The massage parlours acting as fronts for brothels in Cairns

At least 12 “massage centres” across Cairns are acting as fronts for brothels with some overtly advertising sexual services and making $10,000 in a matter of days.

Legal brothels accounts for just 10 per cent of the sex work industry in Queensland.

At least 12 “massage centres” across Cairns are acting as fronts for brothels, an investigation has revealed.

The businesses are advertising their services in the escort sections freely on many personals and classified websites.

A Cairns Post investigation found 12 businesses which operate as “massage centres”, according to their shopfront or online but advertise and offer sexual services on escort websites.

Cairns no longer has a legal brothel since Northern Belle closed in 2021, which limits options for professional sex workers.

Emma Bennett, from the Queensland Adult Business Association and owner of the only legal brothel in North Queensland, Onyxx, based in Townsville, said unlicensed brothels posed a potential health risk and may involve “sex work for survival”.

“We are highly regulated and are regularly audited,” Ms Bennett, said.

“These places, for instance, are often known to not require men to wear condoms which they are required to wear by law in a legal brothel.

“Some of these places are making $10,000 in a couple of days. If they get shut down they just open somewhere else.”

But #DecrimQLD campaign leader Janelle Fawkes said the current licensing system was flawed and “reduces financial viability and sex workers’ options”.

Massage centres are acting as fronts for brothels, an investigation has found. Picture: Generic

“Some sex workers choose to work in massage parlours because they can get a higher percentage or cut from the price of a booking, and others choose to work independently in order not to share the booking price with a brothel owner,” Ms Fawkes said.

One such operation trades under one name as a shopfront but advertises its services with several different names online.

The Cairns Post understands the premises charges $40 for a massage but also offers its customers sexual services, up to $250 for intercourse.

Online, the business says it has been operating for 11 years and is one of the “earliest rub shops” in Cairns.

Among the host of “male grooming” centres in Cairns advertising on escort websites is a business which uses its usual retail name in the escort services section on several websites, where it offers an “Intro for Prostate Service, hope can treat your coldness, premature ejaculation, and urinary tract obstruction” and the “sexual pleasure gained by rub the prostrate is clinically called the ‘prostate orgasm’.”.

Similarly, another business offering “Thai Massage”, advertises online that it does an “authentic prostrate service” to achieve “prostate orgasm”.

Another operation offers “massage services” but says it also provides “dinner companion, overnight stays, sexy shower for two, police women and boot worship”.

Legitimate massage parlours are understood to be suffering as a result of the underground brothels. Picture: Generic

Another says it offers “mens grooming” (sic) under the escort services section and says it charges “$350 for an hour”.

While another promotes its massage therapists this way: “Today, We have a young, beautiful, skinny and sexy girl... from Cambodia. She is 21 years old”.

The illicit sex work industry in Queensland is much bigger than the limited, legalised services available under current laws.

Across Queensland there are just 20 licensed brothels – which industry insiders say accounts for a mere 10 per cent of the industry.

Prostitution is legal in Queensland if provided in licensed brothels or by sole-operator sex workers.

Each person involved in operating the brothel must have their own license.

However, licences are expensive – they cost up to $40,000 – and some say are overly onerous in their regulations.

This current licensing system, along with the Prostitution Licensing Authority, could be scrapped after the state government announced in April it would decriminalise sex work following a Queensland Law Reform Commission report.

It likely means places like those being advertised will be able to operate legally, advertise with full disclosure and open away from the current designated industrial areas, where brothels are currently limited to.

While Ms Fawkes believes the decriminalisation of sex work will allow sex workers to work legally in groups and thus improve safety, Ms Bennett is not so sure.

“I’m worried about how these places will be regulated going forward, how they will be made accountable and whether this will reduce police powers to deal with unsafe practices and sex trafficking,” she said.

Originally published as The massage parlours acting as fronts for brothels in Cairns