Human Trafficking

Lord Bew Excerpts

Thursday 14th October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bew]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, for securing this important debate. She has performed a great service to the House. I speak somewhat reluctantly. Three years ago, when I first came to the House, the view in Northern Ireland was that there simply was no problem with human trafficking. The Police Service of Northern Ireland said that there were no signs of it in society. The then Minister, Paul Goggins, who had responsibility for the matter and who was very diligent, claimed that there was no clear evidence of human trafficking. When the UK-wide anti-trafficking initiative, Operation Pentameter, was launched in 2007, it was again thought that there was no sign of human trafficking in Northern Ireland.

One could take some comfort from this from a Northern Irish point of view. One might say that the prevalence in Northern Irish society of stronger forms of religious morality than in the rest of the United Kingdom may have played a role. Less charming is the fact that in Northern Ireland the paramilitaries often control prostitution and therefore it would be difficult for outsiders to break in. For whatever combination of charming and less charming reasons, it appeared that Northern Ireland did not have this problem.

However, things have changed dramatically and sadly during the course of this year. The assistant chief constable, Drew Harris, has issued a statement saying that the police have now recovered dozens of individuals whom they suspect have been trafficked for the purposes of prostitution or domestic servitude or to work in some form of business. The assistant chief constable’s statement continues:

“After we carry out operations and raid places, neighbours say that they wondered why lots of men were coming and going to and from the premises at all times of the night and day”.

In June of this year, Northern Ireland’s Minister for Justice, David Ford, again said that anti-racketeering officials had rescued dozens of victims of trafficking in Northern Ireland. He said that human trafficking is nothing less than modern-day slavery.

In this respect, the Northern Ireland Assembly's work has been good and strong. In June of this year, the Public Accounts Committee also issued a statement to the effect that it now acknowledged that there was a serious problem; and in September, talks were held with the relevant minister in the Republic of Ireland, Dermot Ahern, Kenny MacAskill, the relevant Scottish Minister, and David Ford, the Minister for Justice in Northern Ireland, in order to co-ordinate policy. After this meeting, Mr Ford admitted that Northern Ireland was a staging post for human traffickers operating between Scotland and the Republic. This followed the arrest of a Scotland-based group, which was alleged to have been involved in forced trafficking and to have had a large budget for advertising sexual services in the local press. The sophistication of the operation was remarkable.

The Minister who replies at the end of the debate has no responsibility for the matters that I have just raised; they are devolved matters. In this respect, I am happy to say that the Northern Ireland devolved authorities are taking the matter seriously. Other noble Lords have raised the issue of the European directive and our compliance with it. My own view was that the Government had a reasonable case. However, while listening to the speeches this morning, in particular those of the noble Lords, Lord McColl and Lord Roberts, with their emphasis on the significance of the European directive with respect to the cross-border dimensions of the problem, I began to wonder whether the Government's case was as strong or as reasonable as I thought it was yesterday.

Even more profound than the question of the European directive is that of our values. Precisely because we are at a moment of economic crisis in the United Kingdom, the decisions and tone of government must reflect a sense of what it is to be a civilised society. This is even more important now. Therefore, I ask the Minister, at the end of the debate, to address the seriousness of the moral issue.