A WI Lady's Guide To Brothels C4

THE Women's Institute is generally thought of as a body of hairnetted femaledom concerned predominantly with the fruit content of home-made potted preserves. It's not a place to go should you wish to compare tattoos.

However, this is actually far from the case. The WI has had to move with the times. While they don't all go round hiding their bosoms behind outsized creamcakes à la Calendar Girls, they are certainly not as stuffy as everyone makes out.

Last year, for example, middle England met the sex trade head-on when the Hampshire WI emerged as an unlikely champion of the reform of prostitution laws.

Members Jean Johnson and Shirley Landels led their 7,000-strong membership to advocate the legalisation of brothels in Britain. Bridge-playing harlots would be welcomed into the organisation with open arms.

A WI Lady's Guide To Brothels, a tome which would liven up the travel section at any decent bookshop, saw presenter Nicky Taylor join forces with Jean and Shirley on a journey to find out what makes a best-practice brothel – not burning your bottom on the radiator, that kind of thing.

Is it possible, they asked, to set up the UK's first legal brothel? And, if so, is an empty flat above Greggs really the right place?

I could involve myself in this programme because I have been to Amsterdam once or twice and seen the red light district first hand. I often wondered if I couldn't offer one of those girls a better life back in Blighty. But since I was living above a second-hand Hoover shop at the time, I thought it better not to ask.

Things hotted up for Jean and Shirley when they joined the line-up in one of Nevada's licensed sex ranches. One of the girls may yet make the return trip. Certainly, she'll offer a better option than a wickerwork demonstration.

Back at home, Nicky immersed herself in the industry, manning an X-rated phone line, talking to lap dancers, and offering herself for sale in a Winchester shop window. She nearly scored a sale, but the gentleman in question got flustered and forgot his pin number.

Of course, there is a serious side to Jean and Shirley's campaign. Women face nightly dangers working on the streets and the underground sex trade only adds to the horrors of human trafficking.

They should be applauded for stepping out of middle England into an altogether less welcoming place.