There's too much life on the streets

The man who polices Bradford's notorious red-light district has asked the Government to consider legalising brothels. Steve Boggan joined the prostitutes on his patch and, with John Arlidge (below), looks at Edinburgh's new approach to an old problem

As the interior of the Audi became bathed in the headlights of the unmarked police car, it looked as if only one person was inside. Then a girl's head came into view.

"Hello boys," she said to the men of Bradford's Toller Lane vice squad. And, having encountered her time and again, they said hello back.

Deborah (not her real name) straightened her skirt and chatted a while with constables Mark Boyle and Derek Owen, unaware that her lipstick was smeared. They treated her with respect and she giggled at the misfortune of her punters before teetering off into the night.

"That's the easiest 40 quid she'll make tonight," said Boyle, referring to the time-honoured tradition of cash up front, in this case for no services rendered.

An attractive woman in her mid-twenties, Deborah appeared to regard the whole terrifying business in which she was engaged as a huge joke.

"You can take pictures of me," she said. "But only from behind." And she giggled again.

Deborah did not want to talk about the suggestion by Peter Corkindale, head of Bradford's vice squad, that the Government should look at ways of getting prostitution off the streets - including the introduction of licensed, regulated and well organised brothels.

Fifteen minutes earlier, however, on a corner off Thornton Road, her younger sister, Sandra, displayed no such reticence. Without a trace of irony, the 19-year-old said: "Well, it would definitely help to get these young kids off the streets.

"It's terrible. You see them as young as 12 and 13 now. They just don't care. You get a lot of them coming out of [local authority] homes, working for a few hours and then going back."

Her concern is not entirely altruistic; the younger girls undercut the older ones, charging as little as pounds 5 for sex compared with pounds 20 and, according to one officer, consenting to anal sex for as little as pounds 10.

The increase of under-age children on the streets is one of the reasons for Mr Corkindale's concern. He and his officers have noticed a steady rise in child prostitution, which he believes could be stemmed if prostitutes were allowed to work legally from licensed premises.

"If there was legislation that put down ground rules then that would make our job easier," he said. "If there was a brothel using under-age girls, we could threaten the licence holder with closure and prison.

"When bookmakers were legalised there was a huge outcry, but that has been taken from back alleys and pubs to organised betting shops and the problems have gone.

"If women were allowed to work for themselves from licensed brothels, paying the owners a rental fee but keeping the rest for themselves, the threat from pimps would be removed and the kerb crawling that goes on in residential areas would become unnecessary."

Mr Corkindale argues that regulation would make life safer for prostitutes - removing the need for pimps as protectors - and for clients, who are often set up and robbed by prostitutes and their pimps but who seldom complain to the police.

All but one of the prostitutes we spoke to agreed with him. At 11pm on the corner of City Road and Thornton Road, Susan, a 24-year-old single mother dressed in sandals and a short white skirt, shivered as she smiled at passing drivers.

"I would certainly like to work indoors," she said. "I've only been doing this a few weeks and I haven't had any scrapes yet, but I expect I will. The thought of it terrifies me.

"Last week, one of my friends was picked up by a bloke and driven behind a Mercedes showroom. When he stopped, one of his mates got out of the boot. They beat her up and took all her money.

"I think brothels would cut down on the threat of violence and on child prostitution. All the guys I've picked up so far don't want to come here. They don't want to kerb crawl and, if they want to see you again, they always arrange it at another spot.

"If there were brothels, they would rather go there. I don't think there would be any punters out here for the under-age girls to pick up."

Although Bradford has only 50 or so known street prostitutes, it has developed a reputation as one of the country's worst areas for the sale of sex. It was the site chosen for the filming of Band of Gold, a television drama based on the city's sex industry.

Last April, residents in the Lumb Lane area of Manningham formed vigilante groups, driving kerb crawlers and prostitutes out of the area. The girls have re-grouped in the Sunbridge Road/Thornton Road area of the city, which is more commercial and less residential.

The problems, and the vigilantism that still continues, have prompted the city council, church leaders and the police to meet regularly to debate the situation. It would appear that their examination of the facts is leading them to recommend - and possibly adopt - a more liberal approach.

Jack Womersley, chairman of Bradford City Council's Community Safety Board, has backed Mr Corkindale.

"If the Government ... introduced a Bill legalising prostitution, there would be an outcry initially," he said. "But it would produce the legislation necessary to break the cycle of people getting children on drugs and then putting them on to the street to work as prostitutes. The problem is not going to go away, but it can be regulated and made safer. It isn't called the oldest profession in the world for nothing."

'The sex industry is not going to go away, so we compromise'

There has been talk of legalising, decriminalising, tolerating and simply ignoring prostitution for many years and a number of towns and cities - Edinburgh, Bristol, Birmingham - have been linked prominently with reform.

Until now, however, only Edinburgh has actively taken steps to liberalise the profession - and even these measures are operated by police on an unofficial basis.

There was talk in Birmingham and Bristol last year of introducing tolerance zones that could be regulated. These would be away from residential areas and would include massage parlours and saunas where a blind eye was turned to prostitution. In turn, prostitutes would be taken off the streets.

Neither council has grasped the nettle - the subject is still a political minefield - but many believe that it is only a matter of time before liberalisation becomes the trend.

The most successful working scheme is undoubtedly Edinburgh's, where the district council's licensing committee has licensed some 20 saunas and massage parlours known to sell sex. The licences, costing pounds 500, are awarded only after hygiene and safety checks by environmental health officials.

This does not mean the premises are licensed brothels - no council has the power to license that which legislation deems illegal - but it does bring them under some control, ensuring they are clean and that clients have access to showers, clean towels and so on. It also means that officials from the local health authority have direct access for the first time to working prostitutes, who are given condoms and advice on safe sex and related health matters.

"Even where we suspect sexual services are being offered, our environmental health officials have no powers to prosecute," said a spokeswoman for Edinburgh District Council. "However, we can act as professional witnesses and we will gather evidence and submit it to the police force and the procurator fiscal.

"Applications for entertainment licences have to be made on an annual basis, so if any premises stepped out of line we could refuse to renew their licences. We have been running the scheme since 1984 and so far not one has been closed down."

Since word spread of the relaxed attitude to the "brothels" street prostitution has all but disappeared in the old problem areas of Leith Walk, Haymarket and Rose Street, the spokeswoman said.

When interviewed last year, Dickie Alexander, convener of the licensing committee, said: "We know what they get up to but we go ahead and license them all the same because we know that if we do not, the trade will simply go elsewhere. The sex industry is not going to go away, so we have decided to reach a compromise which enables us to safeguard the public, the punters and the girls.''

The council describes the police's attitude as "softly, softly" but the police will not formally admit to turning a blind eye.

Senior officers at Lothian and Borders Police know that massage parlours and saunas sell sex, and publicly they insist they uphold the law. Last year Tom Wood, assistant chief constable, told the Independent: "We're not in the dark. We know what goes on and as far as our powers go, we maintain the law.''

Privately, however, other officers say that unlike their colleagues in other forces in Scotland and south of the border, they tolerate the illegal brothels.

One detective said: "The public are much more worried about housebreaking, car crime and even things like messy streets than they are about the goings- on in the Finger-tip Massage Parlour at the end of the road.

"We have limited resources, and provided the parlours do not become the focus for drug dealing or other serious criminal activity, we are prepared to let them operate.

"We don't condone prostitution, any more than we condone the existence of brothels, but we would rather have it licensed and indoors than unregulated and on the streets.

"If that is seen as enlightened policing, then so be it. I'd prefer to call it the least-bad solution to an inevitable problem.''