Introduction

As discussed in the previous chapter, the successful lobbying for change in how the sex industry was regulated in New Zealand culminated in a parliamentary vote on 25 June 2003 where the Prostitution Reform Act (PRA) was voted into law by 60 votes to 59 with one abstention. This chapter gives an overview of how sex work was regulated in New Zealand prior to 2003 before discussing the purpose of the PRA and how the specific aims were addressed in a section-by-section discussion of the Act.

Regulation of sex work in New Zealand prior to 2003

Prior to 2003, sex work in New Zealand was not illegal but all related activities were criminalised through the invocation of clauses of a number of existing Acts. Section 26 of the 1981 Summary Offences Act made it an offence for a sex worker to offer sex for money in a public place:

However, clients were not criminalised, as it was not an offence to pay or to offer to pay for sex. A double standard existed, therefore, as a sex worker could be convicted of soliciting and incur a criminal record, while, in the eyes of the law, the client had committed no offence.

Section 147 of the 1961 Crimes Act made it an offence to keep or manage a brothel.

(1) Everyone is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years who–

• (a) Keeps or manages, or acts or assists in the management of any brothel; or

• (b) Being the tenant, lessee, or occupier of any premises, or any part thereof to be used as a brothel; or

• (c) Being the lessor or landlord of any premises, or the agent of the lessor or landlord, lets the premises or any part thereof with the knowledge that premises are to be used as a brothel, or that some part thereof is to be so used, or is wilfully a party to the continued use of the premises or any part thereof as a brothel.

(2) In this section, the term ‘brothel’ means any house, room, set of rooms, or place of any kind whatever used for the purposes of prostitution, whether by one woman or more.