Slavery resources

People who are in the National Referral Mechanism for identifying victims of trafficking (NRM) are ‘entitled’ to legal aid. However legal aid is also means tested. This means not everyone in the NRM is able to access legal aid in practice. This poses a significant barrier to justice for people who are not eligible and denies them a key entitlement. We recommend that being in the NRM should also passport you through the legal aid income and capital tests. This would mean that everyone in the NRM would be able to access legal aid.

This briefing reviews the provisions of the recently established Multi-Agency Assurance Panels (MAAPs) to date, assessing the extent to which they contribute to robust and transparent decision-making in the NRM. It focuses on the practical function of the MAAPs based on a survey conducted by ATMG in 2019, and feedback from 8 panellists. It goes on to highlight how this new approach to decision-making has revealed poor information sharing practices between relevant bodies, therefore undermining panel members’ ability to quality assure second stage negative decisions. In addition, it asks questions about victim support provisions more widely, especially for those engaging with the criminal justice system.

This submission has been submitted on behalf of the 31 members and endorsers of the Coalition to End Forced Labour in the Uyghur Region, a coalition of over 280 Uyghur representative groups, civil society organisations, trade unions, faith-based groups and investors united to end state-sponsored forced labour and other egregious human rights abuses against people from the Uyghur Region in China, known to local people as East Turkistan.

Submission to BEIS Committee consultation on Forced labour in UK value chains:

Our statement with 9 partner organisations responds to the Government’s response to the Transparency in Supply Chains consultation, published in September 2020. We  argue that a lack of commitment to meaningful sanctions and enforcement measures is a major concern – and that much tougher government action is needed to tackle modern slavery and other human rights abuses in corporate supply chains.

ATMG, Anti-Slavery International.

This report aims to tell the story of how and why the Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group (the ATMG) was formed in 2009, and the impact it has had over the last decade. It also aims to illustrate the coalition as a model for good practice in holding governments around the world to account through ‘critical friendship’. Over a decade, the ATMG’s approach has sought to question the UK Government’s efforts to combat slavery and trafficking, while at the same time offering a positive critique of their actions in order to improve the protection of victims of slavery and their rights.

he submission on access to justice and effective remedies for victims of trafficking in human beings in the UK to the Group of Experts on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings (GRETA) on the implementation of the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings. The submission is to inform GRETA’s 3rd round evaluation of the UK and has been compiled by the Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group (‘ATMG’), a coalition of twelve UK-based anti-trafficking organisations coordinated and chaired by Anti-Slavery International, from content submitted by ATMG members and ten other UK based organisations.

Although progress has been made by the UK in implementing the Council of Europe Convention, there is more to be done if the UK is to achieve its desired status as a world-leader in addressing human trafficking. The austerity cuts, which resulted in a systematic lack of funding for trafficking response programmes and prevented many trafficking survivors from obtaining specialist legal advice, and a tension between the implementation of anti-trafficking and immigration policies, which has undermined the UK’s ability to identify and support survivors, are amongst the biggest obstacles for the UK’s further progress.

Joint letter from organisations within the anti-slavery sector to the UK Minister of Safeguarding asking for a clear plan and resourcing for survivor support in the context of COVID-19.

The following report to the UN Human Rights Committee by Anti-Slavery International and nine other UK civil society organisations, assesses the UK Government’s response to trafficking and modern slavery, including the situation of trafficked children and migrant domestic workers.

While welcoming a number of significant and positive improvements to the law and policy framework addressing trafficking and modern slavery in the past few years, the report highlights critical gaps in the UK’s response. Obstacles persist in ensuring that victims are identified and protected, preventing survivors from being able to access the support needed to rebuild their lives away from slavery. The current Overseas Domestic Worker visa in place makes migrant domestic workers more vulnerable to abuse. Safeguards promised by the Government are not being implemented, and a fresh approach is needed to prevent their exploitation, including a return to, at minimum, the rights in place for migrant domestic workers prior to 2012. There are also significant gaps in the provision of care and support for child victims of trafficking, and the current identification system is not fit for purpose for child victims. Together, we call for a number of reforms to ensure that children and adults who have been trafficked or in modern slavery in the UK can be effectively identified, protected and supported, as well as having access to justice and remedy.

Submission by CORE Coalition, Anti-Slavery International, Amnesty International, Business and Human Rights Resource Centre, Christian Aid, Environmental Justice Foundation, Fairtrade Foundation, FLEX, Freedom Fund, Freedom United, Traidcraft Exchange, TUC, UNICEF and UNISON.

We’re calling on the UK government to:

• Introduce mandatory criteria for reporting
• Introduce an effective Government-run registry
• Introduce meaningful sanctions for failures to comply with the TISC provision
• Extend the reporting requirement to the public sector
• For the UK government to go beyond reporting and introduce mandatory human rights due diligence.