A SEX worker has won an anti-discrimination case against motel owners in a Queensland mining town who refused to rent her a room.
Okay – refusing to rent someone a room on the basis of their profession is discrimination. But I would have thought that subletting a room would be violation of contract. So the motel owners rent a room to person A who in turn effectively rents it to her clients.* There would be nothing wrong with the individual managing her business from the room, i.e. calling clients and making appointments etc., but actually conducting her business there can be thought of as subletting.
If an individual hired a room and set up a convenience store the owners might be annoyed too.
If the owners are happy to sublet that’s fine, but many property owners place restrictions on subletting and I don’t think that is unreasonable or discriminatory.
* Then there are trespass laws, many hotels have rules against visitors at particular hours.
(HT: Andrew Bolt)
Update: Gab points us to the actual judgement.
The owner of the property should be able to outlaw any business that the owner doesn’t like! This should have been a victory for landowners everywhere- but I am not surprised that it isn’t. The whole trend of Western civilisation is to revert to the mindless collective, when it is usually brainy individuals who have helped all to progress. Why doesn’t this sex-worker work from home?
Nuke Gray
7 Aug 12 at 4:59 pm
Nuke – I think the problem is thinking about this in sex-worker terms as opposed to any business subletting the property.
Sinclair Davidson
7 Aug 12 at 5:02 pm
Sinclair,
What part of commercial law forces you to potentially disadvantage yourself by compelling you to help potential competitors, with your own property?
Can the discrimination commissioner regulate commercial and residential tenancies?
If the manager is not the owner, how can the law regulate the principle of agency?
How does this not break other regulations regarding prostitution and zoning?
Why isn’t there a OH&S defence to this? The manager cannot guarantee other visitors that the duty of care to them can be upheld.
Like I said elsewhere – this decision is ultra vires and thus void.
.
7 Aug 12 at 5:07 pm
. – I don’t think we need to go to zoning laws or anti-prostitution laws on this. All you need to a prohibition on subletting for any business purposes.
Sinclair Davidson
7 Aug 12 at 5:10 pm
She’s essentially operating a brothel out of a motel. Brothels have to be licensed surely. What if a home owner with a separate granny flat on the same property rented the granny flat out and the person who took up occupancy conducted her sex work out of that flat? Does this ruling mean the owner could not evict the tenant because it would be discriminatory?
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 5:17 pm
Gab – that is probably true. But I’m thinking of a solution that doesn’t revolve around government licencing or attitudes toward prostitution.
Sinclair Davidson
7 Aug 12 at 5:20 pm
This is crazy.
I know a case where the motel owners in a small NSW country town were socially ostracised by the remainder of the community for allowing this activity to occur in their premises.
Legal or illegal, why can’t a person choose who occupies their room?
Token
7 Aug 12 at 5:20 pm
Whether prostitution is legal or illegal, why can’t a person choose who occupies their room? Its private property.
Token
7 Aug 12 at 5:21 pm
The motel owners need to respond by destroying her client’s confidentiality. “All guests MUST register at reception.”
Screw this goddamn whore.
Infidel Tiger
7 Aug 12 at 5:22 pm
Sinc,
I’m saying there is a variety of reasons why the discrimination authority got this wrong, among them, a majority being pro liberty reasons.
.
7 Aug 12 at 5:23 pm
Who bares the OH&S risk for the commerical activities?
It is already a hazard renting a room to public servants:
Token
7 Aug 12 at 5:25 pm
But is it unlawful discrimination? No!
The story here has been badly reported. What appears to have been the illegal dscrimination was the action of refusing a room to someone engaged in a lawful sexual activity (Sec 11 of the Queensland Anti Discrimination Act).
All thesae awful laws need to be swept away and adults allowed to make free choices as to whom they deal with.
Rococo Liberal
7 Aug 12 at 5:26 pm
The owner should be able to rent or not to rent to anyone for any reason. People should be able to discriminate on whatever basis they like. It is their business after all.
Samuel J
7 Aug 12 at 5:28 pm
Yep, and charge her gazillions more AND charge her ‘guests’, too. This could be a price for single occupancy and a different gazillions price for multiple occupancy.
There is also the risk of endangerment to other guests. It is a profession not unknown to be dangerous.
Helen Armstgrong
7 Aug 12 at 5:32 pm
Rococo Liberal – can you expand on that? We all understand that people can bonk in a hotel room if they want to.
Sinclair Davidson
7 Aug 12 at 5:32 pm
That’s like trying to think about Switzerland without the alps and snow.
Viva
7 Aug 12 at 6:09 pm
many businesses try to control their mix of customers. they then sell that mix of their other customers
cheap hotels get all sorts. let’s be frank. many book at hotels above a certain price because they do not want they and their children to meet the rougher class of people who frequent the cheaper hotels.
the same goes for rough pubs versus wine bars. who takes their children to a rough pub or to the hill at the SCG etc., in the bad old days?
Jim Rose
7 Aug 12 at 6:11 pm
Do you really think any hotel owner would mind if an occupant was meeting clients in their room for palm reading or if it was to go through some figures with a potential franchisee? Obviously they wouldn’t give a crap. Therefore it is discrimination against prostitution that drove this hotel owner. Your responses, Sinc, show that you’re trying to find an underhanded way around that decision. Why not be upfront and argue that prostitution is a special case and should require special permission from the hotel owner.
The Hunted Mind
7 Aug 12 at 6:18 pm
Me? Underhanded and devious in the defence of property rights? Why, thank you.
But I don’t think prostitution should be a special case.
Sinclair Davidson
7 Aug 12 at 6:30 pm
The motel should have set up cameras over the door to the suite with a sign saying “Hi, go to http://www.hookerlovers.com to see your photo.”
The whore would have fooked off right quick, and no need for legal action.
Abu Chowdah
7 Aug 12 at 6:32 pm
We don’t know all the ins and outs of the case though. Perhaps there’s more to the story that has not been reported.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 6:37 pm
FFS, forget the legal niceties such as ‘sub-letting’ and discrimination based on ‘occupation’.
Surely the owners of the motel can rightly take the view that they simply don’t want someone running a mobile knock-shop from their premises.
James P
7 Aug 12 at 6:40 pm
What would the whore have done if her John had asked to sublet her vagina to one of his mates during the hour he had paid her for?
I’ll bet she would have demanded double payment.
Infidel Tiger
7 Aug 12 at 6:42 pm
No the hotel owner has the choice to decide who may conduct a ‘for profit’ business on their permisis.
If the owners decide that an active protitute on their premisis will hurt their business as a whole then they have the option to decide if they want that individual on their property.
Carpe Jugulum
7 Aug 12 at 6:43 pm
Special case Hunted Mind? Going through figures is one thing but if you set up your accountancy business in a room I think you might be moved on. I assume the private contract entered into when renting a room specifically excludes using it for commercial purposes ie to become a business address. Am surprised this wasn’t the case here?
