Miss Charlie Daniels

KERB CRAWL CRACKDOWN

I was once a street girl, I plied my trade outside the now long-gone Jessops maternity hospital in Sheffield when I was just 18. Later on I worked at every level of the industry and have now written a book about my experiences (Priceless). I worked on the government strategy Paying The Price and alongside others in many agencies stated my own views based on my own experience. I'm in a fairly unique position - I’m not some do-gooder, politician or academic - I’ve been there & done that, luckily I survived to tell the tale - but more than one of my friends didn't... Two years ago I also sat on the trial of a girl who was murdered and dismembered - something I will never forget. I've listened to heads of vice, charities who work with girls and the more I hear the more I realise just how complex tackling the issues is.

The latest kerb-crawler strategy is a double edged sword to me; on the one hand I have no sympathy for street clients - there are other indoor alternative ways of accessing the industry and their reasons for kerb crawling are things like

a cheap thrill psychologically associated with dogging

to find workers who are so desperate they may not use condoms

to save money

seeking underage girls

or in some cases an even more sinister, ulterior motive

But on the other hand such drastic measures drive the girls to work in even more dangerous places to avoid arrest. The girls who work outside, as opposed to the indoor workers are already vulnerable and at the desperation end of the market where very serious grass root issues that need dealing with such as benefits, housing, immigration, addiction exist. There are already over 60 unsolved crimes of sex workers missing or murdered in the last decade. There has also been increased incidents of clients on foot taking girls to their cars a practice that brings its own set of dangers.

In one area of the UK this method was tried and tested and scrapped one of the ethnic communities was found more pro-active than others - even though this was a fact based on arrests and not race - its elders made a complaint that there was victimisation going on! Another mad example of our overly sensitive PC state nonsense.

Surely there has to be a way to combine deterring clients and protecting the girls - without compromising on British family values, no one asks society to find prostitution morally acceptable but we need to move it indoors & to a point where we can monitor it more - otherwise it will always attract organised crime and the seedier elements to it.