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Taiwan lawmakers bid to decriminalise prostitution

Ruling party lawmakers in Taiwan vowed to press ahead with attempts to decriminalise prostitution after winning enough backing Sunday to introduce a bill to parliament.

Their proposal aims to amend the existing law under which prostitutes are punished but their clients are not.

Prostitutes face detention of three days or a fine of up to 30,000 Taiwan dollars (888 US) if they are caught providing sex services.

“Since prostitution is illegal, sex workers were often abused, and what’s more, when this happened, they dared not turn to police for help,” said Cheng Li-wen, the legislator behind the proposal.

The proposal has been endorsed by more than 10 legislators from the ruling party, meaning it has passed the threshold for becoming a bill and would be discussed on the parliamentary floor, the United Daily News said.

Opponents claimed that legalising the domestic sex industry would result in increased sex abuse in the country.

However, Wang Fang-ping, a leading advocate for the rights of sex workers, hailed what she called “a small step forward” in decriminalising prostitution.

While there is no official estimate of the scale of Taiwan’s sex industry, Wang said up to 800,000 people may be involved, with estimated annual revenue of at least 60 billion Taiwan dollars.

There are about 30 prostitutes licensed by the government nationwide under laws enacted in 1957. Governments have stopped issuing new licences, allowing existing permits to be phased out.

But Wang said phasing out licences had forced prostitutes underground. “In many cases, we could see that police and corrupt officials used the loopholes to take hefty bribes from the huge underground business,” she said.