Rob
7 Aug 12 at 6:45 pm
I agree with James P’s common sense approach and disagree with Sinc’s letter of the law approach.
How would Prof Sink feel if the tutorial room next to his office was rented out for sex orgies? He’d probably be less inclined to give the whole issue such an open-minded and academic reading.
Abu Chowdah
7 Aug 12 at 6:46 pm
Well she won the case. Curious to know how the owners found out she was a prostitute? If it was in a mining town, she was probably a FIFO sex worker, or just worker. She books in for say, 2 weeks, pays for the room in advance, and providing there are no complaints of wild parties who would know. She might have been interviewing men for jobs for all they know. It must have been a quiet motel to know all the comings and goings.
delfino
7 Aug 12 at 6:57 pm
At Bolt’s he says that she stayed there 17 times before the owner’s even noticed so I doubt if scaring off other hotel clients was the issue. I’m guessing hookers and their clients are discreet.
If your accountancy business was there for an hour or so at a time, 17 times in 2 years, then I’m sure no-one would care. I just don’t think you can do the disruption to business angle. These hotel owners and lots of people here just don’t like hookers. I don’t know why I’m defending them actually, I just think freedom is freedom and they and their clients should be free to transact if they want to.
The Hunted Mind
7 Aug 12 at 6:59 pm
The problem with banning all forms of business is that it would be very difficult for travellers of any description to conduct business.
I just find it unbelievable that this judgement implies the owners have no say in who can occupy their rooms.
And if I was them I would promptly sue the prossy for harming the rest of their business.
entropy
7 Aug 12 at 6:59 pm
According the Queensland Civil and Administration Tribunal, this is clearly not an option for the moteliers.
I don’t understand why prostitution should not be a special case if that is what the owner of the motel chooses to make it. None of this would be an issue if the state didn’t feel the need to interfere in the private business affairs of others.
The real issue is the continuing extension of anti-discrimination laws to cover a wider and wider scope. Laws designed to ensure black people would not be refused service on the basis of their skin colour alone are now interpreted by a state agency as to allow a women to set up a mobile brothel on someone elses property. Come drug decriminalisation would it be illegal to discriminate against people setting up meth labs?
Anti-discrimination laws should all be repealed. No doubt some businesses would choose to discriminate on the basis of race, religion, sexual orientation etc. If they choose to act like ignorant racist prats, that would be their choice. The rest of us have the option to boycott them, condemn them etc.
Matt
7 Aug 12 at 6:59 pm
In a quasi judicial body.
This isn’t case law, nor should it be.
.
7 Aug 12 at 7:00 pm
But motel owners should not be free to not transact if they choose not to? Strange definition of freedom …
Matt
7 Aug 12 at 7:01 pm
I am curious to know, is this a problem with the law, or a problem with a specific judge interpreting the law?
hzhousewife
7 Aug 12 at 7:04 pm
Does this new principle apply to the odd junkie running a meth lab set up in a hotel room?
Chris M
7 Aug 12 at 7:06 pm
She paid the bill with a hairy cheque book.
Infidel Tiger
7 Aug 12 at 7:07 pm
Because it’s a legal business transaction like any other, and none of your fucking business. That’s why it shouldn’t be special case.
Most of the posts in this thread reveal why this doesn’t happen. A large part of the community still thinks it is perfectly okay to discriminate against minorities, so businesses that did so wouldn’t be punished much at all.
Yobbo
7 Aug 12 at 7:10 pm
There is surely a practical reason why motel/hotel owners aren’t keen on prostitutes setting themselves up on their premises: accountants or tupperware salesman don’t have a reason to be having a shower 6 times a day, or inviting their clients to do. Nor indeed do they usually get the sheets dirty in the process of doing tax returns.
If a family of 3 rents a motel room next to the beach, then invites their friends (a family of 6) visiting from the city to have showers there after a swim, doesn’t the business owner have a right to complain about the invitees using his water and amenities for free?
Technically, I would have thought any accommodation provider simply has a right to insist (if they desire) that the room is for the occupation of the guests who have paid for the room only.
steve from brisbane
7 Aug 12 at 7:13 pm
Don’t be a dill. If I don’t like niggers, whores or god botherers I shouldn’t have to serve them. It’s my loss not there’s.
Thomas Sowell has covered the economics of discrimination very well.
Infidel Tiger
7 Aug 12 at 7:14 pm
The hotel owners are stuffed. It’s their property but they have no say in what people do whilst on their property unless a nuisance to other guests occurs. A sex worker operating out of a motel is a legal business.
Not really worth operating a motel if you don’t want prostitutes working there. I wonder if this means every single room in the hotel could be occupied by sole operating sex workers and the owners just have to put up with it or just walk away from the business?
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 7:18 pm
Yes, everybody’s a “minority” these days. Just pick a label, any label.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 7:20 pm
So why is your fucking business who the motelier chooses to let a room to?
Matt
7 Aug 12 at 7:20 pm
/thread
Abu Chowdah
7 Aug 12 at 7:22 pm
If prostitution isn’t an example of a special case with regards to legal commercial activity, I guess we are all quite comfortable with the Daily Planet demanding the right to set up a recruitment stall at the local high school careers day …
Or maybe, just maybe, prostitution – while legal – still is a special case in some situations.
Matt
7 Aug 12 at 7:25 pm
I wonder if this sort of thing goes on in lots of motels around the place, and the ‘workng girl’ pays something to the motel owner to keep things sweet.
but this motel owner did not like the company she kept, or it was jeopardising his business.
candy
7 Aug 12 at 7:26 pm
Cue Yobbo in 3, 2, 1…
Abu Chowdah
7 Aug 12 at 7:30 pm
Yeah, what a horrible situation for that hotel owner. 100% occupancy. I bet they would cry themselves to sleep every night.
I think you are continuing to miss the fact that it’s not. You don’t have the right to treat prostitutes as lepers purely because of their job any more. Sorry that makes you mad.
Yobbo
7 Aug 12 at 7:32 pm
The actual details of the case.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 7:36 pm
Yobbo
It is a special situation. If you don’t think it is, then you go an pick up the soiled sheets after her night shift…. 20 pairs.
Running a brothel isn’t the same thing as running a motel. There’s a pair of soiled sheets that needs replacing after every bout, so you require intensive cleaning, perhaps even shampooing the rugs.
JC
7 Aug 12 at 7:38 pm
What I find offensive is that the hotel owner may get a cut from prostitutes, but he basically can’t say no to those who don’t want to play ball!
Basically the Government is now their pimp!
.
7 Aug 12 at 7:38 pm
It is if that owner does not want his hotel turned into a unlicensed brothel. What’s wrong with that? What’s so wrong with admitting they don’t want prostitutes operating out of their hotel? They didn’t physically harm the sex worker in any way, they just didn’t want her to operate prostitution business on their premises. What’s wrong with that? Oh dear heavens – oh, that’s right, they hurt her feelings.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 7:46 pm
If I were the motel owner, I wouldn’t be providing unlimited repeat fresh sheets all night! Could I also take a hefty deposit for future rug cleaning ??
