Dr. Gillian Wylie:

There are different ways of regulating prostitution, through abolition or legalisation, or points in between. These are often discussed as ways of combating sex trafficking. The international research and literature is highly inconclusive. The Dutch national rapporteur reports ongoing sex trafficking in the Netherlands. The Swedish Government's own evaluation has provided very little concrete evidence of the efficacy of the Swedish law as a means of combating trafficking. The 2012 "Trafficking in Persons Report" of the US State Department names both Sweden and the Netherlands as countries of transit, destination and exploitation for human trafficking.

There is a problem in the conflation of sex trafficking and prostitution. As Dr. Ward said, people experience a diversity of outcomes and experiences in the sex trade. Our research showed that and the Department's conference poignantly illustrated that with very divergent views from the floor from women involved in the sex trade. It is also important to recognise that human trafficking occurs for reasons beyond sexual exploitation, such as forced labour.

If we are to take a demand-led model, we need to understand the complexity of demand for exploitable labour in society more generally, in domestic work and in construction. This leads me to an analysis which points to the importance of recognising the paucity of migrant workers' rights and the lack of access for migrant workers to employment in the European Union, creating a nexus between trafficking and migration.

In Ireland we have had an anti-trafficking law since 2008 and we are in line with our UN and EU obligations. We have anti-trafficking infrastructure, policing commitment and civil society collaboration with the anti-human trafficking unit. There have been investigations and prosecutions but barely any convictions. While I do not maintain everything is right with Ireland's current anti-trafficking legislation or with what happens to people identified as victims within that law, at the same time we have the makings of an adequate anti-trafficking framework in the Irish context. These issues, along with the necessity of addressing the issue of migrant workers' rights more generally should be considered by the committee in combatting human trafficking rather than the reductive route of criminalising the purchase of sex.