Dr. Teresa Whitaker:

Anyone who enters the sex industry before the age of 18 is not engaged in sex work but is a victim of child sexual abuse. The numerous reports published in the past 20 years show that, sadly, such abuse is not an uncommon feature in Irish society. We cannot, however, generalise about the background or situation of sex workers. In looking at research, one must consider the social context including, in particular, location. Without a doubt, some people enter sex work voluntarily. There is a massive amount of research from Australia and New Zealand, for example, showing that there are women in their 20s and 30s who go into prostitution by choice and consider themselves sex workers. The issue of people being groomed for prostitution at a very early age is a separate matter. Those who are coerced, exploited or groomed by older people are in a different category from those who enter the business willingly. There are laws to protect children in Ireland and that is not related to the situation of people who enter sex work voluntarily.

Of the 35 people we interviewed for our research, three had been coerced into prostitution. The others, who were using substances such as heroin or cocaine, chose sex work over other types of criminal activities including shoplifting, stealing and pushing or trafficking drugs. Their choices were very limited but the option they chose was prostitution. When I started my research, I had the same opinion as has been expressed here today. As a sociologist who came through the traditional Irish universities and participated in feminist studies, I assumed that all women were coerced into prostitution. I could not imagine how any woman in her right mind would do it and that it must be a terrible thing for all of them. When I spoke to these women, however, I discovered that to them it was just work. They were doing it to make money and had learned all types of survival strategies, such as how to negotiate with punters and so on. However, the research from Sweden shows that sex workers there can no longer negotiate with clients because everything is done in a big rush. Whereas before they might check out whether a potential client has a passenger in the back seat, for instance, there is no time for such precautions when the transaction must be done very quickly. The research from Norway in the past year shows that for the women who remain in prostitution, their lives are in greater danger than they were before criminalisation.