National Ugly Mugs: New Law to outlaw purchase of sex could lead to just 45 recorded crimes a year, Ash Regan admits

• Ash Regan’s claims of “epidemic” of abuse collapsed by admission that new laws could lead to just 45 recorded crimes each year – similar to numbers fined for littering
• Bill documents riddled with mathematical and factual errors – including claim it costs just 50p an hour to train police officers
• Pro-Nordic Model groups supporting Bill set to cash in with multimillion pound taxpayer windfall

Ash Regan’s claims that Scotland’s prostitution laws have led to an epidemic of violence against women have been ‘fatally undermined’ by her admission that outlawing the purchase of sex could lead to just 45 new crimes each year, according to campaigners.

Documents filed by Ms Regan alongside her Prostitution (Offences and Support) (Scotland) Bill show that the Alba MSP expects as few as 25 people to be prosecuted for buying sex each year under the new legislation, with “two cases at most” leading to prison sentences.

The tiny scale of offending sits in stark contrast to her claims that current prostitution laws have led to an “epidemic” of abuse and a national “system of exploitation”. Instead it puts the problem on a par with littering and fly-tipping, for which 47 people received police fines or warnings in 2022-3, the most recent year for which Scottish crime statistics are available.

Sex worker groups and international NGOs have warned that sex workers face high levels of violence, stigma and exploitation, but criminalising clients doesn’t remove those harms. Instead it pushes sex work further underground, making it harder to report abuse, easier to target people already at risk, and more dangerous for those with the least power.

A financial memorandum, filed by Regan at the Scottish Parliament, claims that the new law could cost a staggering £2.6m to enforce in its first year, falling to £2.2m annually thereafter. However, the document contains a number of mathematical and factual errors that suggest that the true cost would be several orders of magnitude higher.

This includes the risible assertion that it could cost just 50p an hour to train officers to enforce the new law, with Regan claiming that 17,000 Police Scotland officers would need just two hours of training in the legislation, which she says could cost as little as £17,000.

However, she acknowledges elsewhere in the document that Police Scotland accounts for its officers’ time at £79.50 per hour, making the true time cost of the training around £2.7m – without accounting for the price of procuring or developing training materials.

In other ‘scarcely believable’ costings, Ash Regan claims that the only costs involved in finding, pursuing and arresting a person purchasing sex would be six hours of a single police constable’s time, with no involvement from any senior officers.

In reality, police investigations involving indoor sex work are led by specially trained officers who review websites commonly used by sex workers to advertise. These officers work in coordination with specialist operational teams deployed on the ground, as well as dedicated victim support units.

After a person is arrested, Ms Regan claims that it would take just “an additional six hours of police work”, costing £477, for each case that proceeds to charge. However, the independent Policing Productivity Review, carried out last year for the UK Home Office, found that the average time officers spend building a case file is 63 hours.

The financial memorandum also shows how groups supporting the Bill would cash in with a multimillion pound taxpayer windfall if the new law is passed. Ms Regan suggests that the Trafficking Awareness Raising Alliance (TARA), an enthusiastic supporter of the Nordic Model, should have its public funding doubled to £1.24m per year, to provide support services to sex workers impacted by the new law, while other local groups should receive a further £1.25m per year of taxpayer funds.

Lynsey Walton, chief executive of National Ugly Mugs, the UK’s national sex worker safety charity, said: “Ash Regan is trying to have it both ways. In public she claims that the Nordic Model is needed to stop a national epidemic of abuse, but privately she admits that changing the law would lead to only a handful of cases a year – on a par with littering.

“As the UK’s national sex worker safety charity, NUM works with police forces across the country to support sex workers during investigations. This means we know that Regan’s estimates of police time needed to enforce her proposed legislation are laughably false, just like her ludicrous claims that it costs just 50p an hour to train officers.

“Sex worker groups, alongside NGOs like Amnesty and the World Health Organisation, oppose the new law on the grounds that it will make life more difficult and dangerous for sex workers, while costing taxpayers millions of pounds a year to enforce. The only winners will be the pro-Nordic Model groups that support Regan’s Bill, who she argues should pocket millions of pounds of taxpayers’ cash.

“If we truly want to address systemic violence against sex workers, we need full decriminalisation, not another expensive, performative policy that protects no one.”

An official government review of similar legislation in Northern Ireland – the only nation in the UK to enact the Nordic Model – found that there was “no evidence that the offence of purchasing sexual services has produced a downward pressure on the demand for, or supply of, sexual services”.

“It also found that “the legislation has contributed to a climate whereby sex workers feel further marginalised and stigmatised”.

A YouGov poll of 1,088 Scottish adults, carried out last year, showed that Scots firmly oppose the Nordic Model, with 47% saying it should be legal for a person to pay someone to have sex with them, versus 32% who think it should not be legal.

The poll showed that 69% of Scots say MSPs should focus on protecting the health and safety of sex workers, and providing support to people who want to leave the industry, compared to just 14% who support new laws to prevent people exchanging sexual services for money.