If I were the customer of the working lady would I notice the clean sheets…..
hzhousewife
7 Aug 12 at 7:48 pm
No no. Prostitute.
C.L.
7 Aug 12 at 7:53 pm
As a former Pornographers Assistant, I’m just standing back and laughing my guts out.
LMGO.
Winston Smith
7 Aug 12 at 7:54 pm
The original decision was a sane one and made many of the points raised here. Issues about breaches of the Liquor Act etc were raised, as well as damage to the business of the motel.
However GK appealed and won at the Skippy Appeal Tribunal. Go figure. Those “members” of the QCAT are not top shelf, mostly being selected by the previous Labor grubbermint on “equity” grounds.
Wait and see if the motel owners appeal.
Cato the Elder
7 Aug 12 at 7:54 pm
As long as she is discrete and is not damaging the business, the owner shouldn’t be able to discriminate.
dover_beach
7 Aug 12 at 7:55 pm
I really don’t think the sheets are changed after each bout if she’s in a hotel room otherwise in this case for example the owners would have noticed the hooker before the 17th time she used the premises. Maybe they just put their own towels down or something. Maybe the hooker using community just don’t care. After all, who hasn’t shagged on the couch in a hotel room? I bet there not cleaned after each guest. You still sit on them, don’t you?
The Hunted Mind
7 Aug 12 at 7:55 pm
On one occasion a bloke was found wandering around the hotel lobby looking for room 17. Lucky that time he wasn’t drunk or abusive to other patrons so, yeah, discrete.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 7:57 pm
So suppliers should charge me trade prices, as a shmuck consumer?
.
7 Aug 12 at 7:57 pm
or maybe they didn’t and the poor cleaner had to sort out the mess the following morning.
No I haven’t “shagged” on a couch in a hotel room if there’s a bed there and there usually is being a hotel room.
JC
7 Aug 12 at 8:00 pm
If it was a young male homosexual ‘prostitute’ with old men clients,
would the magistrate rule differently? would it be more seedy or still the same rights to the ‘prostitute’?
candy
7 Aug 12 at 8:01 pm
You were? Really? I thought you were female with a “pert” butt. That’s disappointing.
JC
7 Aug 12 at 8:03 pm
Given we all have glass walls I enjoy it actually.
I don’t any difference between James p and myself. He is describing what people should be able to do and I’m describing the mechanism.
Sinclair Davidson
7 Aug 12 at 8:03 pm
You really do need new glasses, JC.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 8:04 pm
What’s wrong with not wanting niggers at your hotel? It’s not like you caused any physical harm with your “No Niggers” sign, only hurt feelings.
And it’s not your fault that you’re the only hotel in town, and therefore there’s nowhere at all where Niggers can stay. That’s unfortunate but there’s nothing you can do about it!
The reason people in this thread aren’t getting this is that they think that their personal feelings toward prostitutes are acceptable, just like people in the 40′s thought their feelings about blacks were.
Yobbo
7 Aug 12 at 8:05 pm
time for an appointment with the optician JC
IF IT WAS vs
IF I WAS
hzhousewife
7 Aug 12 at 8:06 pm
And also because a motel isn’t a brothel that requires different attention. Also because it may upset other customers and impair potential future business opportunity.
Yobbo, if i take a hotel room, I don’t want the place to be a freaking brothel. If I wanted to hire a room at a brothel I’d do so but they are the same business transactions.
JC
7 Aug 12 at 8:09 pm
No this is wrong. It’s the reverse of this malarkey that now means a publican can’t allow people to smoke in his bar even if they all want to.
Does the whore have to take in the arse from everyone who calls her number and has the cash or can she pick and choose her clients?
Infidel Tiger
7 Aug 12 at 8:09 pm
Fail. The “nigger” as you them is not operating a prossy business.
There are other hotels and the sex worker even owns her own property in the town.
Wrong again. No one is staying she ought not be “allowed” to stay at the hotel as a guest.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 8:09 pm
It would be more sensible to think of this in terms of permitted us. The motel has a DA for residential use and the business use of the hooker would be a different thing. Think of this this way, refusing to rent a room to a catholic would be discrimination, refusing to rent it so a catholic priest could say mass from it would be quite a different thing.
Pedro
7 Aug 12 at 8:10 pm
I don’t know why the mess would be substantially different to any other couple’s mess. Granted more couplings may have occurred. I assume condoms are normally worn with hookers though thus reducing the mess. It’s still just a changed sheet though. Not a reason in itself to ban hookers from hotels. Anyway. how can a hotel cleaner complain about dealing with stained sheets with a straight face?
The Hunted Mind
7 Aug 12 at 8:12 pm
Oh please, Yobbo. This is the prostitutes’ March on Selma?
Motel guests – to say nothing of the building’s owners – have a right to stay in an establishment that doesn’t feature desperados wandering around the corridors in their be-hard-on-ed reflector trousers at 2 in the morning.
C.L.
7 Aug 12 at 8:13 pm
IT – mate, no. Things like that attract all sorts of naughty spam.
Sinclair Davidson
7 Aug 12 at 8:13 pm
I know, I know, I was just kidding. Relax ladies.
JC
7 Aug 12 at 8:15 pm
Yobbo, accommodation is always %100 booked out in Moranbah.
Are you saying the motel owned should be forced to rent his rooms to people conducting activities such as;
*VD clinics?
*Injecting rooms?
*abortion clinics?
*Scientology recruitment ?
* Tattoo parlour ?
Would you allow said folk to advertise the place of Business on TV at 7:30pm ? Full page ads in the local rag with motel address and picture?
Jumpnmcar
7 Aug 12 at 8:15 pm
Exactly, IT. She can refuse a client, but the hotel owner cannot. As for minority, I’d say there are more sex workers than hotel owners.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 8:15 pm
Hey Abu, your link up there to hookerlovers.com just gave Big Pond a heart attack.
Great idea though.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
7 Aug 12 at 8:15 pm
Why not? How does the fact that someone in that hotel is having sex for money affect your stay in any way, shape or form?
It doesn’t. You just find it uncomfortable, the same way people found the presence of black people uncomfortable.
Yobbo
7 Aug 12 at 8:15 pm
I like what pedro said. It goes hand in hand with what I said at 7.38.
The hotel owner should be able to discriminate as a supplier. This decision has stopped this.
This theory cannot be applied economy wide. Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together… mass hysteria! Well…just some very screwed suppliers or consumers now facing huge markups on finished products.
.
7 Aug 12 at 8:17 pm
Sorry.
Arse.Bottom.Infidel Tiger
7 Aug 12 at 8:18 pm
Rubbish. If she just stayed at the motel as a guest but conducted her business elsewhere there’d be no issue.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 8:19 pm
No they don’t.
A free country would.
Irrelevant though, unless you’re picking up the tab.
.
