Gentlemen's clubs and so-called massage parlours which are nothing more than brothels should be closed, Nationalist MP Edwin Vassallo has insisted.

Edwin Vassallo

In a Facebook post in which he said he was expressing a personal opinion, the former parliamentary secretary pointed out that Malta was seeing more illnesses caused by promiscuity, more violence against women, and more undermining of women's dignity.

Therefore, he agreed that gentlemen's clubs should be closed, along with the so-called massage parlours, which he said were nothing more than a front for brothels.

The conservative MP said that while he respected other people's views, it was evident that these were the matters which were destroying Maltese society.

Malta was like a tree which was being eaten away by disease from the inside only because the people were allowing it to. 

"We cannot continue to have a situation in this country where everything has a price and everything can be bought and sold. Women's dignity is not for sale," Mr Vassallo argued. 

Mr Vassallo had voted against the Marriage Equality Bill and then controversially against a Domestic Violence Bill, saying it had tried to paint over differences between men and women. 

Last week, Madam Justice Edwina Grima stressed the need for laws to regulate gentlemen's clubs in a society that, she said, was becoming “increasingly permissive.”

In August, Lara Dimitrijevic, a leading gender equality advocate said that gentlemen's clubs "glamorise prostitution" and should be closed.

The Tourism Ministry had also said in August last year that it was considering rules for gentlemen's clubs which would, among other things, determine whether entertainers can perform naked, semi-naked or clothed. 

Justice Minister Owen Bonnici had also said, as far back as 2004, that the Cabinet would study recommendations by the Attorney General to regulate gentlemen’s clubs.

Owners of such establishments have always insisted that the clubs are not brothels.