Time to clean up Prostitution Law – Copeland The Kiwi Party
Press Release
April 21, 2009

Former MP, now Kiwi Party President, Gordon Copeland believes it is time to “clean up” the prostitution law.

“The current law was enacted by Parliament on a 60 to 59 vote with one abstention. It was the brain child of Tim Barnett, with the full & determined backing of Helen Clark” said Mr Copeland. “In fact Helen Clark lobbied a number of her own MPs to back the Bill & that proved to be the decisive factor. It was not a free vote nor did it have the backing of a majority of kiwis”

“Helen has now gone & the new Government should act to bring street soliciting, in particular, to an end”.

“Along with my colleague Larry Baldock, now Kiwi Party leader, I was a member of the Government appointed Working Group which looked into necessary changes to the current law in 2006”. It was immediately apparent that street side prostitution at Northcrest, Manurewa, Hunters Corner, Papatoetoe & Manchester Street, Christchurch was out of control & deeply resented by the people living in those cities”.

“We recommended, amongst other things, that street prostitution should become illegal by criminalising the buyer, that the law should be tightened to protect underage sex workers & that broth-els should be licensed in an open & transparent way”. However it was never going to happen under Helen Clark & I suspect that even within the Labour Party there will now be a greater willingness to clean up the current mess”

ENDS

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