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Struggling Liverpool students are turning to the sex trade to fund their education, a Sunday ECHO investigation today reveals.

The numbers of students working as so-called ‘escorts’ has boomed – with dozens selling their menu of sex services on grubby online adults-only websites.

Some escorts can earn up to £1,000 a week – and collect as much in one hour as they can in 12 on a minimum wage job.

We today reveal:

- The escort agency advertising “fresh faced, beautiful” Liverpool university students.

- How college girls aged as young as 18 and 19 are selling sex.

- How one student we interviewed says she knows the dangers but says the money outweighs the risk..

- How the economic climate is forcing women, both young and old, into prostitution.

Annie– not her real name – is 22. She turned to escorting as means to fulfil her dream of qualifying as a psychologist.

She offers herself as an escort in Liverpool – with rates ranging from £40 for 15 minutes ’ to £450 for an overnight stay.

And little is off limits.

“I want to be a psychologist or a doctor and this is how I plan to pay for it,” she said.

The English Collective of Prostitutes, which campaigns for sex workers’ rights, told how a paucity of jobs and high tuition fees meant more and more students had turned to prostitution to avoid becoming saddled with debt.

Calls to their helpline have trebled since 2011.

Sarah Walker, from the ECP, said: “Most are actually working for themselves or through agencies. It’s not that they are being coercedby force – it’s the economic climate that’s forcing women to weigh up their options.

“Traditional high-street jobs are scarce – we heard of one bar job that had 800 applicants – and these women know that they can earn 500 times more than stacking shelves in a Tesco supermarket.

“In 2011 we reviewed our log of calls from student sex workers and we thought they had increased by around a third.

“They are both young students and mature students with kids who are going back to try and get a degree, a certificate or skill.

“There has probably been a similar increase since 2011. They call about safety, that’s a primary concern, and they want to know about the laws.”

Prostitution itself is not illegal. However, “controlling” prostitution is. One escort agency’s terms state: “Money exchanged in legal adult personal services is for time and companionship – anything else that takes place is a matter of personal choice between two or more consulting adults of legal age.”

One Liverpool escort agency tells customers “looking to date an intelligent escort” that the “university in Liverpool is one that is the crème de la crème”.

“We have fresh faced beautiful students with not only beauty but also brains,” it brags.

Further enquiries made by the ECHO revealed that the agency had students working both day and night. “The 1st hour is £100 and any extra hour is £80,” we were told.

Posing as a would-be student escort, our reporter Catherine – a Liverpool university graduate – rang the agency to enquire about signing up.

She was told students from Liverpool, Manchester and Oxford were among the 50 escorts on its books.

Catherine said: “The madam at the end of the line was pretty frank on the profession.

“Potential escorts are usually grilled over an extensive hour-long interview, in which looks, weight, style and class are closely scrutinised to make sure their girls are desirable for their middle-class clientele.

“I was encouraged to visit their office for a formal interview, but the fact their oldest client is 92 sent shivers down my spine."

One city madam who runs six escort girls told how the number of students turning to sex work had continued to grow.

Asked if people would be surprised at the levels of students in the sex trade , she replied: “Yes, very”.

She said: “It’s tripled every year for the last three years. There’s not many jobs out there and this is the one paid job they can do.

“It’s easy money. They can make a lot – it just depends on how they look and how they perform.”

One online profile, freely available to view after a simple registration process, purports to be from a 19-year-old Liverpool girl.

“I recently decided [to] start escorting again as I just missed the sex and having fun and meeting all you lovely gentlemen,” it reads.

"I am studying theatrical make up at college and I really enjoy it but I enjoy being a sexy minx much more."

Some students approached by the ECHO declined to speak out. One said: “I do this very discreetly and I wish to keep it that way. Too many things could go wrong if I spoke”.

The student union NUS has launched a research project aimed at better analysing the numbers of students involved in sex work.

They said: “Most of what we know about students working in the sex industry is anecdotal, we want to move beyond hearsay.”

The dark world of a call girl: this is dangerous work but it pays the bills

A city escort today lifted the lid on the seedy world of vice, admitting: “I don’t want to do this – but the money is too good to turn down”.

Annie – not her real name – is 22 and, like many young women, advertises sex services online.

She was top of her class at school and speaks two languages – her intention is to eventually become a psychologist.

For now, though, she earns around £800-£1,000 a week, selling sex to men as young as 26 and as old as 68.

But Annie, who lives in Liverpool, admits the world of prostitution is “dark” and “needs highlighting”.

She told the ECHO: “While I’m going to be doing my studies, I’m going to be doing this to make things easier for myself.

“If I have to use men to get what I want then so be it – women have been doing that for ever.”

“The money outweighs the negative side. It’s sex. It’s fun. I just think in my head ‘it’s a job’.”

Annie is among dozens of students and would-be students using websites to advertise their services.

Many escorts showcase scantily-clad, or naked, pictures of themselves, listing how much they charge and what they are prepared to do.

She says the internet has allowed escorts to expand their reach and made the trade safer than work on the streets.

Annie, who sees around two customers a day, said: “I can choose when I work, who I see.

“There’s not the surprise element of working on the streets.

“The men are registered on the website so they are traceable. It’s the best way to do it.

“I feel pretty bad about it sometimes, but I sort of just think of the money and get over it.”

Her client range comes from all walks of life, and from across Merseyside. She has a friend, 20, who also works as an escort.

Annie said: “We have got a client who is going to pay us £650 to stay overnight. He’s asked us to dress as schoolgirls.

“Using the website makes it a lot less scary for you but it can still be dangerous.

“It’s always in the back of your mind to watch out. You learn to handle yourself and what to do when the alarm bells ring.

“There are some weirdos out there.”

Annie’s plan is to embark on her studies when she has saved enough cash.

She continued: “I want to be a psychologist. I’m interested in crime and how people think.

“I am an intelligent girl. I know I have it in me to do this. In school I was top of the class. I go to the library all the time, I’ve always got a book loaned out.”

Annie says she knows a number of students working as escorts. Of one girl she says: “She’s got a kid and it makes it a lot easier for her while she’s in uni.

“I can understand it. There are few jobs out there unless you’ve got experience and the money is really good.

“At the end of the day, it’s just a job. That’s the way I have to think of it to get by.”

The Escort with 200k Twitter followers

Charlotte Fox, 27, is Liverpool’s most successful escort. She has more than 200,000 Twitter followers.

She turned to prostitution two years ago after working as a lap dancer for five.

Charlotte said: “I thought I would try escorting. I knew I couldn’t choose the client so I had to prepare myself mentally and I thought if I don’t like it then I just won’t do it again, but I loved it and I’ve carried on loving it.

“Students want their main focus to be on their studies so working in a bar for eight hours then having to study and go to university can be hard.

“So if they can earn in one hour what they would earn in eight then this would seem really appealing to them.

“I know a lot of girls who fund their way through university by escorting. It has become more accepted due to the younger generation being a lot more open minded and more open about the likes of one-night-stands.

“To most they just see it as a paid one-night-stand.”