Prostitution is increasing because of austerity. A 60% increase in street prostitution recorded in Doncaster is primarily attributed to destitution caused by benefit sanctions,.with charities saying: “Women are being forced to sell sex for £5 because of benefit sanctions.” Sheffield reports a 166% increase (2014) while charity workers in Hull report: “ . . . women who are literally starving and they are out there to feed themselves.”
“We have nowhere to turn if clients stop coming to see us. Our community is facing a crisis”.Many sex workers in the UK are now are being put in the perilous position of choosing to feed their families or risking their health – and the health of their loved ones, campaign groups have warned.Additional powers […]
This action has now ended but thousands of sex workers and supporters in our network wrote to their MP to demand emergency payments for sex workers during the pandemic. ——— Dear Friends Please demand that your MP raise the situation of sex workers, many of whom have been made destitute and homeless by this crisis. […]
In April 2020, the WEC launched an inquiry into the disproportionate impact of Covid-19 on people with protected characteristics (that is people who are discriminated against on the grounds of “age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership and pregnancy and maternity”). The ECP’s submission demanded ‘emergency payments for […]
The lockdowns imposed in most European countries due to the COVID-19 pandemic have brought to the forefront a reality that sex worker collectives have been highlighting for decades: the criminalisation of sex work puts lives at risk. In the past weeks, grassroots organisations have been working to raise funds and provide essential products to sex […]
Saskia HagelbergSex workers are a marginalised social group who face near constant opposition in the form of stigma and legal obstacles. COVID-19 has exacerbated the adverse condition of sex workers, many of whom have seen their income reduced in part or entirely as a result of social distancing. Like many precarious workers in the gig-economy, […]
Many workers are facing an uncertain future, or an immediate financial struggle, due to the coronavirus outbreak. And for one industry, the impact has been unavoidable. “We are in a lot of trouble,” Cari Mitchell, a spokesperson for the English Collective of Prostitutes (ECP) tells Euronews. “Because sex work is a contact job.” The ECP, […]
Some sex workers still see clients to make ends meet, while charities report rise in suicide attempts Sex workers in “dire and desperate” circumstances across the UK are continuing to see clients during the lockdown, potentially exposing themselves and others to coronavirus, according to charities and sex worker organisations. “We are facing a massive crisis,” […]
Sex workers say they have been abused and spat at, yet many can’t access government support By Frankie Miren As everyone’s life is thrown into turmoil, it’s right to focus on those at the sharpest end of the pandemic chaos. But, in the glut of articles about sex workers and coronavirus, the reasons for sex […]
The Guardian: UK sex workers in “dire and desperate” need amid coronavirus lockdown “As the bills come in I stack them up on a shelf and try to forget about them. I spend my whole day anxious. There is no let-up. I have the worry of the children, the worry of my mother who is […]
A THREE-YEAR series of protests to support mothers and children targeted by poverty, child removal and domestic violence moved online today amid the coronavirus crisis.The monthly action, organised by the Support not Separation Coalition (SSC), had been taking place outside the Central Family Court in London, but saw thousands of online posts to make up […]