Setting the Boundaries – reforming the law on sex offences (2000)
The ECP submitted evidence to the 2000 Government consultation: Setting the Boundaries, Reforming the law on sex offences. We opposed a new offence of trafficking for the purposes of sexual exploitation as, based on the experience of women in our network, anti-trafficking laws are systematically used – not to protect victims – but to arrest and deport migrant sex workers. We also objected to the definition of trafficking as the “movement of people” without any reference to force and coercion, as it would therefore be used to strengthen immigration controls and prevent women moving across international borders. All that we predicted about the harmful affect of this new legislation has been borne out in the years since.