Network uproar over Westminster Councils phone card tricks

Westminster has embarked on a campaign to get networks to bar phone numbers that appear on prostitutes calling cards posted in phone boxes.

The council has picketed phone stores and distributed mock tart cards to charities and the general public bearing the names and numbers of network bosses.

In its stunt Westminster printed 20000 calling cards with the business phone numbers of network heads Arun Sarin (Vodafone) Brian McBride (T-Mobile) Sanjiv Ahuja (Orange) David McGlade (O2) and Bob Fuller (3). Chief executives of NTL and Telewest have also been targeted. Westminster hopes that complaints to the networks management will spur them into action.

Quipped Brian McBride: Ive had no phone calls at all. My friends and family have stopped calling now they think I am mixed up with prostitutes and Westminster MPs.

He went on in a more serious vein: It was a very clumsy and ill-informed piece of electioneering.

The Council said it had produced the cards because the network chiefs should be held publicly accountable.

In an unfortunate turn of phrase a spokesman for Westminster City Council said:

We will keep this up until they pull their fingers out and calls to these numbers are barred. They talk about social responsibility on their websites and it is about time they put this into practice. Because it hasnt been legislated the networks have been slow to cooperate.

He went on: Prostitution relies on anonymity. These companies must bar the numbers and help break up the sex industry.

But the operators have accused Westminster of drumming up a media frenzy and making demands they say are unreasonable and which they claim could be counter-productive.

It is a media frenzy and smacks of political expediency because it is to do with sex and is something everyone dislikes said a spokesman for Vodafone.

It is not true that we have refused to talk to Westminster. We have not received a single enquiry as a result of the councils action.

Vodafone does not normally get involved with interpreting the legality of issues that are the territory of law enforcement authorities.

Other considerations are the safety of prostitutes and the danger of inadvertently barring numbers that have no association with either carding or prostitution.

Westminster has claimed that both 3 and NTL have agreed to bar phone numbers. 3 denied this however and was angry that Westminster suggested that it had acted in response to the campaign.

We have already been trying to talk with the council so trying to claim that as a victory is not right said a 3 spokesperson.

Our door has always been open to dialogue. We are still waiting for them to get in touch. We arranged to meet them as long ago as March but no one from the council turned up because of a mix-up with the dates on their part. We have followed up that initial meeting with legal queries.

We cant just cut off phone lines and accuse people of being prostitutes. We are happy to work with the council but there are legal and data protection issues. We are perplexed by the method and approach that Westminster has taken given that we are awaiting guidance from the council on how to tackle certain issues.

We would be in breach of contract by disconnecting customers without proof that the numbers are being used for criminal activity.

3 is happy to iron out these issues and to engage in dialogue with Westminster but we have been trying to contact it since April and it hasnt responded or attended meetings. We are dismayed that it has chosen this course of action when 3 has been willing to work with the council on the issue.

In a statement O2 said:

We strongly reject the suggestion that we do not take our responsibilities seriously with regard to crime prevention. O2 continues to be at the forefront of measures to tackle areas such as handset theft as well as child protection.

Cutting off lines would set an uncomfortable precedent for those in other unpopular but legal activities. Anyone who puts a card up in a phonebox whether for malicious reasons or as the result of a practical joke would be cut off.

T-Mobile said it would only bar numbers in legitimate cases.

Orange said disconnecting prostitutes mobile numbers would simply mean they would buy new SIM cards for 10 and a rise in the number of phonebox cards in circulation because all new numbers would have to be advertised.