Campaigners from more than 100 organisations claim that prostitute’s cautions trap women in sex work, prevent them from leaving abusive and violent relationships, and push them further into poverty.
While prostitution is not against the law in England and Wales, loitering or soliciting in a public place is. The police can give prostitute’s cautions to women they believe are loitering or soliciting as sex workers. Unlike other criminal cautions, sex workers don’t have to admit guilt and may not even be informed that they have received one.
In a joint letter organised by the English Collective of Prostitutes, the organisations say that the cautions are used against street sex workers who face “the greatest need, the most dangerous working conditions and the harshest and most punitive policing”.
Prostitute’s cautions are an unjust practice with a devastating impact
They say that “thousands of women in the UK have received a prostitute’s caution” over a two-year period, of which at least 800 are in the West Midlands.
As the campaigners point out, there is no right of appeal against a prostitute’s caution and they remain on a person’s record until the age of 100. They add: “There can be no justification for this unjust and draconian practice continuing.”
In November 2024, the English Collective of Prostitutes launched a report on the impact of the cautions on sex workers’ lives.It concluded that prostitute’s cautions have a devastating, lifelong impact on women’s lives. They put women at greater risk of exploitation and violence and can mean that sex workers lose custody of their children, are denied compensation and/or insurance and are deported or prevented from travelling. Having a prostitute’s caution on your record is an immense barrier to getting another job and leaving prostitution.
The impact of a prostitute’s caution is compounded for sex workers who are migrant, trans, women of colour, street workers and working class. Victims of rape, trafficking and other violence are deterred from reporting these crimes to the police by the threat of prosecution and of ending up with a prostitute’s caution on their record.
At the launch of the report in Parliament, one woman testified:
“At the age of 25, seven years into the industry, I tried to leave. I had three kids to feed and looked for a job in an office, but they did a DBS check and the cautions and convictions came up. So, I didn’t get the job. I had to carry on with prostitution.”
Widespread calls for a ban
There are widespread calls to end prostitute’s cautions, including in Parliament, in the House of Lords and in the London Assembly. Labour MP Nadia Whittome said: “It’s absolutely shocking. We’ve got an institutionally misogynistic police force that has been proven to have routinely failed”, and she added: “I think that all [prostitute’s] cautions – no matter somebody’s status as a sex worker, former or current – should be taken off their records. The government should be investing in anti-poverty measures so that fewer people feel that sex work is the best option in the circumstances that they’re in.”
Anger about the injustice of prostitute’s cautions is helping highlight the unjust criminalisation of sex workers generally, whether working on the street or together from premises. Women are forced to choose between keeping themselves safe and possible arrest, or avoiding a criminal record and putting themselves in danger.
Research confirms that criminalisation undermines safety: sex workers won’t come forward and report attacks for fear of being arrested themselves. One survey found that where arrests of sex workers and clients are high, only 5% of sex workers who experienced violence reported it to the police.
Addressing poverty is essential
Sex workers are mostly mothers working to support themselves and their children. Policies like the two-child limit, the benefit cap and benefit sanctions are proven to make women and children poorer. The Work and Pensions Committee found a direct link between the move to Universal Credit and an increase in “survival sex”.
Sex workers, like other women, want the power to refuse and escape from exploitation and violence. This is much harder to do if you are living hand to mouth and have children to feed and clothe.
In their letter to the Home Secretary, the organisations “ask that you take urgent action to implement our demands: abolish prostitute’s cautions, expunge criminal records which trap women in prostitution and target resources at sex workers to allow women to leave prostitution if and when they want. Women whose lives are being devastated by this injustice cannot wait any longer.”
The signatories to the letter include several big trade unions including Unite and the GMB, human rights organisations such as Liberty and dozens of sex workers’ groups.
