Human Trafficking

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Thursday 14th October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, for initiating such an important debate so close to Anti-slavery Day, which is next Monday. I also want to add to the congratulatory words of the noble Lord, Lord Luke, about Anthony Steen for the tremendous work that he did in combating human trafficking during a large part of the period that he spent as a Member of the other House. I declare an interest as co-chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Human Trafficking and a trustee of the Human Trafficking Foundation.

We all have concerns, which have already been expressed, about the extent of human trafficking in the United Kingdom and the failures to deal effectively with it. The Metropolitan Police, however, have done some extremely good work, although police work across the country is patchy. I congratulate the Metropolitan Police on a recent operation in east London in conjunction with Redbridge Council on 12 October, where they removed 28 Roma children believed to be victims of a Roma gang of child traffickers. There are major Roma gangs working this country.

Trafficking, as noble Lords will know, is big business; your Lordships might be interested to know that it is worth as much, or nearly as much, as drug trafficking, and begging is more profitable than prostitution. My concerns are particularly about children and young people trafficked not only for prostitution but for begging and forced servitude, and the lack of sufficient help for these young people.

I want to raise several issues for the Minister’s consideration. First, I am concerned about the operation of the national referral mechanism, the NRM, set up in April 2009. Children who come illegally into the United Kingdom are often identified by safeguarding teams of local authorities or by the police as probably trafficked. They are then referred to the NRM, which makes a separate decision as to whether these young people are trafficked. Sometimes the NRM makes decisions without any input from the local authority or from the police. Between April 2009 and June 2010, 215 children, potential victims of trafficking, were referred to NRM. Twenty-eight were British, 187 from abroad. The largest single group, of 59, was from Vietnam, and the largest type was labour exploitation. In only 77 cases was it decided that the child or young person had been trafficked. Twenty-four were British and 53 were from outside the UK. Many children not accepted by the NRM as having been trafficked are considered by police to have been trafficked. It seems extraordinary that where the police consider a child or young person is likely to have been trafficked, the NRM none the less decides that they are not a victim. There also does not appear to be any appeal process against the NRM decision, which is leading to expensive and time-consuming applications for judicial review of those decisions.

I was told by a senior police officer this week that when some of these young people appeal to the immigration tribunal against refusal of asylum, police give evidence to the tribunal on behalf of some of them. I have concerns, therefore, about the training of those in the NRM who make these crucial decisions. I ask the Minister to look again at how the NRM is operating, the training of those who make the decisions, and whether weight should be given to the police and safeguarding committee’s assessment that a young person has been trafficked. I also ask the Minister what level of support is being given to these 215 young people. Are the police investigating the cases and is there a crime report number for each child referred to the NRM?

The second matter is one that has been raised by several noble Lords: the prosecution of children and young people who are under the control of traffickers. There was a recent example when three Romanian women, two of them under the age of 18, were convicted and sentenced to prison in Manchester. They had a successful appeal last week. They had been forced by a violent gang into a brothel with other trafficked women and are now giving evidence against the traffickers. The UK Human Trafficking Centre and the Poppy Project both considered that the women were probably trafficked. The fact that they themselves were victims should have been established before the prosecution.

The largest group of such young people is made up of Vietnamese boys and girls. The noble Baroness, Lady Massey, gave us an example of a case in, I think, Doncaster. These young people are trafficked into this country for labour exploitation—that is, to look after cannabis farms. There are thousands of cannabis farms in private houses around the country, but why on earth are these children prosecuted? I understand that this is a matter for the Ministry of Justice. Will the Minister ask the Ministry of Justice to consider the matter?

My third point is about support services for children. I, too, am concerned about the Government’s decision not to opt in to the directive. The previous Government ought to be congratulated on extending the law on the definition of trafficking to labour exploitation, domestic servitude and forced begging, but these welcome improvements do not go far enough. The most important point that I have raised today is the lack of proper provision for looking after individual children who are found to have been trafficked. There is no special representative, as required by Article 14 of the directive. Various organisations may look after them at different times but there is no one person in charge. There are gaps in the system of care for these children. The Government really cannot say that the existing legislation and procedures are compliant with Article 14. Will the Government look at the pilot project that is just about to start, or has just started, in Scotland?

Finally, opting in to the directive would focus the Government’s mind and show that the UK continues to be a leader in the excellent work that it does in catching and deterring the trafficking gangs. I ask the Government to look again at whether they really want to opt out of the directive.