In 2000, Westminster Council attempted to close flats in Brewer and Peter Street using compulsory purchase orders claiming that the premises were not used for residential purposes.Determined not to be thrown out of the flats where they lived and worked, women organised a petition which was signed by thousands of people, held a press conference […]
You are invited to the launch of a new book by the International Prostitutes CollectiveSome Mother’s Daughter – The hidden movement of prostitute women against violence “I wish Some Mother’s Daughter had been around when I was researching for Band of Gold, it would’ve made life a lot easier and a hell of a lot safer […]
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – Prostitutes on Tuesday launched a petition drive urging city officials to decriminalize the sex industry, a move called for in a study that said it could save more than $7 million a year in law enforcement costs.Nedra Ruiz, a defense attorney who spoke at a morning news conference announcing the drive, […]
Los Angeles Conference 14 March 1997All sex workers must be decriminalised whether they work on the street or in premises.Scrap the prostitution laws: they criminalize sex workers, divide us from our families and friends, make us vulnerable to violence, and set us apart from the rest of the community — separate is never equal.An end to […]
The calls for legalised brothels reflect increasing public concern with prostitute women’s safety and civil rights. It may also reflect the Government’s drive to cut the unemployment figures.Legalised brothels usually go hand-in-hand with police crackdowns against street workers – the most vulnerable women whose protection the police have rarely prioritised. As with other workers, women […]
On 12 March 1996 a woman from Bristol who was violently attacked, raped and robbed won £4,000 compensation from the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board (CICB.) The CICB had initially refused her compensation because she had convictions related to prostitution. Ms X was raped in July 1994. Despite knowing that the police and courts were likely […]
In 1995, two women brought the first successful private prosecution for rape in England and Wales with the support of the English Collective of Prostitutes (ECP) and Women Against Rape (WAR). Both women had independently reported being attacked in what turned out to be remarkably similar circumstances. Yet the Crown Prosecution Service decided there was […]
Heather Mills Home Affairs CorrespondentTwo women who brought the first private prosecution for rape and indecent assault after the Crown Prosecution Service dropped their cases saw their attacker jailed for 14 years yesterday.Coming the week after a London family – in another private prosecution – succeeded in committing for trial two men accused of killing […]
A young teen-age girl compelled Kay Mellor to write “Band of Gold,” a six-hour miniseries from Britain’s Granada Television about a group of prostitutes and how their lives change after one of them is brutally murdered.The adult thriller starring Geraldine James (“The Jewel in the Crown”) and Cathy Tyson (“Mona Lisa”) makes its American TV […]