A Dundee survivor of human trafficking has demanded the Scottish Government outlaw online pimping websites where women are sold online for sex.
Diane Martin CBE, who was exploited in prostitution as a teen, has called for controversial Adult Service Websites (ASWs) to be made illegal as part of the A Model for Scotland campaign.
Online pimping websites, such as Vivastreet, advertise hundreds of women across Scotland for sex – many of these women are the victims of human trafficking.
Diane, chairwoman of A Model for Scotland, told The Courier: “Profiteers, pimps and organised crime groups use these websites to create a mainstream market to sell women for sex.
‘Trafficking and pimping is big business’
“Trafficking and pimping is big business, and these websites incentivise that, reward it and make it easy.
“They are a key part of the supply chain connecting traffickers with sex buyers and they facilitate the expansion of commercial sexual exploitation and the misery, violence and devastation that comes with it.
“I believe that despite their protestations, they know what they are a part of, but continue because just like the pimps and traffickers, profit is the bottom line.”
Earlier this year The Courier carried out our own The Exploited investigation into ASWs and found hundreds of women for sale across Tayside and Fife.
On Wednesday, campaigners will demand such sites are made illegal.
Highlands and Islands MSP Rhoda Grant, convener of the Cross-Party Group on Commercial Sexual Exploitation, says the Scottish Government must crack down on the lucrative pimping sites.
‘Online catalogue of women’
“If the Scottish Government wants to challenge men’s demand for prostitution, they will have to combat the pimping websites that these men use to find women to sexually exploit,” she said.
“Pimping websites provide an online catalogue of women for men to choose from.
“They enable abusive men to easily and quickly select and ‘order’ a woman to sexually exploit – while remaining completely anonymous in the process.”
The MSP called ASWs ” a gift to sex traffickers” and claimed Scotland’s laws against sexual exploitation were “not fit for the 21st century”.
“Websites advertising women for prostitution in Scotland are getting rich from facilitating sex trafficking – and it is an absolute scandal that they are able to do this with impunity,” said Ms Grant.
The Nordic Model for prostitution
A Model for Scotland wants to change prostitution laws in Scotland to shift the criminalisation from females onto buyers.
The campaign looks to Sweden and the Nordic Model which has been in place for more than 20 years and has significantly changed attitudes towards sex buying.
Countries already following a version of the Nordic Model include Norway, Iceland, Ireland and France.
France and the United States have outlawed ASWs since 2018.
Bronagh Andrew, operations manager at TARA – an organisation providing support to victims of sex trafficking in Scotland – backs the change in laws stating the sites are used by “ruthless criminals”.
She said: “The stark reality is trafficked women are advertised daily on these websites.
“Some women are coerced into placing these adverts by their traffickers but for many others they simply do not know how or where they are advertised online.
“Week after week we see and hear of the devastating impact this has on women who are treated as a commodity to generate profit.”
