Slavery resources

In March 2015 the Minister for Modern Slavery, Karen Bradley, tasked James Ewins QC to undertake an independent review of the Overseas Domestic Worker (ODW) visa. The review includes consideration of:

• Whether the arrangements for issuing ODW Visas are effective in protecting potential victims from abuse
• Whether there is any evidence that the terms of the Visa, including the link to the specified employer, have led to the trafficking or slavery of domestic workers
• Whether the policies or processes for (i) identifying and (ii) providing support to victims of modern slavery amongst those who entered the country on an ODW visa are effective
• Whether the policies and processes for pursuing those accused of perpetrating modern slavery offences against those on an Overseas Domestic Workers Visa are effective
• The need to maintain the integrity of the immigration system.

The UK Government has recently released the report on the implementation of the European Union Trafficking Directive (EU/2011/36) by the UK. The Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group, which was set up to monitor the implementation of the Directive as well as the Council of Europe Convention on Trafficking in Human Beings, has been critical of the Government’s findings.

The following briefings were supported by the Anti Trafficking Monitoring Group shared with parliamentarians to improve the Modern Slavery Bill going through the parliament.

• A briefing on the Independent Anti-Slavery Comissioner; to welcome a government amendment which allows the Commissioner to oversee victim support and assistance, but continue to call for the role to have greater independence from the government and more direct access to Parliament.
• A briefing on victim protection (Clause 49) to support an amendment to create a duty on the State to provide physical, psychological and social recovery to victims, and a separate amendment to provide for the statutory establishment of the National Referral Mechanism (NRM).
• A briefing to call for the inclusion of a separate child exploitation offence to address the potential prosecution gaps that may result from the existing offences.
• A briefing to welcome the government’s amendments to clause 48 which give child trafficking advocates full legal powers and to seek assurance from the Minister that the provision of  advocates will not be dependent on a positive NRM decision.
• A briefing in support of an amendment to reinstate protections for Overseas Domestic Workers (ODWs), to allow them to change employer, renew their visa and be entitled to a 3-month temporary visa to find an alternative place of (domestic) work if they leave an abusive employment situation.
• A briefing which calls for the statutory defence to be strengthened to ensure it works effectively for children, specifically by removing the ‘Reasonable Person Test’.
• A briefing in support of an amendment to Clause 47 to ensure that legal aid could be provided to a person before an application had been made to the National Referral Mechanism (NRM) competent authority or before the competent authority had reached its NRM decision.

Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group.
The Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group has created proposals for a revised National Referral Mechanism (NRM), one for adults and a separate one for children, to assist the Home Office in its ongoing review of the current system. The NRM is the process through which victims of trafficking are formally identified and supported and has been in place in the UK since 2009. After it was established, the ATMG has raised concerns about the way in which it operates and has highlighted these in its research reports. The proposed models address these issues and provide workable solutions to them.

RACE in Europe Project, lead by Anti-Slavery International.
This report analyses the phenomenon of trafficking into crime such as cannabis cultivation, ATM theft, pickpocketing, bag-snatching, counterfeit DVD selling, benefit fraud and forced sham marriage, as well as being forced to beg. The report explores the situation in the project partner countries (Ireland, the UK, the Czech Republic, and the Netherlands) and provides an overview of the rest of Europe. It exposes the dearth of systematic information and awareness about this type of exploitation amongst the policy makers and justice system actors with very few cases reported in official statistics and many victims misidentified as offenders.

Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group.
Fourth report in the ATMG series analyses the UK’s response to trafficking four years on from the Council Of Europe anti-trafficking convention coming into force. Whilst there has been a number of improvement in the government’s response to trafficking through the National Referral Mechanism (NRM), the system fails to systematically identify, assist and protect victims of trafficking. The report highlights major problems of the UK’s system, especially looking at victims of trafficking through context of their immigration status, causing the decision making to be unfair and discriminatory.

Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group
This report examines the effectiveness of the UK’s Criminal Justice System’s (CJS) response to trafficking in terms of law, policy and practice. The report found that, in spite of localised examples of good practice, the CJS fails to systematically prosecute traffickers and protect victims’ rights. Despite the Government’s claims to make the UK a “hostile environment” for traffickers, human trafficking is not a policing priority.

Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group.
The new report from The Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group is the result of research carried out between 2010 and 2011 with the aim of examining trafficking prevention in the UK in accordance with the Government’s obligations under the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings. In particular, it assesses measures instigated by the UK Government to prevent trafficking/re-trafficking, highlights good practice in prevention programming and offers recommendations to strengthen the UK’s ability to prevent trafficking in the future.

Sarah Edwards (with contribution from Rachel Annison).

Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group; Lorena Arocha; Mike Dottridge
This report by the Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group looks at the government’s flagship ‘National Referral Mechanism’ and concludes that the UK’s new anti-trafficking measures are “not fit for purpose” and the Government is breaching its obligations under the European Convention against Trafficking.  It also finds that the current system places too much emphasis on the immigration status of trafficked people rather than focusing on protecting the victims of this traumatic crime. The report also includes recommendations for the Government to reform the system.