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The Minister for Immigration (Damian Green)
I am happy to assure the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty) that I will be generous in allowing interventions, even though I am restricted by time, because I appreciate his contribution and his long-standing interest in this subject.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) on making a uniquely Europhile speech, on securing this debate and on his work for the all-party group. I am grateful for his kind remarks, although I am deeply worried when he says that lobbying me is like pushing at an open door. I make it clear to all non-governmental organisations that that should not be taken as precedent.
There is, rightly, a lot of interest in this issue. Everything that my hon. Friend said about its seriousness and the importance of having an effective anti-trafficking strategy is, of course, true. The one point where I would slightly disagree with him, apart from on the central argument—I will come on to why I disagree with him about that—is on the lack of public awareness. It has struck me, over the past few years, not least through the actions of the all-party group, NGOs and successive Ministers in both Governments, that there is consciousness throughout the country of the evil of trafficking and the fact that it is present not just in our inner cities and the sex industry, but in many small communities, including rural communities, and all parts of the United Kingdom, as we have heard. Indeed, it is everywhere. That consciousness has grown in recent years, which is good, because we will be much more effective in fighting trafficking if, out there, the general public knows about it.
In that context, it is fair for me to outline some progress that we have made since we published the human trafficking strategy in July last year, which focuses, as my hon. Friend said, on four key themes: improving victim identification and care; enhancing our ability to act early; smarter action at the border; and more co-ordination of our law enforcement efforts in the UK.
Officials have been working across the Government to build a more collective and collaborative response to fighting human trafficking, bringing in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Department for International Development, the Department for Education and the Department of Health. Equally importantly—I take the point that there must be collaboration between the Government and extra-governmental bodies—this response is specifically supported by stakeholder groups on specific themes, attended by a range of NGOs. The current groups are focusing on five key areas within the strategy: raising public awareness; working with the private sector; working with child victims; tackling demand; and international engagement. Those groups have already instigated action to support the aims of the strategy. For example, they are considering how we can expand the awareness-raising initiative with airlines—something that I helped to launch with Virgin Airlines as part of the activities on the most recent national anti-slavery day.
We have already provided additional information to posts in other countries to raise awareness of trafficking and to support collaborative working with NGOs in those countries. Part of that work includes gathering information from posts, so that we have a better understanding of their challenges and issues to help inform how we might best support anti-trafficking efforts around the world. We recently agreed an awareness-raising campaign with a major supermarket in Lincolnshire to provide information to potential vulnerable workers in the agricultural sector.
Officials continue to review and refine the national referral mechanism to ensure that victims can be identified appropriately and to ensure that the picture on the extent of human trafficking within this country is clearer.
My hon. Friend was disapprobatory about the UK Human Trafficking Centre. Clearly, it can get better and is doing so, but improvements can always be made. That is what we are trying to do in respect of its intelligence function and organised crime group mapping, which will help inform the Government’s view of the priority areas to combat human trafficking.
Michael Connarty
I am reminded of the adage that a camel is a horse designed by a committee. On 18 January, the Minister said in his response to the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe’s special representative and co-ordinator for combating traffic in human beings:
“Progress is monitored by a strategic board of cross-Departmental officials which meets on a six-weekly basis. This board reports to the biannual Inter-Departmental Ministerial Group…on human trafficking.”
That seems to be a larger number of people than is required to do a job, which, as the chair of the all-party group, the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone), said, is done by a co-ordinator—a proper rapporteur with a single purpose, independent of the Government.
Damian Green
Let me move directly on to the central point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough about whether we need a rapporteur added to our armoury. Obviously, this matter arises from the directive that we have now opted into. I am grateful to him for his support, not just for our opting in, but for the way that we did it—at the end of the process when had we ensured that it was appropriate and helpful to this country to do so.
We have given much thought to how we implement the directive. We are about to make changes to primary legislation, with amendments to the Protection of Freedoms Bill, to ensure that we are compliant with those parts of the directive to which our laws are not compliant at the moment, and we are making an initial assessment of where we may need to introduce secondary legislation. We are determined to ensure that everything is in place by April 2013, which is when we need to be completely compliant.
