PRESS NOTICE FROM ACTION ON RIGHTS FOR CHILDREN
October 5th 2004
PROSECUTION THREAT STOPS ABUSED CHILDREN GETTING HELP
Action on Rights for Children (ARCH), the children’s campaign group, is hoping that an amendment to the Children Bill will finally remove criminal liability from child prostitutes. Currently anyone over 10 can be prosecuted under the Street Offences Act 1959, and although the Crown Prosecution Service instructs that child prostitutes should be treated as victims of abuse, the Government has so far resisted changes to the law.
Last year, the Home Secretary promised that the new Sexual Offences Act would ‘decriminalise’ children involved in prostitution, but this was not the case, and an amendment to the Street Offences Act tabled by Hilton Dawson MP was dropped after promises that the matter would be dealt with in a forthcoming review of street offences. That review has recently been published - but yet again the Government has made it clear that it doesn’t want to remove the threat of prosecution from child prostitutes.
Hilton Dawson has again tabled an amendment, this time in the Children Bill, to restrict the Street Offences Act to over-18s.
ARCH’s Terri Dowty says: “Children don’t choose to become prostitutes. They are tricked into it when they are too young to understand, or exploited when they are at their most desperate and vulnerable. Many children suffer threats, rape and beatings from the pimps who control them. Some are given addictive drugs and then forced to keep working for their next ‘fix’.
“It is vital that children know that they won’t be in any trouble if they ask for help, but so long as they run any risk of prosecution, they are trapped in a dreadful situation. A year ago, the Home Secretary promised that child prostitution would no longer be a criminal offence, but that was simply untrue. We call upon the Government to keep its word and remove criminal liability from these children as a matter of urgency.”
NOTES TO EDITORS:
CONTACT: Terri Dowty Archrights@aol.com
ARCH Office Tel: 020 8558 9317
1) Currently anyone 10
or over can be prosecuted for loitering or soliciting for the purposes of
prostitution (section 1(1) of the Street Offences Act 1959 (c.57))
2) excerpt from Hansard – Sexual Offences Bill - in which the Home Secretary
stated that child prostitution would no longer be a criminal offence:
[Commons Hansard 15th July 2003 column 186
<http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200203/cmhansrd/vo030715/debtext/30715-15.htm#30715-15_spnew0>]
3) Excerpt from Hansard – Sexual Offences Bill - in response to Hilton Dawson’s
amendment
[Commons Hansard 18
September 2003 column 275
<http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200203/cmstand/b/st030918/am/30918s09.htm>]
4) Street Offences review:
"Paying the
Price" in July. See page 68 re "compelling arguments" for keeping loitering
or soliciting as a criminal offence in respect of those under 18 to "underline
the message that prostitution involving children and young people is wholly
unacceptable."