New Government legislation on human trafficking should criminalise people who buy sex and protect vulnerable sex workers, a women's group urged yesterday.
Ruhama, an organisation working with women involved in prostitution in Ireland, said the State must send out a message that human trafficking and the purchasing of women for sex is a crime.
The organisation said politicians should examine rulings made in Sweden nine years ago before it passes the Criminal Law (Human Trafficking) Bill, which is expected to be enacted in the upcoming Dáil session.
In 1999 Sweden introduced legislation criminalising the purchase and decriminalising the selling of sex, which has seen a drop in the number of women involved in prostitution.
Geraldine Rowley of Ruhama said: "After drugs and arms, human trafficking is the third largest area of criminal activity. Ireland needs to take a stand against organised crime and having the correct legislation in place is crucial to achieving this."
Ruhama yesterday welcomed the former head of Swedish Social Services Prostitution Centre, Agneta Bucknell, to discuss her country's efforts to combat the problems of human trafficking and prostitution.
Ms Bucknell estimates that since the legislation was enacted in 1999, street prostitution is now 60 per cent of what it was.
She also said the number of women being trafficked into the country to join the sex industry had decreased to between 400 and 600 annually.
The legislation states people found buying sex can be sentenced to up to six months in prison or be fined. Some 250 men who were found soliciting sex have been prosecuted so far.
Ms Bucknell said the Irish Government has "a responsibility to protect the vulnerable and abused women" working in the sex industry and "it will fail in its efforts to combat criminals involved in trafficking" if it does not criminalise it.
Ruhama said it is aware of more than 200 women trafficked into Ireland for the purpose of sexual exploitation between 2000 and 2006.
Almost three-quarters of these women arrived from Eastern Europe and more than one-fifth came from Africa.
Ms Rowley said this figure was only "the tip of the iceberg". She believes that 90 per cent of the women involved in the sex industry are foreign nationals, many of whom have poor English and little access to support services.
She added that the number of trafficked women arriving in Ireland to work in prostitution outside Dublin grew from 25 per cent in 2005 to 40 per cent in 2006. "This demonstrates the sex industry in Ireland is lucrative and booming.
"Traffickers and pimps are operating with impunity and when we get legislation on the matter we need a Garda unit to deal with the crime.
"There is a growing normalisation of the sex industry in Ireland and it is entering the entertainment sector . . . We need the best legislation possible and a lot could be learned from this Swedish Bill," Ms Rowley said.
