Liverpool is notorious for being the city with the highest population density of sex workers in the UK. In the infamous red light district in Sheil Road in the city, there are hundreds of sex workers looking for business every day.
A new documentary produced by the BBC tells the sad tale of a prostitute soliciting clients on the street, who despairs the cut-throat competition caused by the influx of Eastern European women, driving down market price to just 4 pounds (approximately 10 USD) for each transaction. The meager salary they earn can’t even buy them a meal.
The documentary features Natalie who is addicted to drugs and has to sell her body for money to afford them. She usually works on Sheil Road. In the interview she could not hold back her tears when she complained about the massive inflow of Eastern European women, forcing her to lower her price to retain business. She earns as low as 4 pounds in each sexual transaction now.
Liam who lives on Sheil Road, agreed that most sex workers are willing to take just 4 pounds in order to make ends meet. Natalie’s roommate Jack added that in recent years many immigrants from Serbia and Croatia came over and scrambled for sex clients, many of them are very pretty and addicted to drugs, which mean they are desperate for money and will cut their price for more customers.
Another woman Hayley said, she had been in the sex industry for 15 years, and in order to buy drugs she will perform oral sex for clients for just 10 pounds (approximately 100 HKD), and even so it is often not easy to earn 60 pounds in one night, because Eastern European women will do anything for just 8 pounds
Natalie said in the end of the interview that she had already forgotten what it feels like to be respected, because nowadays whenever someone opens his arms to her, it is when she is dragged onto bed. A day in her life would start with waking up, putting on clothes, and end with having sex with different men.
LONDON (AP) — Britain's Conservative Party, which governed the country from 2010 until it suffered its worst-ever electoral defeat two years ago, was plunged into fresh turmoil Thursday after its leader sacked the man widely seen as her greatest rival for apparently plotting to defect from the party. He then defected.
Robert Jenrick, the Conservative Party’s justice spokesperson, confirmed his defection at a subsequent press briefing of Reform UK, the upstart hard-right party led by Nigel Farage.
Jenrick said the Conservative Party had “betrayed its voters and members” and was “in denial, or being dishonest” about what it had done on an array of issues, including the economy and immigration.
“After the election, I hoped the Conservative Party would change, reckon with our mistakes with humility, repent,” he said. “I said this after the election, fought for it, hoped it would be possible. But over the last year, I’ve realized this was naive. It hasn’t happened.”
Jenrick joins a string of Conservative politicians, many of whom lost their seats at the July 2024 general election, to have made the move to Reform UK, a party that has put clamping down on immigration at the heart of its agenda for government.
Critics, including Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer, argue that Reform UK is becoming a lifeboat for failed Conservative politicians who have concluded they have no future in the party. Starmer refers to the Conservative Party as a “sinking ship.”
Though Reform UK only has a handful of lawmakers in the House of Commons, it is leading both the governing Labour Party and the Conservatives in opinion polls ahead of a raft of elections on May 7, including for the parliaments in Scotland and Wales.
Farage said the door to further Conservative defections was open but would close on that election day, Britain's equivalent to the U.S. midterms.
A day of high drama on the right of British politics started when Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said she sacked Jenrick due to “irrefutable evidence that he was plotting in secret to defect" in a way that was “designed to be as damaging as possible” to the party.
Badenoch will be hoping her abrupt and straightforward sacking of Jenrick will help bolster her position as the leader of the Conservative Party, often referred to as the Tory Party, and regain supporters lost to Reform UK. She added that Farage won't find it easy keeping Jenrick onside.
“All I would say to Nigel is, Rob’s not my problem anymore," she said. "He’s your problem.”
The Conservative Party is no stranger to turmoil, having gone through six leaders in 10 years, five of them serving as prime minister. Widespread anger at the way the Conservatives were governing Britain led to their heavy election defeat in 2024, their worst since the modern party was created nearly 200 years ago.
Badenoch, a small-state, low-tax advocate, has not made much of a mark in the country since she beat Jenrick to become leader of the Conservatives in late 2024. However, she has been making a better impression in recent weeks, particularly during her weekly questioning of Starmer.
For Starmer, Jenrick's defection provides a distraction from the grind of government. Starmer, whose favorability ratings have fallen sharply since the general election following a series of missteps, questioned why it took Badenoch “so long” to sack Jenrick given all the speculation that he was looking to either challenge her or to defect
Thursday’s tussle between the Conservatives and Reform UK appears to have put to rest to any idea that the two parties will form an alliance of the right ahead of the next general election, which has to take place by 2029. That means the vote on the right would remain split, potentially helping Labour.
Robert Jenrick speaking at a Reform UK press conference in Westminster, London, where it was announced the former Conservative MP has joined Reform UK, Thursday, Jan. 15, 2026. (Jordan Pettitt/PA via AP)
Robert Jenrick with Reform UK leader Nigel Farage at a Reform UK press conference in Westminster, London, where it was announced the former Conservative MP has joined Reform UK, Thursday, Jan. 15, 2026. (Jordan Pettitt/PA via AP)
Reform Party leader Nigel Farage addresses protesters outside the Iranian embassy, in London, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026. (Yui Mok/PA via AP)
Kemi Badenoch with Robert Jenrick before being announced as the new Conservative Party leader following the vote by party members at 8 Northumberland Avenue in central London, Nov. 3, 2024. (Stefan Rousseau/PA via AP)
