Pushed off the Sidewalk

In the damp midday gloom of London's worst fog in seven years, prostitutes were dimly visible as they patrolled their familiar stations in Soho, Piccadilly and Paddington. The chilling smog also seeped through tightly closed windows into the House of Commons, where Home Secretary R. A. ("Rab") Butler was opening the second reading of the Street Offences Bill, aimed at clearing those same girls off the sidewalks of London.

Denigrated Ladies. Based upon the Wolfenden Report published 18 months ago (TIME, Sept. 16, 1957), Butler's 600-word bill covers prostitutes and the pimps who live on their earnings, has nothing to say about the other subject raised by Wolfenden: the prevalence of homosexuality. The maximum -L-2 ($5.60) fine for prostitution, which has been on the books since 1840, would now be increased to -L-25 and three months in jail, and no longer would a cop have to prove that the girls were "annoying" anyone.

Religious organizations, from the Church of England Moral Welfare Council to the Roman Catholic St. Joan's Alliance, though alarmed at the number of whores on London streets (a spectacle unmatched in the U.S. or Europe), opposed the bill as likely to make prostitution more covert, and thus more professionally organized. Labor's cherubic Anthony Greenwood objected to the phrase "common prostitute" in the bill as violating the traditional presumption of innocence. Not for long did the debate stay on this legalistic level.

Sad Lovers. "If we want to drive women off the streets, where would we prefer them to go?" asked Laborite Reginald Paget. He told of watching two girls in a doorway on Curzon Street who, in a two-hour period, took eleven men upstairs, with the average time per man being under 15 minutes. Paget had also noted a common factor in all the men: "Their sadness ... If we were to stop this business outright, we might be doing something which would.be pretty dangerous." Girls on the streets are a nuisance, he conceded, but he felt it was better than spreading the corruption to "part-time pimping" by cab drivers, elevator operators, hotel porters--the same sort of organized vice that "there is in New York."

A Tory barrister, William Rees-Davies, answered Paget. Acting for various church groups who own much property in the red-light areas, Rees-Davies had interviewed some 250 prostitutes, concluded that what drove the vast majority into their profession was sheer "laziness." One prostitute, he reported, drove up to his office in a Rolls-Bentley, asked his help in freeing her boy friend, who had been charged as a pimp. She said that she earned $17,000 a year and paid no income tax because "it has all been paid by those who give me presents."

Up popped irrepressible M.P. Emrys Hughes to ask what amount Rees-Davies had charged the girl for his professional services? "Never mind about that," snapped the barrister. The gleeful Hughes then accused Lawyer Rees-Davies of also living on the girl's earnings, and the House rocked with laughter.

602 Women. The most damaging blows against the bill were delivered by the women M.P.s. Mrs. Lena Jeger, who sits for vice-ridden Holborn and St. Pancras South, objected to the use of the word "loitering" in the bill, and stirred giggles by stating that she liked "loitering" in disreputable streets, because they were interesting ones. Slight, blue-haired Joan Vickers said coolly: "I rather wonder whether, if the House of Commons consisted of 602 women and 28 men, this bill would have come before us today."

The six-hour debate seemed to indicate more reasons for shelving the bill than passing it, but when it came to a vote, Butler led his followers to an easy victory, 235 to 88. Soon a London woman may be able to stop and look in a shop window in the evening without an indignant prostitute hissing in her ear: "Get the hell off my beat!" On the other hand, she may have a policeman tap her on the shoulder and caution her against loitering.

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