Overview of the legality and practice of prostitution in New Zealand
The Pelican Club, a massage parlour / escort agency in Newton, Auckland
Prostitution in New Zealand, brothel-keeping, living off the proceeds of someone else's prostitution, and street solicitation are legal in New Zealand and have been since the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 came into effect. Coercion of sex workers is illegal.[1] The 2003 decriminalisation of brothels, escort agencies and soliciting, and the substitution of a minimal regulatory model, created worldwide interest; New Zealand prostitution laws are now some of the most liberal in the world.[2]
Until 2003, indoor prostitution in New Zealand was governed by the Massage Parlours Act 1978, which allowed brothels to operate in the guise of massage parlours. However, the act defined massage parlours as public places, so laws against soliciting in a public place applied to workers in parlours, and they were sometimes raided by police posing as clients.[3] Workers in the parlours were also required to provide their names and addresses to the police. Advertising the sale of sex ("soliciting"), running a brothel, and living off the earnings of prostitution were illegal.
Despite the Massage Parlours Act and other laws meant to suppress prostitution, there was considerable toleration of sex work in practice in the last decades of the 20th century. These laws were all changed by the Prostitution Reform Act in June 2003.
^Section 16, Prostitution Reform Act 2003.
^"Ex-sex worker made a dame in New Zealand honours list". France 24. 4 June 2018. Retrieved 28 March 2021.
^Jordan, Jan (31 May 2018). "Sex work: 20th-century sex work". Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand. New Zealand Ministry for Culture and Heritage. Retrieved 27 October 2018.
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