After two years of studying prostitution in Montreal, a panel of experts has recommended the city quit trying to regulate the sex trade through the courts. It wants police and prostitutes working in downtown Montreal to co-operate to solve problems of violence, rather than treating each other as enemies.

The report says prostitution is being driven further into the shadows since a police crackdown began 15 years ago. Prostitution tends to flourish in neighbourhoods of chronic poverty and jail cells do nothing to prevent it, says the report.

The task force wants police and community workers to patrol together Montreal's high prostitution areas. If problems arise between citizens and the sex-trade workers, the team will encourage people to meet and to take responsibility to solve their differences.

The Montreal Police Department likes the plan, saying it will allow police to get along better with the prostitutes and will open the door to allow the women to report robberies or rapes.

The proposal is also being welcomed by a coalition of sex workers because it treats prostitutes as members of a community. A woman who simply wants to be called "Anna Louise," says Montreal prostitutes believe this new approch will make the streets safer.

"We're open to it, not because we think it will be fully effective, but because the situation we're in now is incredibly dangerous for sex workers."

The plan for more co-operation between police and prostitutes still has to clear the political hurdles at Montreal City Council. But with police themselves supporting it, observers expect little opposition.