Business owners and local bodies in South Auckland have been pleading for too long for a law to rid them of street prostitutes. No community should have to accept this trade being conducted in daylight on footpaths where other citizens, including children, are going about their daily lives.
This week the local boards of Mangere-Otahuhu, Otara-Papatoetoe and Manurewa issued an illustrated booklet to give people in more fortunate places an idea of the sights, sounds and even smells confronting shopkeepers and their customers. The booklet suggests many of those offering sex are male transvestites and the behaviour described is gross and threatening.
The chairman of the Otara-Papatoetoe board, John McCracken, said, "Children are seeing things they shouldn't see, shoppers are being intimidated and street workers operating in residential streets are keeping people awake. When asked to keep quiet they make it very clear they have every right to be there. What other industry would be permitted to behave in this way?"
The former Manukau City Council pressed hard for legislation seven years ago, but Parliament declined to act. The same Parliament had legalised prostitution a few years earlier and regarded a ban on street soliciting as a backward step. But National supported Manukau's bill at that time and a revised bill, introduced two years ago, may have a better chance of passing. A select committee is due to report the bill back to the House this month.
Rather than a complete ban on street prostitution, the revised bill would allow the councils to prohibit it from specified places, which would introduce needless difficulties. As fast as a street or a shopping precinct was declared off limits, the trade would move around the corner, or to some other unfortunate locality.
