THERE IS STILL no sign of a review into Ireland’s sex work legislation more than three years after it was first due to be published.

The Department of Justice has “considered the best options to conclude the review in a timely and thorough” manner, a spokesperson told The Journal.

It’s expected that Justice Minister Helen McEntee “will be in a position to decide on the next steps in the near future so that the review can be completed without any further undue delay”, they added.

However, no exact timeline was given.

The Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act was contentious when it came into effect in 2017.

The Sex Workers Alliance of Ireland (SWAI) was among those critical of the fact the legislation criminalised the purchase of sex. The alliance has long called for the decriminalisation of sex work.

The Government promised to carry out a review of the 2017 Act within three years.

In summer 2021 solicitor Maura Butler SC was tasked with overseeing this review. She was originally due to publish her report within three months.

However, repeated delays occurred including Butler being tasked with overseeing a separate review into murder-suicides following the death of that review’s original lead Norah Gibbons.

In July 2023, Justice Minister Helen McEntee told the Dáil her department and Butler had “mutually agreed” that it wasn’t possible for her to finish the review due to her workload in other areas.

At the time McEntee said that Butler had been “very helpful… in making available to my department the documentation and the research” done to date.

The minister said her department would “advertise shortly to commission a new person to complete the review”, noting that “a huge body of work” had been completed at that point.

“It is just the writing up of a report,” she added.

Calls for decriminalisation

The 2017 Act made paying for sexual services a criminal offence. Previously, paying for sexual services was only criminal if the person selling sex was either a victim of trafficking or a minor.

Under this law it is not an offence to receive money in exchange for sexual services. However, it is against the law to advertise such services.

The Department’s spokesperson said “a key purpose” of the 2017 legislation “was to provide additional protection to persons involved in prostitution, especially vulnerable persons and victims of human trafficking”.

“Given that the goal of the legislation is to protect vulnerable persons, the review will include consideration of whether further measures are needed to strengthen protection for persons who engage in sexual activity for payment.”

The SWAI has been critical of the delays in the review being published and is calling for full decriminalisation of sex work, saying the current model puts sex workers at risk.

Linda Kavanagh, spokesperson for the SWAI, told The Journal that many sex workers would prefer to work with others for safety reasons but can’t because, under the current law, this could be classed as a brothel.

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“Sex workers are forced to work alone to work legally. The vast majority of sex workers want to work with someone else for safety but the way the brothel-keeping law is written means they can’t.

I cannot express the marginalisation and the isolation they feel because they are forced to work alone.

“We’re advocating for decriminalisation. It doesn’t mean that trafficking or exploitation would be derciminalised, all of that is still criminalised.

“But consensual transactional sex is decriminalised, and it means that sex workers are recognised as workers and they get workers’ rights.”

Kavanagh added that if sex work was decriminalised, sex workers would feel “much more able” to contact gardaí if they are the victims of assault, theft or other crimes.

A spokesperson for An Garda Síochána said the organisation will treat any report of a crime against a sex worker “very seriously and sensitively – whether it is assault, theft or criminality of other kind”.

They said AGS – through the Organised Prostitution Investigation Unit (OPIU), the Garda National Protective Services Bureau, and local gardaí – has “extensive and widespread engagement” with sex workers. 

They added that gardaí also “carry out regular safeguarding checks on people involved in the sex trade”.

“These safeguarding checks are especially important so that gardaí can identify those who may be vulnerable or who may be being sexually exploited or trafficked. The OPIU is also cognisant of those who are working independently in the sex trade.”