Human Trafficking:

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3rd January 2007
Human Trafficking the modern slave trade
Rt Hon David Davis MP, Shadow Home Secretary
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Summary

• Human trafficking what is it ?
• The UK problem
• A Conservative approach

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Human trafficking in context

• Involves deception, intimidation or coercion
• Two main forms of human rights abuse
• labour exploitation
• sexual exploitation
• Involves organised criminal gangs
• prostitution
• forced labour
• illegal immigration
• loan-sharking
• drugs
• money laundering

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A Global Problem

• Between 700,000 and 2 million women and children
  are trafficked across international borders every
  year (IOM).
• Human trafficking generates 9.5billion in annual
  revenue (FBI).

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A Global Problem
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A European Problem

• Human trafficking is a serious European problem.
  Europol (2002)

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A UK Problem

• The UK is classified by UN as a high level
  destination.
• The Home Office estimates that human trafficking
  cost the UK 1billion, in economic and social
  costs, in 2003.

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The UK Problem origins of gangs and victims
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Trafficking for prostitution into UK

• Women and girls from Eastern Europe, the Far East
  and Africa are especially vulnerable.
• There were 4,000 victims of trafficking for
  prostitution in the UK during 2003 at any one
  time (Home Office).
• 85 of women in UK brothels today are foreign
  born (compared to 15, ten years ago).

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Case study enforced prostitution

• Eleina, 15, from Lithuania
• Eleina was brought to the UK on the false promise
  of a summer job selling ice-cream.
• Instead, she was herded from brothel to brothel
  by criminal gangs.
• Eleina was sold seven times in 3 months.
• I have run out of tearsI try to forget but
  sometimes I have nightmares about it.

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Trafficking for labour into UK

• 60 of illegal immigrants arrive in the UK by
  illegal means, the majority in the back of a
  lorry.
• They pay up to 22,000 to agents.
• They are forced into debt bondage.
• They are kept in appalling conditions.
• They are victims of organised criminal gangs.

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Case study labour exploitation

• 5 February 2004, 23 Chinese cockle pickers
  drowned in rising tides in Morecambe Bay.
• They were working under a gangmaster.
• Many were illegal immigrants.
• They lived in appalling conditions, forced to do
  dangerous work without any formal training.
• There were 16 survivors, 14 from mainland China.

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The UK Problem

• Porous borders
• Few prosecutions
• Limited victim protection

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Porous borders a case study

• Sarah, aged 16, from Africa.
• Sarah arrived in the UK aged 14, with a
  middle-aged white man, with a passport that was
  not hers and did not even have a picture of her
  on it.
• She entered the country without being challenged
  at the airport.
• Sarah was locked up in a flat and forced to have
  sex with men continually.
• She managed to escape.
• For every Sarah who manages to escape, there are
  thousands of others who do not.

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The number of UK prosecutions

• There were only 30 convictions for trafficking
  offences in 2004 - 2006.
• Only 12 defendants have been charged in just
  three separate cases of child trafficking since
  2000. Only 10 were convicted.
• Between 1997 and 2004 the Government prosecuted
  only 35 employers under the Asylum and
  Immigration Act 1996 (employing a person subject
  to immigration control who has attained the age
  of 16). 17 were convicted.
• There have been no convictions for trafficking
  for labour exploitation.

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The UKs record on victim protection

• Inadequate specialist expertise at border
  controls.
• Limited places in safe accommodation and none for
  children.
• No victims helpline

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A Conservative Approach

• Police UK borders
• Prosecute traffickers
• Protect victims

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A Conservative Approach

• Police UK Borders, including
• UK Border Police Force with specialist
  expertise.
• Separate interviews at airports.
• Immigration checks on tickets.

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A Conservative Approach

• Prosecute the traffickers
• Make it a UK priority to
• commission much more thorough research
• strengthen Government coordination
• increase the number of UK prosecutions
• International
• international police cooperation, including with
  transit countries and countries of origin
• cooperation between other countries prosecution
  authorities

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A Conservative Approach

• Protect the victims
• Helpline
• Public awareness campaign in the UK and abroad
• Public information campaign
• promote social responsibility
• Expand safe houses

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A Conservative Approach

• Sign the European Convention on Action
• Against Trafficking in Human Beings 2005, already
• signed by 34 States, to strengthen
• Border controls
• European cooperation (e.g. Article 32 obliges
  State parties to cooperate to prevent and
  investigate people trafficking).
• Victim identification and protection

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Conclusion

• Trafficking - modern slave trade
• Global, European and UK problem
• 200 years since Wilberforce