any public input or review.
Containment ended in July 2000.
The Prostitution Act 2000
Responding to requests from inner city residents to curtail the activities of streetwalkers and their “kerb-crawling” clients, the government introduced new legislation. Seventeen kerb-crawling men were fined one thousand dollars each on 7th February, 2001, under the provisions of the Prostitution Act. Plainclothes policewomen acted as sex workers to catch the men, whose full names, ages and suburbs of residence were printed in The West Australian newspaper. According to the article, “ Officers say if they can take demand off the streets, they will keep the scourge of prostitution off dark street corners.” It is futile to attempt taking demand (clients) off the streets. The demand and supply of sexual services has always and will always exist. As for the streetwalkers, “… police had applied successfully for six restraining orders forcing women who repeatedly ignored move-on notices to stay out of the area for a year.”
Once again, those working in or using the sex industry have been treated as criminals. Apart from humiliating the kerb-crawling men and probably destroying a few of their families and career prospects, it is doubtful that this elaborate police sting served any purpose other than to show some disgruntled voters that the government was ‘doing something’ about street prostitution.
Mary-Anne Kenworthy, brothel owner, believes streetwalkers need safe houses, not restraining orders and fines. “ Most of these workers are drug addicts. They need to make money to support a habit. Surely it is better that they earn money on the streets rather than breaking and entering someone’s home and putting others at risk. They will get the money they need regardless.”
She believes safe houses should be made available, where streetwalkers can take clients, as is the case in South Sydney. A safe house has a caretaker, clean showers and toilets. Sex workers can shoot up in the house rather than on the streets and the workers do not run the risk of being raped and murdered in the back of cars.
Some lobby groups believe the government needs to tackle the drug problem head on, putting streetwalkers into rehabilitation programs and ultimately finding them alternative
employment. This is probably an unrealistic approach, given that streetwalkers don’t want to be ‘saved’ and there is already a high unemployment rate, amongst many other contributing factors. However, as an idea it is a great deal more positive than the familiar crime and punishment provisions found in current legislation.
The Prostitution Act fails sex workers, brothel owners, clients and the public on many levels. Promoting employment in the prostitution industry, for example, is illegal. Yet if you flip though the back pages of The West Australian newspaper, you’ll notice that brothels and escort agencies freely advertise job vacancies. The newspaper publishes these advertisements, does not incur the $50 000 penalty and is committing a second crime by living off the earnings of prostitution.
The police can detain and take anything as evidence from a client or sex worker whom they suspect of committing a prostitution-related offence. Therefore, anyone carrying a condom could be charged under this provision. Furthermore, police can stop, detain and search a suspect without a warrant. This powerful provision leaves room for entrapment (particularly of drug users and dealers) and fraud.
Allowing a child onto the premises where sex work is taking place is illegal. Yet many sex workers believe that sharing premises and childcare is a safe and sensible option.
The Prostitution Act expires on July 28th, 2002.
Decriminalisation
All sex work is a criminal offence, according to the Prostitution Act and previous West Australian legislation. Prostitution needs to be decriminalised and regulated.
The Prostitutes Collective of Victoria definition of decriminalisation is “that activities are no longer crimes and participants are not subject to criminal penalties … prostitutes and prostitution businesses will operate under the same civil laws as other individuals and businesses.”
Sex work should not be seen as a moral issue, continually needing harsher penalties and greater police control over workers and clients. The protection and health of the vulnerable and politically invisible sex worker is of paramount importance. Workers’ lifestyles can only improve when sex work is seen as a valid occupation and employees have the same rights as other taxpayers. Prostitution should be regulated by social services, industrial relations and health legislation.
Prostitution is not going to stop. It is unrealistic to attempt to wipe it out and unfair to punish those who provide or use sexual services (unless children, violence or coercion are involved, obviously). An open, honest approach by the government should include consultation with sex workers and brothel and escort agency owners. It must not be politically motivated nor prejudiced against the industry. Decriminalisation is the answer to the age-old question of how to deal with prostitution.
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