Question to the Home Office:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the number of victims of human trafficking that have lost Government support and assistance during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Support provided to victims of modern slavery through the Victim Care Contract (VCC) is available to potential and confirmed victims for as long as they have an identified recovery need that cannot be met by alternative services.

A confirmed victim will only be exited from Victim Care Contract (VCC) support where the Recovery Needs Assessment (RNA) process finds that there is no longer an ongoing recovery need for VCC support or that the confirmed victim has access to alternative support services to meet their recovery needs, such as local authority housing or mainstream benefits. This process ensures that ongoing support is tailored to the victim’s individual recovery needs arising from their modern slavery experiences.

Contingency planning has, and continues to, ensure essential services and support for all victims of modern slavery is available throughout the COVID-19 pandemic and as lockdown begins to ease. Through the RNA process, we also consider the impact the pandemic is having on access to alternative services which may impact on a victim’s ability to move on from VCC services.

On 6 April, in line with Public Health England guidance, we announced that all individuals accommodated by the VCC would not be required to move on from their Government-funded accommodation for a period of three months. This has now been extended and the policy will remain in place until 6 August 2020.