Congratulations to the many Sisters of Mercy who sent in a personal email to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on the upcoming review of legislation on prostitution! This is an important and significant step in the consultation process announced by Alan Shatter, the Minister for Justice. Equality and Defence. At the moment it is not illegal in Ireland to buy or sell sex.

You might like to know that we also contributed to two other submissions. One was from APT (Act to Prevent Trafficking), www.aptireland.org in which we stated: “We believe that demand is the primary driving force behind sex trafficking. The way in which the state addresses the legal status of prostitution will have an enormous impact on efforts to curb trafficking. For this reason we recommend that the purchase of sex be criminalised.”

APT (Act to Prevent Trafficking) is an inter-Congregational group of women and men working to end human trafficking, with a particular focus on those trafficked for sexual exploitation. The full text of the APT submission is added below.

Sheila O’Gorman rsm (far right) at Dail Eireann
with members of the ‘Turn off the red light’ campaign

Did you know that, as members of APT we are partners in the Turn Off the Red Light Campaign? www.turnofftheredlight.ie This is a campaign of 56 organisations, including trade unions, which seeks to end prostitution and trafficking in Ireland. To launch this submission Turn Off the Red Light partners and friends met in front of Dail Eireann where we released 56 Red Balloons to symbolise the of release of people trapped in prostitution and trafficking.

Sisters of Mercy also continue to be supporters of Ruhama, www.ruhama.ie as we have been since it began some twenty years ago.

Proposed changes to the laws on prostitution and human trafficking in Northern Ireland are due to go out to public consultation soon.

Click here to read the APT submission to the Joint Oireachtas Committee

 

Sheila O’Gorman rsm
Congregation