Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of statutory responsibilities to support adults who are selling sex and/or experiencing sexual exploitation.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
We are committed to tackling the harm and exploitation that can be associated with selling sex and continue to work closely with the police and other partners to ensure the legislation achieves these aims.
We continue to provide support to those who are most vulnerable in society, including those involved in selling sex or victims of sexual exploitation. During the COVID-19 pandemic, we allocated £76m to support victims of modern slavery, domestic abuse and sexual violence. This included a £25m package to support victims of domestic abuse and sexual violence, £10m of which was ringfenced for organisations supporting victims of rape and sexual violence. MoJ have also recently announced that £10.1m will be provided to rape and domestic abuse support centres and Police and Crime Commissioners to fund services in local areas.
Potential victims of sexual exploitation have access to specialist support and advocacy services regardless of their immigration status to assist them in rebuilding their lives and reintegrating into local communities.
The National Referral Mechanism (NRM) is the process by which the UK identifies and supports potential victims of modern slavery including sexual exploitation by connecting them with appropriate support, which may be delivered through the specialist Modern Slavery Victim Care Contract (MSVCC), local authorities and asylum services. The introduction of the new MSVCC, which went live on the 4 January 2021, has brought about a number of new services and greater prescription to existing services to better meet the needs of each victim, including those with specialist or complex needs. The MSVCC will continue to provide accommodation, financial support payments, translation and interpretation, transport and access to an outreach support worker for those who are identified as a potential victim and receive a positive Reasonable Grounds decision from the Single Competent Authority.
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much funding from the Violence Reduction Unit programme has been allocated to organisations supporting victims.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
Under the Violence Reduction Programme, the Government has allocated £35m to support Violence Reduction Units in 20/21. Violence Reduction Units then work on a multi-agency basis to determine how best to apply this funding in implementing a ‘whole system’ or ‘public health’ approach to tackling serious violence, which may include funding various organisations.
The Home Office does not hold victim/offender classification information relating to organisations funded by Violence Reduction Units.
As noted in the Government’s April 2018 Serious Violence Strategy, there is evidence of considerable overlap between victims and offenders and serious violence. As part of their implementation of a ‘whole system’ approach, Violence Reduction Units seek to implement those interventions that are most effective in preventing violence from happening in the first place.
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate she has made of the number of victims of modern slavery who were not identified as such by first responders since the beginning of the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The Government is committed to the safety and security of victims of modern slavery and ensuring they receive the support they need, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The hidden nature of modern slavery makes providing an accurate measure of its scale difficult. From 1 April to 30 September 2020, 4,715 potential victims of modern slavery were referred into the National Referral Mechanism.
Given that victims of modern slavery may be especially isolated as a result of the lockdown measures required to combat the pandemic, the Government published additional guidance on GOV.UK (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-support-for-victims-of-modern-slavery/coronavirus-covid-19-support-for-victims-of-modern-slavery) for First Responder Organisations and frontline staff with information about how to spot the potential signs of modern slavery and refer suspected cases to appropriate services.
We also recognise victims are coming into contact with different services during the pandemic and we have worked to raise awareness of the indicators of modern slavery in these areas to ensure victims continue to be identified and supported.
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to page 7 of her Department's 2020 UK Annual Report on Modern Slavery, what progress has been made on establishing a robust estimate of the prevalence of modern slavery in the UK.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The hidden nature of modern slavery makes producing an accurate measure of its scale difficult. In March 2020 the Office for National Statistics noted that there is no definitive source of data or suitable method available to accurately quantify the number of potential victims of modern slavery in the UK:
The Government is, however, committed to improving its understanding of the nature and scale of this complex crime. In July 2019, the Government announced a £10 million investment to create a new Policy and Evidence Centre for Modern Slavery and Human Rights to transform our understanding of modern slavery. The Home Office will continue working with the Centre and other partners to strengthen the evidence base underpinning our policy and operational response to modern slavery.
