An interesting discussion last night on Andrew Neil's This Week programme.
Stacey Dooley (pretty girl) has done a documentary about prostitution in Brazil, Russia and Turkey. She takes a sensible view. So does Michael Portillo, whose view in essence was that if one person wants to buy and one person wants to sell, the law has no business getting involved.
Alan Johnson focused on trafficking, exploitation, general human misery etc. His constituency is in Hull – a port city, of course – and he's met escorts; but the girls an MP meets (unless he's a punter) are almost always going to be the ones that are in trouble / on drugs / looking for help / whatever.
None of us can claim to be experts, but those who have been around the block more times than our wallets like to mention do know a thing or two about a thing or two. This is a subject on which the vast majority of people who pronounce know almost nothing. There are two categories of people whose opinion is of most value in this debate – the girls, whose views are often canvassed; and punters, whose experience is almost never tapped into.