The Swedish prime minister has said that he wants to see the full law applied and people who pay for sex from prostitutes sent to jail.
Fredrik Reinfeldt, who was speaking in Stockholm on Monday, said prostitutes’ clients should not only have to pay fines, but also serve some prison time. He insisted that it’s now time to be clear and, as it states in the legislation, prison terms can be handed out as punishment for purchasing sex.
In 1999, the Scandinavian country became the first in the world to make paying for prostitutes’ services an illegal activity. The law states that any person caught paying for sex could face up to six months in jail. However, in practice, judges have only been able to impose maximum fines of 7,500 kroner to date.
Reinfeldt revealed that 4,782 people have been convicted in Sweden since the law was introduced, but that nobody has spent any time in prison.
He said the conservative Moderate Party plans to campaign to imprison people who purchase sex from prostitutes they know are victims of human trafficking or underage. He added that between 400 and 600 prostitutes in Sweden are there as a result of human trafficking.