Escape from the streets for Bristol's female sex workers

Five nights a week, staff from One25 set off in a plain van and cruise Bristol in search of women selling sex. 

The women they are seeking are among the city's poorest and most vulnerable people.  Many are street homeless, almost all are acutely malnourished: money from punters tends to be immediately spent on heroin, crack and/or alcohol - often for their exploitative 'boyfriend's' habit as well as their own.

All are chronically ill and many will have friends who have died as a result of this dangerous lifestyle.  Yet most remain trapped in a cycle of smothering memories of abusive sex with drugs, then paying for the drugs with sex.

One25's outreach van is a way of intervening in this cycle.  They offer practical help, such as STI test packs and condoms, personal alarms, free food and a listening ear. They invite women to use their drop-in centre at the heart of the sex district as a way of finding further support - getting fresh meals, washing clothes and accessing visiting health, addiction, education and housing professionals, including Dr Sue Norman.

Dr Norman says 'the impact this has on the local community is unique as there are no other providers.  From my own perspective as a sexual health doctor the One25 clinic is a tremendous asset.  Most of the women seen in the drop-in live such chaotic lives that it is impossible for them to access a hospital clinic however much we try to make the clinic acceptable.  If these women are not seen in clinics for investigation our audits have shown how much sexual disease will remain untreated'. 

The results of the scheme are impressive.  Last year, the caseworkers had 52 active cases of which 35% stopped sex work; 27% came off drugs; 25% were put on a heroin-substitute prescription (meaning they don’t have to sex-work to fund it and they don’t share needles); 21% were housed; 38% made contact with their family and 13% were employed, volunteering or in education.

Helen Hill, who manages One25's development, is a former solicitor.  She was drawn into the work, frustrated that the law could do so little to help the women.  'I'd often get a case, where a woman had been picked up on the street and we'd represent her.  But I knew that the issue we were dealing with was the tip of the iceberg and that I was powerless to change things.'

It can sometimes take several attempts for real change to stick.  Fundraiser Josie Hill says 'many want to exit, but with such complex, deep-rooted problems it may require several progressions through a cycle of contemplation, change and relapse before finally breaking free.'

There are happy-ending stories. Inevitably, many women have children who are taken into care.  Yet some are reunited with them as their lives stabilise. One25 has a new mother and baby home, Naomi House and also offers mother and toddler sessions. 

One25 has been resourceful in helping women find courses to make up for their missing education and to start new lives - often in safe houses away from their former scene so they can escape from the boyfriends or pimps who helped to keep them living in such dire conditions. After they have broken free from drugs and sex-work for 2 years, some of the women return to the project to volunteer.

One25 has just acquired funding for a therapist to provide Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, counselling and other support to help the women control their own lives.  They also run art sessions and have resourcefully acquired both a pottery kiln and a professional potter who has trained up a group of volunteers  to run ceramics and pottery classes at One25's centre. The women are enthusiastic about these therapeutic and educational courses which help them to build a sense of self-worth.

Street prostitution may sometimes seem like an unstemmable problem that will never go away.  In One25's area of Bristol their intervention means that women are able to permanently escape - and the risk of others taking their place is dramatically reduced.