7 Aug 12 at 8:19 pm
Clearly the best move for the motel owner is to book himself in with said hooker, ask for something unreasonable (may have to be imaginative and include livestock), then take her to court on discrimination grounds.
brc
7 Aug 12 at 8:19 pm
Yobbo seems to have a nice sense of justice and fairness towards people,
but in the end i tend to think the motel owner buys a business, takes the risks and is up to him/her if they knock back some customers, it’s their livelihood after all.
candy
7 Aug 12 at 8:21 pm
Because it does. Those establishments are usually seedy places and I wouldn’t expect say the Park Hyatt to be a brothel.
In any event as a consumer it’s my business how and why I choose a place. Plus wifey would be upset.
Not true. I don’t expect a place to be shady because it has black people staying there.
Frankly i don’t want to meet the likes of you in a drunk state knocking on my door at 2.00 am looking for Pandora or see you around the the corridors asking if I know Pandora’s room number.
Perhaps it’s not the gals, it’s the drunken johns who are more appalling, Yobbo.
JC
7 Aug 12 at 8:21 pm
If there are guests wandering around making a nuisance of themselves then they should be banned for that reason. As I said earlier, I really believe hookers and their clients have every reason to be discreet (not discrete) and I’m sure they are. Let’s face it hotels everywhere must be crawling with hookers yet even though I’ve stayed in hotels a lot due to work I’ve never ever noticed one. Has anyone here?
The Hunted Mind
7 Aug 12 at 8:22 pm
Do people have property rights?
Let’s ask Dot:
C.L.
7 Aug 12 at 8:24 pm
Yes, not hookers as street hookers per se, but high quality escorts on the arms of Johns. Dude, you can tell them a freaking mile. They are usually really hot looking, really great rack usually extended with silicon and revealing clothes… just a little too revealing. Lipstick is almost always heavy duty.
JC
7 Aug 12 at 8:27 pm
So you’re arguing that the prostitute can’t discriminate against her customers. Say for example if someone with AIDS wants to be a customer of her business she can’t discriminate against them by saying no.
Lets see some consistency here.
twostix
7 Aug 12 at 8:27 pm
I am the only person consistently arguing for property rights here C.L.
Perhaps you need to slow down and read what I wrote.
No, they don’t, unless they agreed to that on prior terms with management.
As long as some dude looking for a root isn’t noisy or a nuisance, they don’t generally have that right at all.
.
7 Aug 12 at 8:28 pm
Yobs loves hookers for some reason. Adores them. Dunno why. Seems obsessed with them.
JC
7 Aug 12 at 8:28 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VJVw32EkIM
C.L.
7 Aug 12 at 8:29 pm
It’s taken as read. That is the tradition. There used to be house detectives to enforce it.
C.L.
7 Aug 12 at 8:30 pm
JC, I’m absolutely positive there are hookers conducting business in the Park Hyatt.
Obviously they don’t CL. Don’t belive me? Put a sign outside your shop that reads “No Jews or Niggers allowed”. We do not have absolute property rights here in Australia, and nor does anywhere in the world.
The only argument here is whether or not prostitutes deserve the same legal protections as blacks and jews. You say no. I ask why not.
Yobbo
7 Aug 12 at 8:31 pm
Oh,and i lived in Moronbah back in the day.
A Combi or Sandman in the dark corner of the carpark of The Black Nugget hotel was the go then for the working girls.
Or so i’m told.
Jumpnmcar
7 Aug 12 at 8:32 pm
You just can’t seem to get past your prejudice, Yobbo.
If she just stayed at the motel as a guest but conducted her business elsewhere there’d be no issue.
This has absolutely nothing to do with race.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 8:33 pm
Is that where Shagger Thomson likes to stay?
brc
7 Aug 12 at 8:36 pm
…it’s up to management. I worked for a pizza shop when I was a kid. A hotel on the edge of town’s clients were mostly hookers I presume, because some old dude with a towel would answer answer the door with some old boiler in lingerie putting a cocktail dress back on.
Let’s not put that dude out of business and onto the dole I reckon.
We should.
I’d agree with you but being black or jewish doesn’t infer you are going to use the room for a higher value service other than accommodation. I reckon this decision is important and wrong as it removes discrimination to higher value clients or trade terms. That may not be the specifics but it applies to all prostitution in QLD. The property owner cannot earn full rents and the Government is now running a “free” protection racket.
.
7 Aug 12 at 8:37 pm
Obviously you’ve never been to the Middle East or Vegas.
Infidel Tiger
7 Aug 12 at 8:37 pm
But why does it bother everyone? That’s the question. If it was any other business you wouldn’t care. So you are discriminating against hookers. By JC’s own admission he knows they’re there because they are walking around with a certain look. Big deal. It’s what they do in private that bothers you. That’s your problem.
The Hunted Mind
7 Aug 12 at 8:39 pm
People conduct business from their hotel rooms all the time, Gab. In fact I think it’s pretty fair to say that most people staying in a hotel mining town are there for some kind of business rather than a holiday.
Yobbo
7 Aug 12 at 8:39 pm
I see plenty of “No Hawker” signs.
Infidel Tiger
7 Aug 12 at 8:40 pm
Hang on. I write like a bong addled hippie far too often.
Everytime we delivered pizza there, a different old be-toweled guy would answer their room door with some sort of working girl looking lady getting dressed again.
The man who owns the hotel? Not a client of either the pizza shop or escorts.
I say we let him run his affairs as he sees fit, and let him earn an income.
If he later decides not to allow prostitutes to stay there, fine. If he wants to turn it into a brothel, fine.
He owns the real estate and the business. That’s the bottom line.
.
7 Aug 12 at 8:41 pm
Ah, so they bring their own towels. I was on the right track earlier. No need to worry about the cleaners JC.
The Hunted Mind
7 Aug 12 at 8:45 pm
Stopped in at the place on the SA/WA border a few years ago, and the child bride says to me, as we sit on the landing having a tuberooni or two, “Show me the odd man out?”
Winston looks around the twenty or so dongas.
“Don’t get it”
“The place across the gravel path has a red light on the porch. All the others have a white one.”
She was right.
That poor girl was busy all night long…
Winston Smith
7 Aug 12 at 8:45 pm
Do you agree that the prostitute, as a business, is legally bound to service everybody who desires to use her services?
twostix
7 Aug 12 at 8:45 pm
Nice idea. Pity it will never happen in Australia.
Gab
7 Aug 12 at 8:48 pm
The tortured reasoning in the original tribunal finding – it’s only direct discrimination if done because of GK’s ‘charasteristics’ as a prostitute rather than because of her actions as a prostitute – shows how much is wrong with the various anti-discrimination acts.
Jarrah
7 Aug 12 at 8:48 pm
What dot says is right.
Property rights rule.
Always look for the basic rule – in this case, if I own the land, it’s mine.
Quite a few Libertarians have issues with this.
Winston Smith
7 Aug 12 at 8:49 pm
The more I think about this the more odd the whole situation seems.
