Hughes Darren: Prostitution Reform Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
Hughes Darren: Prostitution Reform Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
[Volume:607;Page:4459] 
DARREN HUGHES (NZ Labour—Otaki) 
: 
 I rise in support of the title of this bill in the name of Tim Barnett and in doing so I follow on from my friend and colleague Marc Alexander who set out his views in a very clear way. I think that reminded us all that there is a sharp division of members’ views on the bill we are discussing with people taking very different attitudes and approaches to it. It is good that we are starting the debate in the Committee stage by talking about the title of the bill and what that title is intended to mean when it comes to the law that we are trying to put through Parliament. 
I will not be supporting Mr Copeland’s amendment to the title because I do not think the negative connotations he feels we are trying to put in place are what is trying to be achieved. I start from the point of view that I am a member of the Justice and Electoral Committee and we wrote in our report that we neither condemn nor condone prostitution. This is not a prostitution promotion bill. This is a Prostitution Reform Bill because it reforms the current law on and the current legal status of prostitution on the law books in our country. I do not believe that any of us on the committee passed a moral judgment on prostitution. From my point of view we simply said that we recognise the existence—I think the words in the report were the “enduring nature” of the existence—of prostitution. Then having recognised that we asked what legal status prostitution should be given in order to protect the greatest number of people and to bring more justice into the law. 
Throughout the debate members have forgotten a lot of things about what is in the bill and when we talk about clause 3 the purpose clause we need to remember there is a specific reference at that point to no moral judgment being passed on prostitution. Mr Alexander mentioned the issue of child prostitution and this bill I believe will give us a better chance of fighting the coercion of younger people into working in this industry. Clearly very few members in this House—and I acknowledge Mr McNair who spoke earlier about this issue as well—would want us to promote prostitution to young people as their first career choice. What has not come out—and I hope it will come out during the Committee stage—is that we have put specific provisions in the bill so that prostitution will not be something that is promoted to people by way of career guidance at schools by the Accident Compensation Corporation when it is looking to encourage people back into work or by Work and Income if it is work testing or looking at different options for people. We are not putting prostitution into a category where we are saying we want to encourage people to work as prostitutes. 
I do not believe the number of prostitutes is necessarily important. I believe what is important is that those who do work in that industry can do so safely and with protection and that those who want to leave the industry are facilitated and enabled to do so. The fact that we are changing prostitution from an underground activity and acknowledging that it does exist will enable support systems to flourish around people who work in the sex industry. It will also mean in the case of young people working in the industry that there can be a zero tolerance approach to that because those who work as prostitutes will have legal protection so therefore will be able to report brothel-keepers who are using young people under the age of 18 to work in the industry. I spoke very strongly in support of that at the select committee stage. I do not think it is appropriate at all for people under the age of 18 to be working in the sex industry. This bill gives us the first chance to do something meaningful about that. 
Those are some of the reasons that I am supporting the bill. Of course no one could be induced or coerced into prostitution under the bill. Those safeguards and provisions are in there as well. I think the title of the bill sums up quite well what we are trying to do: we are reforming the law to try to create a new legal environment. We are not changing any moral environment here. I do not know whether the number of prostitutes will go up or down. I say it is more important that we have proper law. The Prostitution Reform Bill as named by Tim Barnett is well named and I will be supporting it.