Vulnerability and involvement in drug use and ... - Sex Work Europe

contribute to this study by relating their experiences working in the field. Although this
a p p roach had not been incorporated in the original study design, this opportunity was
discussed with the Home Office who encouraged pursuit of this issue. Three police
o fficers and three sex worker service providers were interviewed in depth about their
experiences and thoughts on services for drug-using sex workers and young people in
p a rt i c u l a r. These interviews were analysed together with data on service experience fro m
i n t e rviews with the main participant group. Conclusions on these issues are v e r y t e n t a t i v e
because of the low numbers of service provider participants involved and because there
was no specific re s e a rch question being pursued in these interviews. Rather, the
i n t e rviews were allowing professionals working with the study’s re s e a rch population to be
h e a rd. We highlight three key points which indicate a diversity of perspectives.
● A tension existed between explanations for involvement in sex work and dru g
use by professionals (‘entrapment’ and ‘evil people’) and part i c i p a n t s
( ‘ o p p o rtunity’). Police officers appeared to distinguish the activities of dru g
users and sex workers from the activities of drug sellers and ‘pimps’. Furt h e r, in
their descriptions of the diff e rences they conceptualised drug users as diff e re n t
individuals from drug dealers and sex workers as diff e rent individuals fro m
‘pimps’. They predicted inevitable decline for some individuals (‘spirals of
decline’) and described attributes of fixed ‘otherness’ (‘evil people’) amongst
the re s t .
● T h e re was a mismatch between ‘interventions’ and ‘the needs of sex workers’
expressed both by professionals working in the field and in local protocols. Local
protocols are often cut and paste jobs from each other and Working Together to
Safeguard Children Involved in Prostitution (Dept. of Health, 2000). Policies start
from ‘what to do when you find a young prostitute’. There was no advice found in
these on how to discover young prostitutes and very little evidence that they are
being looked for.
● The development and implementation of local protocols needs further study.
Researchers attempted to obtain copies of local protocols on child prostitution as
an exercise in discovering how readily available these were and how widely
service providers were aware of their existence. The efforts to get copies of these
often involved ‘being given the run-around’. Frequently, service providers stated
that this was ‘someone else’s responsibility’ or they directed the query elsewhere.
Evidence of the extent of integration of services to tackle young people’s dru g
problems is scant. On the face of it, however, awareness of local protocols for
youth involved in prostitution does not appear to be widespread.
Services
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