Article 19 allows the setting up of a national rapporteur or equivalent mechanism. I am unpersuaded by my hon. Friend’s example. He was mildly humorous about the inter-departmental ministerial group. I think that I am entitled, in return, to note that of the 27 nations in which he could have found examples of people being inspired to greater efforts on anti-trafficking by having a rapporteur, he adduced precisely one. I am disappointed on behalf of Finland, which is the only other country in the European Union that has a national rapporteur. I note that my hon. Friend did not come up with any great advantages from the Finnish system.
Mr Bone
On that important point, the Minister is right; of course there are two countries that do it, but the Prime Minister wants—I hope that the Minister would want to support the Prime Minister—to make the UK the leading country in the fight against human trafficking. With a rapporteur, we could take that lead.
Damian Green
I share the ambition to make the UK a leading beacon, showing people how we can effectively fight trafficking. So let me get to the point of why I think that a rapporteur would be a fifth wheel on the coach.
The interdepartmental ministerial group, which meets every six months, is effective with support from the UK Human Trafficking Centre, which is the central repository of data—my hon. Friend made that important point—and it can effectively perform the national rapporteur function, because apart from the ministerial meetings, officials from across Whitehall meet once every two months to support the ministerial group, to inform it and to provide an update.
I agree that the current structure is not perfect, and I intend to make some improvements, so that it can become more effective. First, I will consider my hon. Friend’s point about the frequency of the group’s meetings, so that it can maintain effective oversight across the Government of the work on combating human trafficking. Secondly, I will review the group’s membership to ensure that we have the right people in the room discussing the issues across the Government. I recently wrote to group members emphasising the importance of their regular attendance: I take the point that my hon. Friend made in that respect, as well. Thirdly, I will revise the terms of reference for the group to reflect the required functions of the rapporteur role, so that it can effectively assess trends and measure the actions taken to address them.
As part of the existing arrangements, the group receives information on human trafficking trends from the UK Human Trafficking Centre, which informs our approach. If particular issues are raised, the group will be able to commission further data from the HTC. To that end, my officials are working with the centre to establish consistent data requirements to support the group in carrying out that role. In line with the requirements set out in article 19, the group will publish an annual report on the assessment of trends in human trafficking, as well as on anti-trafficking activities, and will work with the NGOs to achieve that.
In recent debates, as well as in this one, questions have been asked about the independence of the ministerial group and about the requirements of the rapporteur role. To be clear, the directive does not stipulate that the national rapporteur or equivalent mechanism must be independent of the Government. Indeed, we already have in the UK a vast array of extremely effective organisations independent of the Government that produce assessments of human trafficking inside the country and internationally. We of course consider proposals and recommendations in each report, and we will strengthen our response accordingly. In carrying out the rapporteur function, the group’s report will not only consider trends but will take account of assessments and recommendations from other reports and of the Government’s progress in delivering their strategy.
To make those pledges concrete, I intend that the group will produce an initial report following the first anniversary of the publication of the strategy, after the Olympic games, to ensure that the progress made on the strategy and any learning or experiences gained from the games can be captured and inform our assessment of such work.
As the problems that might come about because of the Olympics have been brought up, let me say that of course we have a threat assessment of the Olympics, including the possibilities of trafficking. I am pleased to say that, at the moment, there is no evidence of extra trafficking activity as a result of the Olympic games, which would have been intuitively plausible because there has been evidence of trafficking at previous World cups, but they attract a different kind of audience from the Olympics. We are now over the construction phase—the venues are built—which is another time that people were worried about, and I think that the sort of people who attend the Olympics will provide less of an incentive. More to the point, so far the police detect no evidence of any large-scale increase in trafficking activity related to the games.
I thank my hon. Friend for his continuing concern with and commitment to the fight against human trafficking and others present in the Chamber today. The appropriate structures are in place and will get better, and they provide the right oversight in this area. It almost goes without saying, but I can assure hon. Members that the Government continue to recognise the importance of fighting such a terrible crime and ending the plight of far too many vulnerable adults and children. I will bend all my efforts to ensure that we are as effective as possible in continuing that fight.
Question put and agreed to.