Press statement from Maggie's, Stella and POWER.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE. Le français suivra...

May 2, 2013 -- Supreme Court Justice Richard Wagner has denied several prominent sex worker groups the opportunity to intervene in the Bedford v. Canada appeal, to be heard at the Supreme Court of Canada on June 13th, 2013. 

The constitutional challenge to the prostitution laws could strike down laws that have documented direct and negative impact on the lives and working conditions of sex workers, bosses, security people and other third parties as well as the lives of sex workers’ clients and partners.

NSWP Statement

NSWP condemns the recent decision by the Scottish Trades Union Congress (STUC) to cancel their agreement with Sex Worker Open University (SWOU) to provide a venue for the upcoming ‘Sex Workers’ Rights and Community Building Festival’.

The ‘Sex Workers’ Rights and Community Building Festival’ brings together sex workers and allies from across the world and has attracted worldwide attention and public interest. It provides opportunities for both sex workers and other experts to share ideas and experiences, organise for sex workers’ rights, and strategise around resisting harmful laws and policies. The decision to organise this festival in Scotland is extremely timely in light of recent attempts to criminalise those who purchase sexual services (known as the ‘Swedish Model’). This approach is one that has been criticised heavily by NSWP and our members as it negatively impacts upon the health and human rights of sex workers. 

Sex work is recognised as informal labour by International Labour Organisation and sex workers are protected under ILO Recommendation 200[1]. NSWP regrets and condemns the decision of STUC to take an approach to sex workers' rights that sits in contradiction to the recommendations of the ILO. This position is a clear dismissal of sex workers as deserving of trade union support and undermines their fundamental human right to organise and unionise.

In a statement the STUC claimed their decision was taken because the title of the event diametrically contradicts the STUC position – and yet the title of the event to have been held in the STUC building is ‘Looking at Laws and Policies that Impact on Sex Workers and Strategies for Resistance and Change.’, not as claimed “The Scottish Context: Opposing Criminalisation of Clients.”, which is the topic of one presentation by SCOT-PEP representing Scottish sex workers perspectives.  The STUC decision clearly represents an attempt to stifle the voices of sex workers and evidence-based debate on the current discourse in Scotland and beyond. It should also be noted that the STUC did not refuse to host this event but cancelled the booking at very short notice after publicity materials had been produced and distributed, at significant cost to a poorly-resourced sex worker rights movement.

NSWP urge the STUC to review their position in relation to supporting sex workers to organise, rather than be part of the system that oppresses sex workers. Sex work is work and sex workers must be afforded the same labour rights as any other workers. Any political perspective or legal framework that refuses to acknowledge this violates the human rights of sex workers.

NSWP has received short term funding from the Robert Carr Civil Society Network Fund (RCNF) and as part of the AIDS Fonds Bridging the Gaps programme to support the further development of NSWP communications and information management work, including the NSWP website, Facebook and Twitter; coordinating of NSWP resource development; drafting updates and reports; cataloguing and summarising externally produced resources and making them accessible through the NSWP website; developing and implementing a media strategy; and monitoring and evaluating the NSWP communications strategy.

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS:  Friday, 26 April 2013 @ 24.00.

NSWP has received funding to support the development of advocacy tools around rights based economic empowerment for sex workers. The first year of this three year project will focus on documenting the work done by sex worker led groups in Asia Pacific, the final two years of the programme will focus on building capacity and documenting of sex worker led responses in Africa.  APNSW are seeking to recruit a policy consultant to work with APNSW/NSWP members in developing economic empowerment advocacy tools that can be used at national, regional and global levels. This project is part of the Dutch collaboration Stepping Up, Stepping Out 2 funded by Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs until 31 December 2015.

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS:  Wednesday, 10 April 2013 @ 24.00.

Press release by STRASS, French Union of Sex Workers, in English and French: on the continuing campaign to repeal the offence of soliciting.

Communiqué de presse en français suit ci-dessous.

Two important events in the USA in the coming months:

The 8th San Francisco Sex Workers Film and Arts Festival - 18th to 26th May 2013

Deadline for entries has been extended until 15th March 2013.

This festival provides a forum for the accomplishments of sex worker film and video makers and to screen works about sex workers and the sex industries from around the world.

See the Festival website for full details on submissions on their website.

5th National Desiree Alliance Conference (The Audacity of Health: Sex Work, Health, and Politics)
July 14th to 19th, 2013 - Las Vegas, Nevada

The 2013 Desiree Alliance conference will focus on all forms of health in our lives and in our communities. 

The deadline for proposals from presenters has been extended until 1st April 2013. Visit the Desiree Alliance website for applications and instructions. Registration information and details of the limited number of scholarships is available here.

Addtional information on both events also available at A Kiss for Gabriela.

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(с благодарностью SWAN)

Further to the news story earlier this month is the offical statement from Tais Plus:

In October 2012 the Ministry of the Interior of Kyrgyzstan initiated a new draft bill to introduce an administrative offence for sex work.

Tais Plus with numerous allies – organisations and individuals – implemented a wide advocacy campaign to stop this initiative of the Ministry of the Interior. Financial support was provided by Urgent Action Fund. Bishkek Feminist Collective SQ provided incredible promotion of all our efforts against the new draft bill.

We mobilised sex workers, allies and organisations actively involved in sex work issues across the country. Public hearings with participation from civil society, government representatives and sex workers took place in 6 cities – in almost all regional centres.

The Petition calling to stop the draft bill was signed by more 1000 people via online and personal communication on the streets.  Face-to-face communication with parliament members and staff of the Ministry of the Interior took place during the official meeting of the Parliament Committee responsible for reviewing this draft bill.

Unbelievable support from Human Rights Watch and a consortium of international women and sex workers leadership organisations allowed us to show the people making the decision that our country and our issue is of concern to international human rights defenders.

Finally in February 2013 mass media posted the official news about withdrawing the draft bill on the punishment of sex work on Kyrgyzstan.

Thank you to all our supporters. It is not possible to make full list of them all here.

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(с благодарностью SWAN)

The Association of Hungarian Sex Workers (SZEXE) recently launched their advocacy film on the situtation for sex workers in Hungary.

SZEXE produced the video jointly with the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union (HCLU) to attempt to give an overview of Hungarian sex workers' situation and come up with recommendations for addressing the problems.The video was first presented on a press event on 17 December 2012 in Budapest. Support for this project was provided by Mama Cash.