Surely motels everywhere must be hosting sex trade to a massive extent. Did the owners just realize this happens? If they don’t hear about it at hospitality school perhaps they have seen some Hollywood films at some point? And 5 star hotels are no different although in Australia legal facilities probably mean less visibility in hotel lobbies, unlike in the developing world where hotel lounges host many prostitutes. I’ve seen hotel staff chasing out the ones they recognize when in China for example.
All the comments above about bed linen are (I suspect) pretty off the mark. I haven’t read the judgement but I expect the room hire is made separately for each encounter.
Lastly while the morals of the owners are obviously impeccable, if yet are disturbed by the sex trade wait til they hear about extramarital affairs, the drug trade, and the alcohol/drug/gambling industries that force people into cheap by-the-day accommodation.
Don’t even mention “love hotels”!!
Rob
7 Aug 12 at 8:50 pm
If she just stayed at the motel as a guest but conducted her business elsewhere there’d be no issue.
Does the whore have to …. from everyone who calls her number and has the cash or can she pick and choose her clients?
These are good points.
dover_beach
7 Aug 12 at 8:50 pm
For a better breakdown on this scenario, go to Kalgoorlie, Hay Street.
Clean towels every time.
Winston Smith
7 Aug 12 at 8:51 pm
Twostix
And that’s the guts of it.
Jumpnmcar
7 Aug 12 at 8:53 pm
Hotels sell a mix of customers to their other customers.
There are cheap hotels with rough clientele. Exclusive resorts etc. family hotels etc.
There are rough pubs versus wine bars. night clubs that cater for young singles, older ages groups, or different occupations such as cops bars, RSLs, leagues clubs etc.
They are all examples of two-sided markets. Two-sided markets, also called two-sided networks, are economic platforms having two distinct user groups that provide each other with network benefits. In some networks, users are homogeneous, that is, they all perform similar functions.
Platform managers must choose the right price to charge each group in a two-sided network. One group’s benefit from joining a platform depends on the number of agents from the other group who join the same platform. That is why night clubs offer free drinks, and even free admission to women.
Jim Rose
7 Aug 12 at 8:56 pm
I can always tell the working girls in hotel lifts. They look straight ahead and invariably carry a cute make-up type of bag that no-one else would carry in a fit. It contains various goodies, so I’m told. The trannies are particularly ‘femme’ looking, and obvious. In China, da Ape says the girls knock on the door to say goodnight to all lone men. Massage, they say invitingly in a high-pitched little voice with an upward lilt. He’s not into massage. Good-o, I say. Keep feeling that way.
In Japan, one time we didn’t have a hotel booking and I spotted a sign in English saying Hotel, with parking, and I was so tired I said let’s go there, ‘cos we were also a little bit lost because the Japanese GPS Lady had given up having hysterics at us and gone to sleep. It turned out to be a Love Hotel, where they expect lots of activity, offer privacy, have the most unusual check-in system, are full of fluffy toys to make the little lady feel comfortable about the tryst, and are spotlessly clean. Our room had a fulll Karaoke Kit (in case of a crowd I guess) and a mini bar slot machine from which you could buy new sex toys. I had no idea about most of them, mystified. Two free condoms on the bedside table. Only two? shrieked all my girlfriends when I told them about it.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
7 Aug 12 at 8:56 pm
I look forward to setting up my undertaking / embalming business out of the local hotel. What my business makes you “uncomfortable”? What a bunch of racist bigots.
twostix
7 Aug 12 at 8:57 pm
Really?
How about a bit of self control and personal responsibility?
.
7 Aug 12 at 9:00 pm
I’m looking forward to SofB and Birdy subletting Yobbos basement.
Jumpnmcar
7 Aug 12 at 9:04 pm
This reminds me of that sign in the window of Zapata’s Mexican Cantina, Shanghai: http://www.weirdasianews.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/no-prostitiutes01.jpg
Andreas
7 Aug 12 at 9:10 pm
Presumably if a motel owner cannot stop a prostitute running services, the chances of a landlord preventing their property from being used as a brothel.
Anyway, the motel owner just has to reserve the right to photograph and post on the internet anyone visiting the motel without a booked room. That ought to slow down the johns a tad. Some wouldn’t care, but the ones with families back home might think twice.
I agree for most people it’s a case of being uncomfortable with the nature of the business – I doubt anyone would be outraged if she was doing bookkeeping in the motel room. But you need to have control over subletting or business activities in the room. Or you could take it to logical extensions and have someone set up a spray booth in a hotel room, as long as they covered up everything in plastic first.
It’s a very simple one to get argument by absurdity on, because it’s an absurd case.
brc
7 Aug 12 at 9:10 pm
“Do you agree that the prostitute, as a business, is legally bound to service everybody who desires to use her services?”
The AD acts are concerned with the provision of ‘public sphere’ goods and services, specifically mentioning work, education and accommodation. While I disagree with the purpose and operation of the act, it does at least limit itself in this way.
Jarrah
7 Aug 12 at 9:17 pm
Basically, I reckon the decision will either be reversed on appeal, or if not, Campbell Newman will have an image enhancing win with an amendment to the Act to allow accommodation providers to discriminate with regard to the provision of commercial sexual activity on their premises, if they so chose.
It would widely, and rightly, be applauded as a win for common sense.
And Yobbo can cry into his Thai beer about the injustice of it all, for all anyone cares.
steve from brisbane
7 Aug 12 at 9:18 pm
I went to the link on the judgement – that is actually great reading.
Thanks for that.
Carpe Jugulum
7 Aug 12 at 9:18 pm
We had to pay more than $150 departure ‘cleaning fees’ for my little cat when we were sprung with her at an apartment hotel. It was only my special pleading – rules are rules they said at first – that didn’t see us (or me and kitty, we were inseparable) kicked out. We were kindly allowed to continue with her there until we were due to leave a few days later. Something to do with health rulings apparently. They dobbed us in to the Ape’s corporate employers, who were paying (but not the cleaning fee), as well.
Pets are a hot issue regarding discrimination in properties, especially apartments.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
7 Aug 12 at 9:31 pm
All well and good. That is not what Yobbo is “arguing” though.
twostix
7 Aug 12 at 9:31 pm
I’d say the hooker’s nether regions count as accommodation and she ought watch herself before she is sued.
Infidel Tiger
7 Aug 12 at 9:33 pm
I fucking hate cat people.
.
7 Aug 12 at 9:34 pm
“All well and good. That is not what Yobbo is “arguing” though.”
True. He’s (surprisingly) arguing the straightforward luvvie position – people should be forced to not discriminate, because discrimination is bad.
Jarrah
7 Aug 12 at 9:36 pm
No he’s arguing we should be equal under the law.
He’s not saying if he supports the law or not, but he also thinks discrimination is dumb.
.
7 Aug 12 at 9:38 pm
Perhaps if he would just answer the question we wouldn’t have to guess.
Does a straight male “sex worker” get to discriminate against a gay male because he’s gay? No other business does, if so why?
