New Zealand

Mindy Ngo

With examples from a 2003 New Zealand prostitution law, this article discusses the logical inconsistencies in laws sponsoring prostitution and includes evidence for the physical, emotional, and social harms of prostitution. These harms are not decreased by legalization or decriminalization. The article addresses the confusion caused by organizations that oppose trafficking but at the same time promote prostitution as a justifiable form of labor for poor women. The failure of condom distribution/harm reduction programs to protect women in prostitution from rape, sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), and HIV is discussed. The success of such programs in obtaining funding and in promoting prostitution as sex work is also discussed.

o New Zealand legalized prostitution in May, 2003 o The purpose of this Act is to decriminalize prostitution (while not endorsing or morally sanctioning prostitution or its use) and to create a framework that(a)safeguards the human rights of sex workers and protects them from exploitation: (b)promotes the welfare and occupational health and safety of sex workers: (c)is conducive to public health: (d)prohibits the use in prostitution of persons under 18 years of age: (e)implements certain other related reforms. Prostitution Reform Act of 2003

DIFFERENCE? Total in 2000 = 3,293 versus 3,016 in 2010 or 2,912 in 2009

Women, especially M ori women, were significantly more likely than men to say they had experienced sexual interference or sexual assault at some time in their lives. Women, especially young women, were much more likely than men to say they had experienced sexual interference or sexual assault in 2000. Fourteen percent of women said that they had experienced sexual victimisation before the age of 17. For some of these women, this had occurred at a very young age. Sexual victimisation is often experienced more than once, even within a relatively short period of time. Almost all victims saying they had been sexually interfered with or sexually assaulted said the offender was male and most said that they already knew their offender(s). Almost half of the victims saying they had been sexually interfered with or sexually assaulted said they were 'very much' or 'quite a lot' affected by their most recent experience. More than two-fifths of the victims saying they had been sexually interfered with or sexually assaulted viewed what they had experienced as a crime. However, slightly over half saw it as wrong but not a crime, or as just something which happened.

 Australian Bureau of Statistics. (1979). General Social Survey: Crime Victims. Australian Bureau of Statistics, Canberra. Australian Bureau of Statistics. (1996). Women's Safety Survey 1996. Australian Bureau of Statistics, Canberra. Australian Bureau of Statistics. (1999). Crime and Safety Australia 1998. Australian Bureau of Statistics, Canberra. Young, W., Morris, A., Cameron, N. and Haslett, S. (1997). The New Zealand National Survey of Crime Victims 1996. Department of Justice, Wellington.

Created dummy variables 1; 1994-2003 0; 2004-2010

R-squared- 32.6% of the sexual crime rates are explained by the dates

.017 p-value; statistically significant

PostLegalization sexual crime rates decreased by 279.486

R-squared- 6.1% of the sexual crime rates are explained by the dates

.338 p-value; NOT statistically significant

PostLegalization murder rates increased by 7.929