Feminist Inquiry into violence against sex workers in Australia and Thailand
CEVAW is conducting a Feminist Inquiry into Violence Against Sex Workers in Australia and Thailand on 21–22 July 2026. The Inquiry is organised by Dr Debolina Dutta in consultation and collaboration with Scarlet Alliance (Australia), Empower Foundation, and the Asia Pacific Network of Sex Workers (Thailand), and is supported by partner organisation Thammasat University. It is co-sponsored by Urgent Action Fund (Asia and Pacific) and Women’s Fund Asia.
The Inquiry will hear testimonies from sex worker organisations to examine how violence is experienced, how different areas of law intersect with sex workers’ lives, and what legal strategies enable these communities to survive and thrive. It will also document what sex workers themselves identify as violence in their specific contexts, and what they see as priorities for legal reform.
The findings will inform the upcoming Victorian legislative review of sex work decriminalisation and support sex worker-led mobilisation for decriminalisation in Thailand, including for Thai migrant sex workers who move across the Asia Pacific region.
The Inquiry will be heard by the following panel:
Marcia Neave (Inquiry Chair) is a law reformer, public policy maker, a former judge, and academic. After nine years on the Supreme Court of Victoria, Court of Appeals Division, she was appointed to the role of Commissioner of the Victorian Royal Commission into Family Violence. In 2021, she was named as President and Commissioner of the Commission of Inquiry into the Tasmanian Government’s Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Institutional Settings.
Fiona Patten is a former sex worker, sex worker rights advocate and an Australian politician. Fiona led the Victorian governments’ review into the decriminalisation of sex work. She was the leader of Reason Australia and was a member of the Victorian Legislative Council between 2014 and 2022.
Pranom ‘Bee’ Somwong is a Thai feminist lawyer and woman human rights defender with over twenty years of experience advancing women’s human rights, migrant & refugee justice, and the protection of community-based defenders, particularly in the context of climate justice and corporate accountability. She serves as the Thailand Representative of Protection International and is a board member of Urgent Action Fund Asia & Pacific.
Her work centres on feminist legal strategies, holistic protection of human rights defenders, social movement building, and challenging criminalisation and structural violence affecting women, communities, and grassroots movements.
Christine Robinson is a Bundjalung woman and CEO of Wirringa Baiya, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women’s community legal centre. She is also a member of the Domestic Violence Death Review Team (NSW).
Heather Douglas is Professor at the Melbourne Law School and a Chief Investigator at CEVAW, and a leading expert in the field of family violence.
After hearing and reading all the testimonies, the panellists will collectively produce a report with recommendations for law and policy transformation and advocacy, to be shared with all relevant stakeholders.
The Inquiry is also supported by MSI Australia.
MSI Australia’s partnership with CEVAW and Melbourne Law School is an extension of our mission to ensure financial hardship is never a barrier to reproductive choice. MSI Australia stands for reproductive justice for all, delivering accredited services, compassionate care and reproductive equality through our non-profit mission. MSI Australia offers the only national reproductive healthcare safety net for women in need – the Australian Choice Fund. Our Choice Fund supports women in Australia, who would otherwise fall through the cracks, to access safe and compassionate reproductive care. With your support, our Choice Fund will ensure all women who need reproductive support can access safe and timely care. For more information on our mission and to donate, please visit > Donate – MSI Australia