But Aotearoa New Zealand Sex Workers’ Collective thinks the area should be larger, saying a restrictive and hostile bylaw will not make the job safer.
A Queenstown Lakes District Council hearings panel yesterday recommended the "middle ground" option relating to brothels in the Queenstown and Wānaka CBD, despite it not being supported by submitters.
Councillors Cody Tucker (chairman), Melissa White and Gavin Bartlett heard submissions on the draft Brothel Control Bylaw — 21 years to the day the Prostitution Reform Act was passed in New Zealand, by a margin of one.
The draft bylaw consulted on proposals to increase the permitted activities, allowing for more opportunities for brothel activity and address concerns the district’s bylaw was overly restrictive.
In a report to the panel, policy manager Carrie Williams said the challenge was to balance community sensitivity to sex work with the council’s legal obligations.
However, the majority of the 20 submissions received — 13 of which came from outside the district — favoured the status quo, or no expansion of the boundaries.
Speaking to the panel in support of her submission yesterday, Dame Catherine Healy of NZPC: Aotearoa New Zealand Sex Workers’ Collective said she would like to think at the heart of the debate — from all sides — was the rights, safety, health and wellbeing of sex workers.
She said there were already several sex workers in the district in breach of the bylaw.
Dame Catherine sought for the council to become "more liberal in its approach", to enable sex workers to be self-governing.
"It’s really important that sex workers aren’t cut off from reporting those coercive situations, but having a bylaw that’s so restrictive and hostile to sex workers doesn’t mean that you’re going to get rid of those coercive situations," Dame Catherine said.
"It does mean you lock sex workers down and prevent them from coming forward."
However, Suffragettes NZ representative Jennifer Scott was opposed to any extension to the permitted areas, because that would inevitably lead to creep into residential areas.
"The more men buy sex, more brothels get set up, they need more girls to fill the brothels and ... the sex traffickers move in to fill the gap.
"By going ahead with this bylaw ... in a once quiet and family-friendly town, you’re not only opening the door to human trafficking, but also you’ll be taking revenue from the businesses, through rates, from the selling of women’s bodies, therefore, the council will be wholly responsible for any harm placed on to women and children in the local area."
She contended the term "sex work" was "used to disguise the truth of the operation".
"This is not work, not labour, it’s abuse."
Ally-Marie Diamond, of Wahine Toa Rising Charitable Trust, also opposed any changes that would allow the extension of the sex trade in the district, which would enable "sex trafficking and sex tourism".
"Regardless of how many brothels are operating in your district currently, expanding areas where brothels can operate, and permitting them to operate at or below ground level will only increase opportunities for trafficking and exploitation, harming individuals and the community — a harm that the QLDC itself acknowledges, but does nothing to prevent or remediate."
Ultimately the panel agreed to recommend a slight expansion to the permitted activity areas, amend the new purpose provision, to remove a reference to meeting "market demand for services", and remove a restriction to enable brothels to be located below ground level, but retain the restriction on brothels at street level.
The council is expected to consider the recommendation at its meeting on August 1.
