Hard-up students are signing up for escort agencies to sell their bodies BEFORE they have even arrived at university
Brothel madam reports surge in enquiries as undergraduates prepare to begin their studies
HARD-UP students are signing up to escort agencies BEFORE they’ve even arrived at university, The Sun can reveal.
Certain cost-conscious undergraduates - facing tuition fees of £9,000-a-year - are shunning traditional low-paid jobs like bar work for the much more lucrative adult industry - where they can earn up to £1,000 a night.
The boss of a high class escort agency in Leeds – where students will begin arriving this week – told The sun she’d had a steady stream of enquiries from women and men looking to be added to her books.
The madam said: “I’ve had about two dozen emails and phone calls. Most were from women in their 20s who are mature students without mum and dad to fall back on.
“Others were school-leavers – girls and some lads too – whose parents simply can’t afford to pay the bills for them to learn. Quite a few asked to be put on the books even before they’d arrived in Leeds.
“Students working as escorts tend to be on the medical courses – nursing, physiotherapy and even medicine as they seem to be more broadminded and less squeamish, if you like.”
The agency boss said her girls can earn up to £1,000-a-night – as opposed to a £50 shop shift.
She said: “It gives the girls the cash they need for the of minimum hours. The ones on my books like the freedom because it means they can concentrate on their studies. Plus, all my clients are hand-picked so the girls feel safe.”
Last year a study found more than a fifth of students had thought about being involved in the sex industry.
About 6,750 students from across the UK took part in an online study by Swansea University.
It claimed nearly five percent of them had actually worked in the sex industry.
Work ranged from stripping, phone sex chat, erotic dancing to prostitution.
It included escort work but also work, which did not involve direct contact, such as webcam work and glamour modelling.
The Student Sex Work Project was carried out by Swansea University's Centre for Criminal Justice and Criminology and funded by the Big Lottery Fund.
Steve Jones, director at Terrence Higgins Trust Cymru, said students needed support to ensure they had the knowledge and confidence to protect themselves from sexually transmitted infections.
"It has long been the assumption that young people who enter the sex industry do so to fund basic living expenses.
"However, this research shows young people's reasons for entering sex work, and their motivations for remaining in it, are more complex."
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