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the total value is of confiscation orders and forfeitures issued for modern slavery offences from March to December 2020.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The most recently published Asset Recovery Statistical Bulletin, which sets out data on the recovery of criminal assets extracted from the Joint Asset Recovery Database, is available here:
Annex A of this bulletin shows the value of confiscation and forfeitures connected to modern slavery offences for financial years 2014/15 to 2019/20.
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the average number of days taken was to make conclusive grounds decisions in National Referral Mechanism cases relating to children, in each of the last five years.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The Home Office publishes statistics on referrals into the National Referral Mechanism (NRM) on a quarterly basis, as well as a yearly summary.
Published statistics include the average time taken by the Single Competent Authority (SCA) to make Conclusive Grounds decisions. There is no target to make a Conclusive Grounds decision within a specific timeframe but the decision should be made as soon as possible after the 45-day Recovery and Reflection period has ended, and only when sufficient information has been made available on the case. The average time for a Conclusive Grounds decision to be made was 344 days for the third quarter of 2020.
Between now and March 2021, over 350 new staff will join the Home Office to work in the SCA. The vast majority of these staff will be decision-makers, with the remainder of the new staff working in case preparation, workflow management, technical specialist and management roles.
Recruiting in these numbers will give us the capacity to make significantly more Conclusive Grounds decisions than we are currently able to do with existing resource, and therefore we expect to bring down decision-making timescales for victims.
The latest published NRM statistics can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/modern-slavery-national-referral-mechanism-and-duty-to-notify-statistics-uk-quarter-3-2020-july-to-september/modern-slavery-national-referral-mechanism-and-duty-to-notify-statistics-uk-quarter-3-2020-july-to-september.
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much funding her Department has spent on (a) identifying and (b) supporting missing children since the beginning of the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Priti Patel
People that go missing include some of the most vulnerable in our society. The Government is determined that missing people and their families receive the best possible protection and support; from Government, statutory agencies and the voluntary sector.
While the majority of incidents of children going missing result in no harm, missing incidents can be associated with a number of criminal harms. The Home Office does not hold missing persons data centrally, but the NCA compiles missing persons statistics from police forces in the Missing Persons Unit Data report, published annually at
https://missingpersons.police.uk/cy-gb/resources/downloads/missing-persons-statistical-bulletins
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate his Department has made of how many and what proportion of missing children have previously been victims of (a) crime and (b) modern slavery.
Answered by Priti Patel
People that go missing include some of the most vulnerable in our society. The Government is determined that missing people and their families receive the best possible protection and support; from Government, statutory agencies and the voluntary sector.
While the majority of incidents of children going missing result in no harm, missing incidents can be associated with a number of criminal harms. The Home Office does not hold missing persons data centrally, but the NCA compiles missing persons statistics from police forces in the Missing Persons Unit Data report, published annually at
https://missingpersons.police.uk/cy-gb/resources/downloads/missing-persons-statistical-bulletins
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many and what proportion of missing children have a record of being (a) in care and (b) subject to a Child Protection Plan.
Answered by Priti Patel
People that go missing include some of the most vulnerable in our society. The Government is determined that missing people and their families receive the best possible protection and support; from Government, statutory agencies and the voluntary sector.
While the majority of incidents of children going missing result in no harm, missing incidents can be associated with a number of criminal harms. The Home Office does not hold missing persons data centrally, but the NCA compiles missing persons statistics from police forces in the Missing Persons Unit Data report, published annually at
https://missingpersons.police.uk/cy-gb/resources/downloads/missing-persons-statistical-bulletins
Asked by: Peter Kyle (Labour - Hove)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the Answer of 12 September 2017 to Question 7781, if she will provide an updated timeline for the publication of her Department's Missing Children and Adults Strategy.
Answered by Priti Patel
People that go missing include some of the most vulnerable in our society. The Government is determined that missing people and their families receive the best possible protection and support; from Government, statutory agencies and the voluntary sector.
While the majority of incidents of children going missing result in no harm, missing incidents can be associated with a number of criminal harms. The Home Office does not hold missing persons data centrally, but the NCA compiles missing persons statistics from police forces in the Missing Persons Unit Data report, published annually at
https://missingpersons.police.uk/cy-gb/resources/downloads/missing-persons-statistical-bulletins