TIM BARNETT (NZ Labour—Christchurch Central) : I have used my right to speak as sponsor of this bill quite sparingly, but I thought now might be a good chance to draw together some of the threads of the Committee stage to date. So far in this stage we have debated the bill for about 6 hours and passed its title. Many of us earnestly hope we will be dealing with the amendments before today’s sitting finishes. I know the record of these debates is important for the future, and there are issues around the bill, particularly those touched on by the amendments today, that some members are still exploring.

To try to focus my comments, I took what some may regard as a brave step of sitting down with the Hansard of our last Committee stage debate, which took place 4 weeks ago today. I analysed the speeches in opposition to the bill and identified the main lines of argument. The immediate thing that struck me was that the nature of this debate has changed. Some new issues have arisen; some others have subsided. I have prepared some new briefing notes that focus on those matters, and they have been circulated today to members.

This bill is a product of years of discussion. Some here may regard it as a work of the devil, or even worse. But I do hope that all can respect it as a desperately serious attempt to address some real evils. I also hope that members can respect that its authors, from Maurice Williamson to Katherine O’Regan, from the National Council of Women of New Zealand to Business and Professional Women, were, and are, utterly convinced that the decriminalisation model was, and is, the proper way to go. I also note that no one has questioned the fact that this nation’s major women’s, human rights, and public health groups, support this proposed new law for prostitution. Some members have questioned whether Parliament has spent sufficient time on this legislation. Oddly enough, the same members seem also to bemoan the fact that we are facing so many amendments during this Committee stage. Well, no force on earth will stop members of Parliament from producing amendments on a complex matter, such as prostitution. Indeed, what we are going through now is a process enthusiastically supported by the New Zealand public. We have approached a progressive, internally consistent proposal for law change in a cross-party way.

This bill was largely prepared by two National members of Parliament, and sponsored by myself, a Labour MP. The Justice and Electoral Committee, which considered the bill, was chaired by two MPs, one National and one ACT. Some members claim there was “nothing broke” in the way our prostitution law currently works, so why fix it? That is one of the most sterile of arguments. Firstly, it is so lacking in ambition for this nation. I want us to have high-quality law in every area, not some awkward fudge because Parliament is too afraid to bite the bullet and deal with the hard issues. Secondly, that argument passively leaves an acceptable level of discretion in the hands of our police. It is simply unacceptable for our approach to prostitution to be based on law with inherent gender bias that can be activated by police who decide that some street workers are easy pickings on a quiet night. That was what happened in Auckland on two nights this year. The police made a series of arrests on the streets of Auckland. They were damaging their relationship with members of a community whose cooperation is vital to effective policing in the inner city and who are vulnerable to violent attack by the nature of their work—a danger increased because our laws tell them to live in the shadows. I tell those Māori and Samoan members of Parliament who intend to oppose this bill to explain their vote to Māori and Samoan prostitutes who are demanding law change and who are much more likely to be arrested than their Pākehā counterparts.

The 2003 year has also seen at least three police raids of reportedly unregistered escort agencies. The charge will be brothel keeping. The evidence will include condoms found on the scene, yet the Inland Revenue Department is happy to accept those workers as taxpayers, and even operate a special unit to cater for them, and public health helps to provide those condoms. If that is not State hypocrisy, I do not know what is. I am sorry that the amendments in the name of Gordon Copeland and Wayne Mapp currently before this Committee sustain all that nonsense. Other members claim that we have done insufficient research on the topic. The select committee met on and off for 2 years on this matter. Its members travelled the country, received 222 submissions, covering every conceivable viewpoint, and heard 66 submissions. We were advised by four State agencies, including those of police and health. Our desire to travel to see how the laws were operating in Australia came up against the rules governing select committees, so we personally paid to go in order that we, as a Committee, could do the best job possible.

Some say that this bill normalises prostitution, but they carefully avoid saying what they really mean by that. Does the Human Rights Act normalise discrimination? Does consumer law normalise shonky trade practices? Well, my bill certainly decriminalises—that means specific law targeted on clear criminalities and exposure to all of the general laws. The result is that an activity that is currently regulated by police-driven systems will instead be regulated by the range of State agencies that most small businesses have to contend with; plus there will be distinct laws on such varied issues as safer sex practices, signage, and age limit. Is that normalising? This bill specifically makes no moral judgment about prostitution, any more than other laws on consensual adult activity seek to pass judgment. Some have argued that this bill was amended at the select committee in ways that effectively increased the level of acceptance of prostitution. That is simply not true. Amendments agreed to relate to penalties, which were increased, to the establishment of a review committee, and to some very specific scenarios brought to the attention of the committee, particularly banning Work and Income from referring people to sex work.

The arrogance of some lines of argument we have had relating to this bill are a little staggering. Some claim that this bill will not offer any help to sex workers. By implication they claim they know more about what it is like to be a sex worker than do members of the Prostitutes Collective. If this bill passes in its present form, sex workers will benefit in the following ways: their work environments will improve in accordance with an occupational safety and health code, which could not be produced under the current law; they will be less constrained in forming collectives, or similar worker-run businesses—currently such businesses run as escort agencies and are outside the law; they will be able to be employed under employment contracts, which is impossible under current law; they will be able to withdraw from an implied contract with a client without fear of a sanction from the operator of the prostitution business; operators who use coercive behaviour against their sex workers will face higher penalties than they do now;if they are street workers they will be able to use the services of a safe house as a location for sexual activity with their client rather than in a street or the back of a car—such a house would now breach a number of current laws; if they are street workers they will no longer be in danger of arrest for soliciting offences, and thus will not have a prostitution related conviction—such a conviction makes obtaining a mortgage or travel to Australia or the USA virtually impossible; and they will also be served by a more comprehensive range of agencies that are designed to help them to exit from prostitution.

The honourable member who spoke before me spoke of a world of degradation and of prostitution, as treated in this bill, as an abomination against society. I have just identified a list of positive interventions to help people who are suffering in our society and to create balance in law. It is about higher ground, not about the comments made by that previous member. We have 21 amendments to decide on at the end of this Committee stage. Some enhance the bill, some cause minor damage to it, and some, in my view, would cripple the legislation, and I reserve my right as sponsor of the bill to take more calls as we focus on those issues.