Oh what a tangled web.
twostix
7 Aug 12 at 9:51 pm
Sad for you Dot. Limits your romantic options unless you are more careful with your grammatical constructions.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
7 Aug 12 at 9:52 pm
ooooooooooooops. My BAD. I misplaced your adjective. Dyslexia strikes again.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
7 Aug 12 at 9:54 pm
I’m interested and slightly disturbed as to what you read that as!
.
7 Aug 12 at 9:56 pm
I thought you had turned a verbal qualifier (I fucking hate) into a verb form, Dot. Viz: I hate fucking (implied verb: to fuck) cat people. You had not done this. Sorry about that. Fourth glass of wine, should go to bed. This very bad language is most unladylike and you can dislike whatever sort of people you wish to dislike no matter what options this may limit for you. Never said otherwise, actually.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
7 Aug 12 at 10:05 pm
Stayed in a fancy hotel in Bangkok. ‘Course it is Bangkok so it is not like we didn’t expect prostitutes to find their way into the hotel. What we didn’t expect was to be woken up about midnight by the guy in the room over having an argument with his whore. He was yelling out ‘just take the f**king money’ and she was crying and carrying on. I’ve never used a prostitute in my life so I have no idea whether this kind of discussion between the prostitute and the client is unusual. Anyway, this went on for a bit and then I presume they reconciled things as about 15 minutes later we heard the bloke yelling out at the top of his lungs about how ‘f**king amazing’ it all was. My wife, who is a bit naive to the ways of the world, was pretty shook up by the whole thing. I had a quiet word with the concierge in the morning and I presume the guy was either moved, booted or told to keep it down as we didn’t hear anything again for the rest of our stay.
My point is that someone might not want to stay in a room next to a prostitute, not because they hate prostitutes, but for other reasons such as wanting to reduce the chance of being woken by their neighbours having sex during the night.
Rebel with cause
7 Aug 12 at 10:11 pm
This remindes me of the joke about the couple who visit a doctor about their problems with love making. They tell the doctor that sex is painful and offer to show him how they go about it. After 30 minutes of furious sex the doctor says “I can’t find anything wrong with what you were doing”.
The couple go away only to return the next week for another consultation. The same thing happens and they leave. This goes on every week for 3 straight months until finally the doctor has had enough and says “I cannot help you or your wife any further, you will have to go to another doctor for a second opinion”.
With that the man says ‘It’s okay Doc, this isn’t my wife she is my mistress. We can’t have sex at my place because I am married and we can’t have sex at her’s for the same reason”. the doctor screams “Well why have you come here”?
The man says” A motel room costs $150 but your room costs only $75 and we get $50 back from medicare”.
Splatacrobat
7 Aug 12 at 10:25 pm
Whatever happened to that reliable old standby “The management reserves the right to refuse service to anyone”.
Viva
7 Aug 12 at 10:33 pm
Can’t have the peasants deciding who they will and won’t associate with now can we.
twostix
7 Aug 12 at 10:40 pm
I wonder if the motel owner has any financing on the property?
Business and commercial financing generally has fairly tight conditions to ensure that asset values are not harmed. Generally the borrower agrees to inform the creditors of any material changes in usage or activities, and often requires the borrower to seek agreement from the creditor before any contemplated changes are implemented.
With this judgement, creditors now know that the owner is knowingly in breach of the conditions of the loan. Motel owner now loses his/her financing, business goes bust, hooker is out on the street. Premises are liquidated and the next poor sap goes through the same issues….
Keith
7 Aug 12 at 11:36 pm
A little different though. The John calls an out service and she goes to the hotel. It’s hardly the same as what was going on in ButtFuck though.
JC
8 Aug 12 at 12:03 am
Jarrah I am just saying that if you are going to have discrimination laws then they should apply just as much to occupations as they do to age, race or religion.
It would be quite easy for the hotel in question to have stopped her working there without telling her she couldn’t stay there. They can just forbid visitors. Hotels all over the world already do this for exactly this reason.
I agree and that’s why I generally don’t agree with laws against discrimination. I’d far prefer to fly in an aeroplane that banned kids, for example. I think your objection is reasonable and I would guess that there’s many people who would find my objection reasonable too.
There are plenty of good business reasons for discrimination in all sorts of businesses. Even for discrimination on the basis of race and religion. It would make good sense, for example, to not accept Japanese customers in a casino where most of your best customers were Chinese businessmen. They would just stop coming and you would lose money.
It would make good business sense to ban fat people from your buffet, since they are far likely to eat more and hurt your bottom line.
But for better or worse, we have laws banning these kind of business policies in place. Wishing they weren’t there doesn’t change the fact that the business discriminated against her by telling her that she wasn’t welcome back.
Yobbo
8 Aug 12 at 12:28 am
Yea, but the laws are generally not structured like that. They are specific to gender creed and color I think.
But you’re correct. There is no reason to tell the woman the reason why. Just don’t take the booking.
JC
8 Aug 12 at 12:31 am
I think they would have been fine if they just said “your room was left in a filthy state, you aren’t welcome back”. It was because she explicitly told her it was because she’s a prostitute that they got done.
I think the overcharging also made a difference.
In the original judgement they found in favour of the hotel because the judge found that Liquor Act preventing business other than accommodation nullified the anti-discrimination laws.
I wouldn’t be at all surprised to learn that the reason they got done on appeal is because they charged her $200 instead of the standard $135.
Yobbo
8 Aug 12 at 12:40 am
After all I think if you put up a sign on your pub that said “Free entry for whites – $20 for blacks”, you’d be in pretty serious trouble. I don’t think Ladies’ Nights are even legal here any more.
Yobbo
8 Aug 12 at 12:47 am
I can’t be bothered to read the details but if I was a motel owner I might have a concern that prostitution attracts a certain clientele and a certain class of entrepreneur who might consider a hostile takeover and expansion of the lady’s business as a viable option.
In other words, if I wanted my motel to be the kind of place that families stayed at (and felt safe at) I wouldn’t be keen to have a bunch of 1 percenters and other human detritus stinking up the place.
By the way, Infidel is exactly right when he draws an analogy with the whore’s (guaranteed) right to refuse clientele, but her desire to control the rights of the motel owners to refuse custom.
Abu Chowdah
8 Aug 12 at 1:23 am
Or Twostix:
Whoever said it, it goes to the heart of this bullshit case.
Abu Chowdah
8 Aug 12 at 1:25 am
She’s a hooker, who’s she going to refuse?
JC
8 Aug 12 at 1:27 am
Abu is right. There’s the rub, so to speak.
Let’s say she refused an Aboriginal client. Could he sue her for racial discrimination?
C.L.
8 Aug 12 at 1:30 am
Hookers can and do refuse trade, except in cases where they are slaves.
Abu Chowdah
8 Aug 12 at 1:33 am
For example, what about if some dude from the Church of Scientology wanted a root but said wearing a franger was against his “religion”? She could refuse the act. Or if some guy choked her during the act and she said “don’t come back”. Or if a 357kg male from Brisbane wanted to be on top?
