With support from Manchester Action on Street Health (MASH) police have managed to help street prostitutes. In the recreation room the conversation is easy and the atmosphere is light thanks to the dedicated volunteers. He says: “We recently supported a lad who was persuaded to meet up with a client, they became obsessed with him, started calling him 20 times a day and then threatened to send the pictures to a close relative. Fergal McCullough is director of charity The Men’s Room and supports male sex workers through creative engagement, outreach sessions, and advocacy support.

Police know the women by name and look out for them. But if I was to take them around Manchester they would not know who any of the lads are,” he says. Rooms or flats within a building which are let separately to different individuals offering sexual services can also count as a brothel. Chorlton Water Park: Situated in the south of Manchester, Chorlton Water Park is a nature reserve with walking trails and a lake. Some parts of the park, especially the more wooded areas, are known for cruising activity, mainly during the evenings and weekends. While they would previously have met men working on the streets to offer advice face to face, they now reach out through instant messaging apps like Whatsapp. There are also general laws on public nuisance and decency which can be used to target the sex trade. What is a brothel?Gay or straight they all have one thing in common, they will easily be able to make money selling their bodies. In Manchester, there are several spots known for gay cruising, and it's important to approach these spaces with respect and discretion. Please note that engaging in sexual activity in public places is illegal in the United Kingdom and can result in fines or criminal charges.

One particularly startling statistic is that many of these men told charity workers they started doing sex work from as young as 14. Inevitably many of them are in care. I’ve had people say ‘If I fancy him I won’t charge him’. That’s the reality for a young, out, gay sex worker. Some even see sex work almost as a right of passage. DC Nield explains: “A lot of the time we find out about pop up brothels because neighbours don’t want it on their street. The girls working in these premises are looked upon as a problem rather than human beings. Everyone surrounding them hates them because they are causing a problem in the area. Popa, 30, organised the operation while Diac, 28, acted as a ‘telephone receptionist’ for potential customers from rented houses in Levenshulme, Longsight and Rusholme.Manchester’s troubling homelessness problem has led to a rise in so-called ‘survival sex’ where young men, often with drug and alcohol problems, are forced to sell themselves to live. It’s part of a huge increase in male sex workers. Many, but not all, of these are run by violent and bullying pimps and populated by vulnerable Eastern European women. They are hard to trace and even harder to shut down for officers faced with frightened women, who speak limited English and don’t trust the police. We need to stress the violence and stigma faced by sex workers who are all really brave, funny, kind women.

Canal Street, located in the heart of Manchester, is the focal point of the Gay Village. Lined with numerous bars, clubs, and restaurants, it offers a variety of entertainment options for visitors. Some popular venues include Via, G-A-Y, and The New Union. Fergal says there is a broad spectrum of male sex workers across the city but there are two common patterns. And then there were brothels, in many cases operated with the tacit knowledge of the police as long as they were drug-free and didn’t use underage girls. They’ve had information from people working in dilapidated properties such as carpenters and plasterers - and some of their best successes have come from nosy neighbours. He explains two of the very distinct problems - those working on the streets and those working in pop-up brothels.Manchester’s homelessness problem is feeding the rise with experts predicting more than two thirds of them have slept rough or lost their home at some point. MASH, which supports sex workers across the city, helped 350 women last year. Over the last six months, the charity’s homelessness worker has managed to support 14 women in getting off the street and into housing. Though some of the women are rough sleepers many sofa surf, stay with punters or remain in abusive relationships. Many women still work in Manchester’s traditional red light districts behind Piccadilly train station, near Strangeways and along Cheetham Hill Road. Running a brothel, being raped while working as a prostitute, paying for sex - stories from the sex trade Romanian couple Alexe Popa and Gabriela Diac were last week convicted for operating pop-up brothels around south Manchester and employing Eastern European women as prostitutes.