On February 24 2015, Parliament
finally voted down the controversial transphobic and anti-sexworker Manukau City
(Regulating Prostitution in Specified Places) Bill on its second reading
(109-11) after four years of stalemate and arduous conflict over the destructive
private members bill in question.
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This bill was the product of
vigilante anti-sexworker activists who monopolised access to the former Manukau
City Council and conservative Labour MPs who voted against the original
Prostitution Reform Act in 2003. Once before, they had failed to ban street sex
work, mostly undertaken at Papatoetoe's Hunters Corner, under the aegis of the
Manukau City Council (Control of Street Prostitution) Bill 2005, which was
defeated 73-46 after adverse recommendations from the Local Government and
Environment select committee, so it got no further than its first reading. The
Manukau City (Regulating Prostitution in Specified Places) also sought to ban
street sex work but did pass its first reading back in 2010 (82-36),
consistently opposed by the Green Party later in the submission process. As it
happened, submissions to the Local Government and Environment select committee
showed an intriguing but predictable divergence. Fundamentalist churches,
anti-sexworker vigilante groups and local councillors supported banning street
sex work, while reproductive and sexual health organisations and sex workers
rights advocates, as well as public health academics opposed its passage,
warning of dire public health consequences from other anti-soliciting bills that
had prioritised moral panic over evidence-based public policy, such as the New
South Wales Summary Offences Act 1988. Wisely, however, the Local Government
and Environment select committee listened to evidence-based research from the
quarter of academic supporters of prostitution reform and made the commendable
prudent choice to recommend that this bill also proceed no further. It argued
that if street sex workers did undertake particular forms of violent or
antisocial behaviour, then the Summary Offences Act 1981, Litter Act and other
statutory provisions could legitimately be used against them. While Family
First tried to orchestrate a pro-bill campaign, its lobbying was restricted to
the introduction of the bill and the select committee process, and neglected its
later stages. By February 24, apart from conservative Auckland local body
councillors and officials, other erstwhile supporters of the bill had fallen by
the wayside- United Future's former party list MPs, now mostly defectors to the
Conservative Party; shrill and transphobic South Auckland-based New Zealand
First List MP Asenati Lole-Taylor, demoted down her party list and out of
Parliament; and the short-lived South Auckland vigilante group PROS (Papatoetoe
Reclaim Our Streets), which harassed and intimidated local street sex workers
through standover tactics and were lavishly funded by local South Auckland civic
officials and councillors. Along with former Manurewa Labour MP George Hawkins,
proponents of this ill-advised legislation have faded away. Predictably, New
Zealand First was the only party that voted against abandonment of the bill on
February 24.
Is it all over? Lole-Taylor
tried to formulate a third anti-sexworker bill while still in Parliament, but
the parliamentary website now shows no sign of that bill. However, it remains to
be seen whether or not New Zealand First or religious social conservative MPs
from Labour and National have a third go at this foolhardy agenda. One hopes
not. One can congratulate the Prostitutes Collective and the Greens for their
ardent campaign against the passage of the current bill, however.
Recommended:
Manukau City Council (Regulation
of Prostitution in Specified Places) Bill:http://www.legislation.govt.nz/bill/local/2010/0197/latest/DLM3177402
.html
Gillian Abel, Liz Fitzgerald and
Catherine Healy: Taking the Crime out of
Sex Work: New Zealand Sex Workers Fight for Decriminalisation: Bristol:
Polity Press: 2010.
Submission Guide: Manukau City
Council Regulation of Prostitution Bill:https://home.greens.org.nz/takeaction/submissionguides/submission-guide-manukau-city-council-r
egulation-prostitution-bill
"Parliament scraps old
prostitution bill" 3 News: 26.02.2015: http://www.3news.co.nz/nznews/parliament-scraps-old-prostitution-bill-
2015022522
Not Recommended:
"Politicians put prostitution in
too hard basket" Family First: 26.02.2015: http://www.familyfirst.org.nz/2015/02/politicians-put-prostitution-harm-in-too
hard-basket-2/
