Page 2392 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 31 July 2018
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reduce stigma around sex work, remove discriminatory offences, better protect children, and align the Prostitution Act with work health and safety legislation.
In April 1991, the Select Committee on HIV, Illegal Drugs and Prostitution released an interim report into prostitution in the ACT. The chairman of the committee, Michael Moore, opened the report by noting:
It is incumbent upon any person, who is concerned with civil liberties, to ensure that no individual or group loses their basic human rights, particularly through the moral position of others.
While the purpose of the committee was to examine the role of the sex work industry in spreading HIV in the wake of the AIDS pandemic of the 1980s, the report ultimately led to broad-reaching recommendations for law reform. The recommendations took into account the public health of the community, the protection of children, and the rights of sex workers to safe and equitable working conditions.
As a result of these recommendations, the regulation of sex work in the ACT was consolidated into a single act, and the ACT adopted a licensing system which the committee believed to be the most appropriate mechanism for regulating sex work. The Prostitution Act was an important step towards protecting the rights and welfare of sex workers. However, in the 26 years since the act was introduced, our understanding of how to protect the rights and welfare of sex workers has continued to evolve. Since 1992, the ACT has become a human rights jurisdiction, with the introduction of the Human Rights Act in 2004, and it updated its framework for protecting workers in the workplace with the Work Health and Safety Act 2011.
Another big change is the way that governments consult with sex workers themselves. In 2016 Amnesty International published its policy on state obligations to respect, protect and fulfil the human rights of sex workers. In this policy, there is one line of particular relevance to this bill:
In establishing laws and policies relevant to sex work, whether they relate to entry, participation or exit, governments should ensure the meaningful participation and consultation of sex workers, including, in particular current sex workers.
This bill represents many years of consultation, from receiving submissions from sex workers themselves during the Standing Committee on Justice and Community Safety’s inquiry into the Prostitution Act, which commenced in 2010, to the detailed discussions with key stakeholders this year, including sex worker advocacy groups. It is critical that when legislating about an industry, we consult with the people who actually work in that industry and who are most affected by changes to the laws. Madam Speaker, we have done that, and as a result, we recognise that some aspects of the government’s regulation of the sex work industry could be improved.
Although the requirement for sole operators to register with Access Canberra was intended to better protect sex workers, unfortunately it has not been the case in practice. Concerns about privacy have meant that compliance with this requirement has historically been very low, and the criminal sanctions mean that this requirement
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