Prostitution in New Zealand

As usual, it seems, New Zealand has followed a trend only to find that everyone else is starting to change their mind....

Family First NZ says that the Auckland police admission that underage prostitution is on the increase in the city is yet more evidence that the National government must immediately repeal the flawed prostitution law. “This latest review has found girls as young as 12 prostituting themselves in central Auckland, and a similar investigation in South Auckland in 2008 found 16 teenagers aged between 13 and 16 prostituting themselves on the streets of South Auckland,” says Bob McCoskrie, National Director of Family First NZ.

“Politicians who voted for this ideologically flawed bill which decriminalised prostitution should hang their heads in shame as they have normalized the behaviour amongst at-risk teenagers. They have also condemned more men and women to this destructive industry. Prostitution is not the oldest profession – it is the oldest oppression.

And in an interesting reversal of a trend:

Bulgaria is only the latest European country to shift its approach to prostitution. Finland last year made it illegal to buy sex from women brought in by traffickers, and Norway is on the verge of imposing an outright ban on purchasing sex. Even in Amsterdam, the city government has proposed shutting down more than a quarter of the famed storefront brothels in the red-light district. And in the Czech Republic and the three Baltic republics, attempts at legalization similar to the Bulgarian one have been turned back.