The Walloon government approved a law seeking to develop and perpetuate subsidies for aggregated support and care services for prostitutes through field associations. The annual budget assigned to subsidise aggregated services will increase from 430,000 euros in 2015 to 710,000 euros at the end of the legislative period. Seven services and twelve posts (to become mobile) will also be distributed within the Walloon territory (for three aggregated services in 2015).
Furthermore, the law will allow perpetuating the operations of aggregated services through an annual renewal of the subsidies available. As a result, the associations will no longer face, each year, a long administrative process in order to obtain the subsidies, as long as they fulfil the objectives stated in the decree of March 27th, 2014 which created the support and care services for prostitutes, stated the Minister of Social Action, Maxime Prévot, in a communiqué.
The approvals and support of the associations are within the framework of the Federal Plan for Combatting Gender-based Violence and the Intra-francophone Plan for Combatting Sexist Violence.
“It was important to allow an expansion of health support and social accompaniment of persons made vulnerable through prostitution. The aim is also to provide the field associations with the means to confront the issues related to the new forms of prostitution (of students, through social networks, etc.) and to expand their geographic coverage,” said the cdH minister.
(Source: Belga)