None of the nanny-state interferiologists would have an issue with her exercising her right to dominion over trade matters pertaining to her delicate feminine attributes. This is the 21st century, folks, and we have evolved to a level of sophistication where we actively fight for a woman’s right to treat her body like a bedpan. The lady has rights your honour!
But some motel owner says, “right I was okay with it for a bit but all of these protein shake stains and poos stains on the sheets are getting a bit much, adios”…? That’s somehow an infringement on her to sell her minging muff as she sees fit.
Australia: a fucking toilet.
Abu Chowdah
8 Aug 12 at 1:40 am
Nah, Abu, she gives it all a hit with pine-o-kleen, every third client, needed or not. Sanitary and pine-forest fresh!
wreckage
8 Aug 12 at 1:57 am
I read the judgement – thanks for the link Gab.
What astonishes me is that it took 17 or 18 pages of legalese from a quasi-judicial official to make a decision which a real judge in a real court would have made with six words – fuck off with costs against you.
Common sense is rapidly disappearing from this society and with it people’s rights and freedoms. Civilised society will disappear with it.
Amortiser
8 Aug 12 at 2:01 am
That is the core of this discussion. Apparently, being opposed to your property being used as a brothel is the moral equivalent of apartheid. Really?
Just because an activity like prostitution is – rightly – legal doesn’t mean others should be forced to support it if they choose not to.
Yobbo and others seem stuck on the idea that moral objection to prostitution is wrong and outdated. Perhaps they are right. But what gives them the right to set the state on to people who disagree with them?
Matt
8 Aug 12 at 8:49 am
I’m embarrassed for you, Yob.
Abu Chowdah
8 Aug 12 at 8:53 am
WTF? So no business is allowed to charge different rates to different customers now?
Token
8 Aug 12 at 9:00 am
What a non-sequitur.
Token
8 Aug 12 at 9:01 am
You can disagree all you want. You just can’t act on it. The power to set the state on you if you do is contained in the anti-discrimination act.
You are of course free to do what you like in your own home, but if you own a business that is open to the public and then try and deny it to a certain class of people (e.g. Aboriginals, Jews, Homosexuals, Prostitutes) based on your personal dislike of them, you are going to run afoul of these laws.
So I would suggest that you don’t open such a business if you are unable to hold your nose, because that’s the way the law currently stands.
The business in question made 3 mistakes:
1.) They could have dealt with the problem by simply banning outside guests.
2.) They explicitly told her she wasn’t welcome back because she’s a prostitute.
3.) They charged her more because she’s a prostitute.
Yobbo
8 Aug 12 at 9:09 am
I think this is the problem. The State is now acting as her pimp!
.
8 Aug 12 at 9:14 am
Uncontested:
How dare she. And on her own property too.
Gab
8 Aug 12 at 9:16 am
prostitutes are now a ‘race’.
Gab
8 Aug 12 at 9:17 am
Where prostitutes gather drug dealers follow.
Then brawls.
Then women get agressively accosted.
Then protection steps in.
john malpas
8 Aug 12 at 9:26 am
The protection has already stepped in. The Government won’t let hotels charge discriminatory prices.
This is why this decision is so fucked up.
Where does this ever happen? It doesn’t even go in that order in the Cross.
.
8 Aug 12 at 9:32 am
Where drug dealers gather prostitutes follow.
Then protection steps in.
Then women get agressively accosted.
Then brawls.
Ref: ill spent youth
what planet am I on?
8 Aug 12 at 9:41 am
IT was right, she should’ve banned her because she smoked cigarettes, ate junk food, was heard to say something racist/homophobic or for one of the lefty/state approved reasons.
Token
8 Aug 12 at 9:55 am
Dot, my parents ran a motel when I was growing up. This is the truth. You didn’t want prozzies in your establishment as when they got set up all of the above happens and your other clients go elsewhere.
From my experiences the only other piece of the puzzle that is missing are the crooked cops that work in tandem with the 2 industries.
Token
8 Aug 12 at 9:58 am
Back then prostitution was illegal, no ifs or buts – not to mention unchecked police corruption.
.
8 Aug 12 at 10:03 am
Apparently so. Not wanting a prostitute plying their trade from your property (as opposed to simply using it as a place to stay) puts you on a par with the KKK. This is the sum of Yobbo’s argument.
Yobbo believes the right to use someone else’s property as a brothel outweighs the right of the property owner to object. No reason for why this should be the case has been supplied, of course.
I don’t disagree with you on this point. The power to set the state on to you is contained in the Act. My point is that I think this is wrong and the Act should be repealed. You appear to support this.
So you don’t have a problem the motel discriminating against prostitutes using their premises as a place of business as long as they do so in a sneaky, dishonest manner?
Matt
8 Aug 12 at 10:11 am
When I was in England not so long ago a bed-and-breakfast business was being fined for, on the husband and wife owners’ strict religious beliefs, not wanting to let a room in their home to a homosexual couple and telling them to go elsewhere
In such a situation of small business, would you also find yourself being forced to share your home with a prostitute, even a homosexual prostitute? Seems you would have to do so if your home was also any sort of accommodation business.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
8 Aug 12 at 10:18 am
No he doesn’t.
Nor would you if you were a hotel owner and a solicitor told you the same.
There is a reason why Virgin has such odd recruitment policies for interviews. They get to discriminate against old boilers under the pretext that they are not “outgoing” enough.
Unless the law gets changed making a martyr of yourself may not do anything – the States basically have unlimited powers to create laws that enforce discrimination or non discrimination. In fact you really need to start thinking in terms of constitutional rights to privacy and free association etc.
Regardless of if you think this has parallels with the civil rights movement, the fact is such a decision has cut across business’ interests to charge preferential or non preferential prices.
Seems like really religious people aren’t cut out for this sort of work.
How many straight guys say “come on darling, let’s go to a B&B”
Hahahaha!
.
8 Aug 12 at 10:37 am
“prostitutes are now a ‘race’.”
Keep up the reading lessons. Yobbo said “class of people”, and gave as examples one race, a religion, a sexual orientation, and a profession.
Jarrah
8 Aug 12 at 10:47 am
Point to where he has defended the right of the motel owner to prohibit whatever activity he or she wishes, please? He has consistently spoken in favour of the Act.
I have never said that the motelier was right in law. My claim is that the motelier should have the right to discriminate on whatever basis he or she sees fit.
Why should they be forced to resort to such subterfuge? Let them hire and fire at will.
Matt
8 Aug 12 at 10:52 am
Yep, a profession is now the moral equivalent of a “race”. Both are “classes of people” equally deserving of protection. Seriously?
Matt
8 Aug 12 at 10:58 am
“Yep, a profession is now the moral equivalent of a “race”.”
I didn’t say that. I was correcting a falsehood.
Jarrah
8 Aug 12 at 11:07 am
They even have tourist tours, where you can take a tour of the brothel and the whole business (no pun intended) is explained to you.
You can rent a room there too and make naughty movies, if you are so inclined.
