CARE welcomes new trafficking law

Social policy charity CARE has welcomed the announcement from the Home Secretary Jacqui Smith this week that the Government intends to introduce a law that will make it illegal to purchase sex from a victim of trafficking.

Current law makes it legal to purchase sex from any person so long as it is not in an 'on-street context', where prospective buyers are subject to kerb crawling laws.

Rachel Davies, Care's Human Trafficking Officer said that the current law was "worrying given that research demonstrates that demand for paid sex in Britain is growing rapidly and trafficked women are increasingly been used to feed this demand".

"The new legislation should address this serious shortcoming at least with respect to the victims of trafficking," she said.

Nola Leach, Care's director of public affairs, also welcomed the plans but said that the Government needed to take further steps towards ending the legal framework that allows men to buy sex from women.

"Although there are a minority of women in the upper classes of prostitution who say they enjoy their work, the vast majority of women don't consider it to be a fulfilling career.

"More often than not - due to the abuse, drug use and the chaotic lifestyle - many find it extremely difficult to exit. The current framework serves the interests of the minority, not the exploited majority who must be our prime concern."

Dan Boucher, Care's director of parliamentary affairs concluded, "It is embarrassing as a British man to confront the fact that in recent years more and more of us have started buying sex.

"We need to grow up, recognising that women are not bodies that we can procure for half an hour, but fellow human beings of equal dignity and worth.

"We cannot expect to live in a healthy society, at ease with itself, so long as our laws sustain a framework that distorts the crucial relationship between men and women."