Policing and Crime Bill
12:00 pm
Niki Adams: The problem has been that, for example, in relation to Soho, which is one of the areas where the sex industry is less underground and where it is easier to see what is going on, even the police said for many years that 80 per cent. of women there were being trafficked. One of the women here today works in Soho. She is from Hungary. Her father died when she was younger and she is here supporting her son and her family back home. That is the most common average situation of women working in the sex industry. Some 70 per cent. are mothers who have gone into prostitution to support their families and other people in the community. We are in an economic recession, and more women will be forced into prostitution to survive. The legislation will do nothing to help women get safe working conditions or survive in that way. What it will do is actually force prostitution underground and make it worse—more dangerous.