But this
hookersexual intercourse seller has her own property, she should be operating out of that if her business is so inoffensive, and not out of this motel.Some hotels in Darwin have installed a key card entry for the lift, so only guests can proceed to the rooms. Now I understand why.
Helen Armstrong
8 Aug 12 at 11:27 am
Common in hotels and smarter apartment blocks worldwide, Helen. Stops thieves and conmen too. But can easily be circumvented by greeting ‘guests’ in the lobby and taking them up. You have to do this anyway for legitimate guests. I guess a hooker operating on the sort of business model JC envisages the motel occupant to be running would be a bit obvious in a swanky lobby though, acting as a sort of elevator operator.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
8 Aug 12 at 11:52 am
Apparently, according to the Oz, she’s now trying to get $30,000 compensation. This case knows no boundaries of common sense. How is she possibly due that kind of money that, presumably, the motel owners will have to find from their own resources? I agree with previous posters: make the “guests” register and make sure they know they’re on security cameras.
Fred C Dobbs
8 Aug 12 at 11:54 am
Da Ape once had to do some business one evening in our posh hotel room, signing deals etc, and I said I would sit downstairs in the lobby for an hour or so. There were uniformed staff who sort of kept looking at me, wondering probably what I was up to. Felt a bit like Pretty Woman, wanted da Ape to come over and deal with them, flash a black Amex and say ‘what’s it to you, Charlie? She’s with me’ in a threatening tone and get them to be all nice and obsequious as they are paid to be.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
8 Aug 12 at 12:04 pm
No, he hasn’t.
He agrees with the spirit of it.
Trust me, Yobbo is very libertarian.
He doesn’t agree with the law.
I agree – so does Yobbo. Now if your solicitor came up with the bright idea, would you get around the law or martyr yourself?
Remember State legislatures have plenary power to give and take away nearly any right as they please.
This is why it is so bizarre. The decision has actually made all hoteliers suffer a potential loss to future earnings in the form of third degree price discrimination.
Anyone who has been on a sporting tour knows clever drunks can game these systems. Sober Johns and hookers should be twice as clever.
.
8 Aug 12 at 12:26 pm
If this whore had any business nous she’d buy a Winnebago and offer her wares out of there.
Infidel Tiger
8 Aug 12 at 12:47 pm
If she took that path, do you think the councils will be charging her for usage of public spaces like they do to personal trainers?
Token
8 Aug 12 at 1:04 pm
“The business in question made 3 mistakes:
1.) They could have dealt with the problem by simply banning outside guests.
2.) They explicitly told her she wasn’t welcome back because she’s a prostitute.
3.) They charged her more because she’s a prostitute.”
I wonder if the truth is that 2 is the reason because 1 is hard to do and 3 is for the extra costs from laundry and such.
Pedro
8 Aug 12 at 1:58 pm
The only solution is to pit one current fad against another – in this case the dreaded “Occupational Health and Safety” as against Universal Non Negotiable Non Discrimination.
So – what about the possibility of housemaids coming across used needles, used condoms, blood and other bodily fluids, aggressive drunks wandering the corridors etc etc?
Viva
8 Aug 12 at 2:12 pm
This is getting way out of control. Possibility of housemaids coming across used needles, etc., etc., think of people who go to Motels to book in and commit suicide, think Brett Whiteley.
Look, I used to accompany my former husband on trips to Melbourne for the tennis, we used to entertain. Stayed at 5 star hotels in Collins Street, have you seen the comings and goings there. Aircrew stayed there, Tennis pros stayed there, I’m sure Union members stayed there with credit card use. All things go on there. We had two lots of knock on our doors, someone looking for ‘the party’. Phoned down to reception to complain, it was 1.00 am in the morning. They couldnt care less. I am not sympathetic with the Sex worker, however if you go into any hospitality business nowadays, you have to be aware of all sorts of goings on. Maybe the owners should have had a quite friendly chat with the sex worker and done a deal. Anyway maybe they (the owners) can still appeal.
delfino
8 Aug 12 at 2:39 pm
There are 1 percenters involved in prostitution in the ACT. The boring old ACT. Where slags gather, shitbirds are soon to follow.
Abu Chowdah
8 Aug 12 at 6:51 pm
I don’t agree. The hotelier shouldn’t have to film their guests in order to discourage prostitution. That’s could make regular guests feel uncomfortable.
Sinclair’s example of running a convenience store out of the hotel room nicely encapsulates the absurdity of the decision.
dd
8 Aug 12 at 7:00 pm
could you unpack that a bit?
dd
8 Aug 12 at 7:04 pm
You should have read a book while you sat there, Lizzie. It is a sure fire way to distinguish a normal person from a tramp or Labor voter.
Abu Chowdah
8 Aug 12 at 7:07 pm
Yeah, Abu, I guess a gossip magazine doesn’t cut it.
Too un-serious.
Actually, after about half an hour of it I solved the problem myself in the end simply by calling the ugly one over, ordering a cup of coffee and giving him our room number for the purchase. Pretty Woman fantasy was over then. I was legit. A paying customer. All they needed to know.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
8 Aug 12 at 7:38 pm
It doesn’t actually, because we haven’t seen the actual decision.
The decision linked to in the original post found in favour of the hotellier, for exactly the reason you describe. Namely, under the liquor act, it’s illegal to provide any business except accommodation in a licensed venue.
I don’t think anyone has seen the appeal judgement yet, so we’re only guessing as to why it was reversed, and my guess is that it was because of the differential pricing.
Yobbo
8 Aug 12 at 7:52 pm
I have already said earlier in this thread that I don’t agree with anti-discrimination laws. I’m not going to point to it, find it yourself.
Yobbo
8 Aug 12 at 7:53 pm
The problem is, how does a hotelier differentiate between a hooker and client from, say, two lovers are simply renting a room for sex? Why is one okay and not the other? How could a hotelier possibly tell the difference, and do they have a right to make such a judgement call?
dd
8 Aug 12 at 8:37 pm
Making the Washington Post:
Australian court rules motel owner can’t ban prostitute from taking clients to her room.
C.L.
8 Aug 12 at 11:36 pm
DD
A hooker needs lots of johns which therefore means a lot of unusual traffic in and out of the room and possibly thumping noises all through the night.
Come on, you’re smart, you freaking work it out.
JC
8 Aug 12 at 11:39 pm
[...] insist that reasonable conditions are met in exchange for their services – like that their rooms aren’t used to run other businesses. And freedom of association means that you should never have to associate with someone you don’t [...]
Property rights trumped again
9 Aug 12 at 1:00 pm
Golly, I don’t know where to start.
So many misinformed comments……
Shame I didn’t have time or rapid internet connection when this was being discussed!
Steve at the Pub
10 Aug 12 at 12:34 pm
[...] Catallaxy Files (“Australia’s leading libertarian and centre-right blog”). [...]
Australia: Great moments in discrimination law - Overlawyered
13 Aug 12 at 9:15 am