Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)

There have been a few points raised and I welcome all the Senators' positive comments in regard to the amendments which have been moved. All of us have the same purpose, which is to deal with this horrendous activity of people who traffick human beings and have them involved in prostitution. It is totally unacceptable. What I stated at the outset was reflected by everybody else. We want to ensure our legal system will be able to secure prosecutions and criminal convictions for those who are involved.

I hope I have taken Senator Mullen's question correctly when he asked would a person walking into a brothel and availing of the services of a prostitute commit an offence. I am satisfied an offence would be committed as in these circumstances some form of payment would be exchanged.

Some of the many issues raised by Senator O'Donovan are pertinent to some of the later amendments we will discuss. The law on prostitution provides that the client may be prosecuted. I understand clients are regularly brought before the courts for soliciting.

With regard to the comments of Senators Mary M. White and Lisa McDonald, we all want to address the expressions of concern outlined in this House by Senators on Second Stage and the issues discussed by Members on all sides in Dáil Éireann. Our legal advisers in the Department, the Office of the Attorney General and the Parliamentary Counsel have given this the utmost consideration. The counsel advises strongly that the form of words in these amendments is too broad and crude and that they would be difficult to prosecute. By expressing the offence in terms of soliciting for the purpose of prostitution it will be easier to gain convictions, which is what we want. There is no point in having law that cannot be implemented or cannot achieve the desired outcome. Everyone in this House wants robust legislation to protect people and to have a legislative framework in place to enable us to convict people who are guilty of crime, as this legislation provides.

Our law covers the offence of procuring. It is an offence under the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 1885 to procure any girl or woman to have sex with any other person or persons. Under the same Act it is an offence to procure any woman or girl to become a prostitute or by threats or intimidation to procure or attempt to procure any woman or girl to have sex. That also applies where a person by false pretences or representations procures any woman or girl to have sex. In addition, it is an offence to procure a person for the purpose of sexual exploitation.

Subsection (1) of our proposed new section 6 creates an offence of soliciting or importuning a trafficked person for the purpose of prostitution. The soliciting can take place anywhere in public or private. Senator O'Donovan referred to that in particular. The person solicited can be either the trafficked person or another, such as a pimp, minder or trafficker. The trafficked person can commit no offence. Only the customer can commit an offence, even where the customer is another trafficked person. This could happen where, for example, a person trafficked into Ireland for labour exploitation solicited a person who was trafficked for sexual exploitation. We must ensure the legislation is robust, has the safeguards and the wherewithal to effect prosecutions where necessary and have criminal prosecutions in place. I strongly commend this amendment to the House. All the contributions to the debate reflect that position.