An Austrian brothel has had to turn away hundreds of customers after announcing it will be giving away free sex and alcohol for eight weeks in protest at paying €5 million in tax.
The fully licensed Pascha brothel in the city of Salzburg revealed it would be introducing a 'summer special' offer where customers could drink free alcohol and have as much sex as they like.
The brothel's well-known owner Hermann 'Pascha' Muller said that over the summer he would be paying the prostitutes' hourly wages out of his own pocket, adding that he was tired of having his income taken away and no longer wants to be 'the tax office's pimp'.
Since announcing the 'summer special', the Pascha brothel has been inundated with far more customers than it can handle, forcing it to turn away hundreds of disappointed visitors.
German-born Muller told Austria's Kronen Zeitung tabloid that although the stunt has proven to be great publicity for him, he can only afford to keep it up for a maximum of eight weeks as the women he employs will be paid their wages at normal rates out of his own pocket over the summer.
The whole scheme, Muller said, was designed to punish the tax office for cracking down on licensed brothels while allowing illegal street and apartment prostitution to go untaxed and unpunished.
'In the last decade I have paid taxes of almost €5 million...The problem is, the tax office wants more and more, he said.
'They allow me no room for manoeuver,' Muller added, going on to claim that tax officials visit the premises on average once every 14 days.
Muller - who call himself Salzburg's 'red light district king' - said his other businesses would partially fund his employees' wages.
He rejected any allegations that he was involved in tax evasion or human trafficking, adding that his business operated full within the confines of the law.
Prostitution is legal in Austria, with the industry fully taxed and regulated.
However the majority of the sex workers in the country are migrants from the Balkans, former Russian republics and Nigeria, raising concerns that some could be victims of people trafficking.
The number of women working as prostitutes in Austria is estimated at being somewhere between 3,500 and 6,000 serving a total of 15,000 clients every day.
Street prostitution remains illegal in the country and there are serious concerns that unregistered sex workers face frequent rape and violence.
According to Austrian government statistics, a quarter of women arrested for illegal prostitution in the country have multiple sexually transmitted diseases.
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