Jobs News

‘A moral stance on adult industry jobs’

By Sarah Dave
August 10, 2010

Budding bare-breasted bar staff and lapdancers looking for a place to writhe will have to search for positions somewhere other than job centres.

The Government announced it is to ban Jobcentre Plus advertising sex industry vacancies because it could lead to exploitation.

Jobcentres banned from advertising adult industry jobs

The move is aimed at protecting people desperate for work from considering jobs they aren’t comfortable with and publicly funded services should not be a conduit to this work, ministers say.

Jobcentre Plus will implement an immediate ban while the related legislation is pushed through.

While the move – which bans the advertising of jobs involved in the direct sexual stimulation of others – affects work like lap dancing, webcam performances and stripping, vacancies in the industry’s retail, manufacturing and distribution sectors such as a cleaner in a sex club would be fine.

A disapproving jobseeker pre-empted the coalition’s new policy when he sent in this vacancy for webcam performers which he said he saw advertised at Reading’s Jobcentre Plus branch in May.

The advert required a dirty-talking nude or semi-nude man, woman or couple with their own broadband internet connection.

“With the amount of people looking for work, I think it is not appropriate for the DWP [Department for Work & Pensions] to advertise this kind of work,” he said.

“It should be done in some other discreet way.”

Employment secretary Chris Grayling said: “It’s absolutely wrong that the Government advertises jobs that could support the exploitation of people.

“We’ve taken immediate action to stop certain adult entertainment vacancies from being advertised through Jobcentre Plus. We shouldn’t put vulnerable people in an environment where they’re exposed to these types of jobs and could feel under pressure to work in the sex industry.”

But Bill Donne, licence consultant for gentleman’s club Sugar Lounge, in St Mary’s Butts, Reading town centre, said he was disappointed with Mr Grayling’s comments.

“The Jobcentre should be advertising vacancies. He is taking a moral stance on the matter,” he said. “However, from a business perspective, I think it’s unlikely we would advertise in a Jobcentre so it would have very little effect on us.

“It’s a very small niche market and people come more from a dance background than anything else. It’s a legal activity, we are bona fide employers – not every club is run the same [but] all clubs run on very strict guidelines because we have to.”

Before 2003 Jobcentre Plus’ policy was to refuse all adult entertainment industry vacancies. But adult business Ann Summers successfully argued in the High Court this blanket ban was unlawful. Since then Jobcentres have accepted vacancies in this sector, though subject to certain safeguards.

The ban followed a public consultation that revealed concern about Jobcentre Plus advertising sex industry jobs. Feedback also indicated staff could be vulnerable to harassment and discrimination.

- What do you think of the ban? Perhaps you work in the adult entertainment industry and think this will affect your prospects.

We’d be particularly interested in speaking to strippers, lapdancers and web performers, in confidence.

Email sarah.dave@reading-epost.co.uk or call (0118) 918 3020.

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While I find this debate interesting, and I do, I am not sure it is altogether news. I believe this is the second, perhaps third, time I have read this in the Reading newspapers and I have also looked at it elsewhere. I know the getreading team are talented, I am looking to move to the town, and I would like to learn more about the area and less about the dos and don'ts of national advertising! Thankyou

Sarosh Zahid
10/08/2010 at 18:54

An excellent point well made, Vestan.

Zadadka, Reading
10/08/2010 at 16:52

I think some of you are missing the point a bit here. Jobcentre plus is all about pushing people into work. It's all well and good going on about choices from behind your desk but most people using the Jobcentre service are there because they have to and a lot don't have any qualifications. In these circumstances it is wrong to advocate the fact that if all else fails you can always take your clothes off for money.

Vestan Pance
10/08/2010 at 16:41

@ArthurMo : I agree and empathise with what you're saying in essence...as long as sex is profitable (which is undoubtedly forever), there will be those who will seek to take advantage of others unable to resist being forcibly made objects of sexual desire...human trafficking, pimps, the whole shebang (no pun). Those that do so are utter scum, not directly stated by you, but I nonetheless also agree here too.

Yet, it is undeniable that the majority of those involved in the porn business are there by personal choice, with that choice also incorporating all the various avenues of "distribution"..whether merely images (Digital stills, Webcam, Kodachrome, Watercolour/Oil-paintings), or available for "hands-on" scenarios...and that has been the case for years, decades, centuries and even millennia...prostition is not without good reason known as "The Oldest Profession".

I think EP/GR have the title of this article entirely correct ...it's a moral stance...as others indicate, the British mentality to sex is still buried in a prudish "behind closed doors, in a darkened room" mentality...it's self-defeating, it's arrogant (and sadly ignorant) in a typically British way, and, for Forty-somethings+, Mary Whitehouse's legacy perhaps still lives.

Provided action is continued to be taken (and regularly seen to be) in order to prevent the human-trafficking/abuse scenario, I beleive a "live and let live" policy is the best approach here....if only for the sake of one's increased blood pressure due to impotent frustration (and again, no pun intended).

Times change, and along the way, we are each left behind in some way.

Zadadka, Reading
10/08/2010 at 15:28

Blimey Arthur Mo!! Digressing a LOT aren't you!!

(Enter the vision in my head, of Arthur Mo at the JobCentre) "Ever considered a career as a stripper? The money is fantastic and you only have to work a few hours week..."

"No I do not want to be a child sex slave!"

Perspective needed...

Brad From-Birch Hill, Bracknell
10/08/2010 at 14:35

Isn't that a little off the topic of a job being a stripper or porn star? You dont get hired as a hooker do ya they become one, the story isnt about child sex slave abuse is it, why bring that into it?

Detective John Kimble, Tilehurst, Reading
10/08/2010 at 14:18

You've gone well off the story Arthur, I suggest you read it again.

Yes Detective, have changed. I love a pint of summer lightening.

Bushes Bernal, The Hop Leaf
10/08/2010 at 14:16

@Bushes Bernal and @Detective John Kimble Sometimes the victims don't even have the opportunity to say no. http://www.unicef.org/protection/uk_46977.html

Arthur Mo
10/08/2010 at 14:00

you've changed your local bushes?

Detective John Kimble, Tilehurst, Reading
10/08/2010 at 13:59

I know what you mean Arthur, I took on a job once as an Administrator and within two weeks I was asked to sell my body.

In all seriousness, does anyone know how to say NO these days?

Bushes Bernal, The Hop Leaf
10/08/2010 at 13:56

Arthur Mo

Well then maybe they should stay where they are!

Detective John Kimble, Tilehurst, Reading
10/08/2010 at 13:51

How about those making comments on the getreading website take over responsibility for in depth interviews!

May get down to short list of 20 or 30 who then have to attend 2nd 3rd or even 4th interviews!

That's Life
10/08/2010 at 13:29

@Bushes Bernal Lots of jobs get offered as one thing but turn out to be quite another.

@Detective John Kimble Do a little - just a tiny - bit of research and you'll see why that flippant comment is so unwarranted. Women are paying vast sums of money to people to bring them to the UK/Europe for a better life only to find that they've actually paid for themselves to become prostitutes. This is modern day slavery and utterly sickening that we're allowing it to go on all around us.

Arthur Mo
10/08/2010 at 13:26

Sorry but I do agree with removing the ads. A person looking for this type of employment will find these jobs easily enough without taxpayer funded assistance. And I would think surely the last place they will be looking for them is down the local Job Centre? The unemployed looking for a non 'adult' type job are the ones who most need the support in finding something suitable.