In May 2021, the Joint Public Issues Team published research with the charity Beyond the Streets into the effect of Covid-19 on women who are sexually exploited or sell sex. The issue was brought up at a focus group with local churches and communities which JPIT ran around a year ago, when we were still getting to grips with the impacts of Covid-19. My colleague Paul has written about how we came to undertake this research in more depth here.
When I was asked to help out with researching the project early on in my internship, I was confronted by my own ignorance – this wasn’t a topic where I had prior knowledge or insight. As it turned out, that in itself was telling. What became increasingly clear during our research period was that this was a group of people who have been persistently forgotten – not just by the public, but in policy responses by government as well. Littered throughout our research was one word in particular: trauma.
Not all women who sell sex are dealing with past or persistent trauma. But for the support agencies we talked to, many of whom work primarily with women facing multiple disadvantage, trauma looms large as an ongoing reality. Not only does trauma adversely affect mental health, but it also makes it much more difficult for women to engage with and access support services – including those which were introduced to alleviate the worst effects of the pandemic.
Trauma doesn’t only make it harder for women to access services, and it didn’t simply deepen the effect of problems caused by lockdown and the pandemic. The pandemic in itself had what one respondent called a ‘re-traumatising effect’ – deepening the cycle of difficulty faced by some women who sell sex or are sexually exploited.
One of the Joint Public Issues Team’s Six Hopes for Society is for a just economy that enables the flourishing of all life. Another is for a society where the poorest and most marginalised are at the centre. At the heart of both of these hopes is a belief in the dignity of all human life – a belief that God cares for and loves all people, and that Jesus came so that we could have life in all its fullness (John 10:10).
If people in our society are unable to access the services that they need to live a safe, healthy, and fulfilled life, then they are not experiencing life in all its fullness. If people in our society are homeless or in unstable housing, they are not experiencing life in all its fullness. And if people in our society are experiencing the re-traumatising effects of lockdown, then they are not experiencing life in all its fullness.
We pursued this work because, as churches, we believe that the way our society is run can be better: more compassionate and more Christ-like. It’s not right that the impacts of lockdown fell more squarely onto the shoulders of people who were already struggling, including women who sell sex or are sexually exploited, particularly those who have experienced trauma.
We identified a set of issues which were specifically affecting this group of women. Food insecurity, income loss, isolation and housing problems, as well as decreased access to services, were all issues which were flagged. We noted that many people in society were facing similar problems – but for many of the women supported by the charities we spoke to, the exacerbating factor of trauma amplified and deepened these problems. You can read our full findings and a summary of the report here.
One of the issues which we encountered during this research was that women who sell sex or are sexually exploited often needed more and different support to access benefits, including Universal Credit. Churches have long advocated for a more compassionate benefits system, which offers enough for people to live in dignity and safety. This means more than simply increasing the weekly payment to a liveable amount – although, of course, this is vital – it’s also about ensuring that the benefits system accounts for differences in circumstances. In this case, it might mean that the application process needs to be more accommodating of acting through an intermediary charity like the ones we spoke to as part of our research, and that trauma-informed approaches need to be layered into the ways that the benefits system works. The report shows that the benefits system disproportionately sanctions those with mental health problems: the system fails to cope when presented with claimants who may be experiencing multiple disadvantage or other complications.
Public services, including benefits like Universal Credit, need to be available and truly accessible to all who might need them if they are to be adequate and meaningful. To enable life in all its fullness, we must cater for the most marginalised in our communities in the way that we relate to one another and provide services as a society. If women who sell sex or are sexually exploited are excluded from policy and understanding, we’ve failed to open up our society and support systems to everyone who might need it.
Our report goes into more detail about the experiences which we heard about and the solutions which might begin to redress a historic failure to consider the impact of trauma when accessing services.
My colleague Paul has written a blog summarising the research and explaining the process of writing the report. You can read it here:
