Women forced into marriage overseas asked to repay costs

It’s very difficult when the girls won’t testify against their parents, and remain at risk of honour killing by the family for the “shame” of escaping the forced marriage.
Ideally, yes, all these vile parents should be prosecuted, imprisoned and the F.O. costs claimed from them along with huge fines, but it’s near to impossible without witness testimony.

NothingOnTellyAgain yes, I thought there were really glaring parallels between this issue and the grooming gangs too.

Police response seems to have been pretty much the same as it originally was in Rotherham etc.

Because this only happens to women and girls.

Depressing but very true. Maybe these charges could be paid out of the years of tampon tax they've had from us, would be poetic at least if not actually fair

And otherwise yes is an abusive scandal, never thought the day would come where I beacame a reader of the Times .

The issue above about how easy it should be to prosecute is in real life incredibly complicated. These women overwhelmingly don’t want to be separated from their families and communities. Education if the wider family and the woman reintegrating but on better terms is often the woman’s own wish. Most do not want their parents or relatives punished. I recognise absolutely the problems with this but there are very real problems for these women if they are left completely separate and alone. I worked recently with a young woman who had gone off alone and she was looking at spending Christmas in a bedsit desperately wishing that college would restart. She expected to see no one over the holiday period.

If someone sets fire to your house and the fire brigade have to rescue you, you don't pay. If someone locks you in your car and the police have to get you out, you don't pay. Why is this any different?

Because this only happens to women and girls.

FFS! Should be so simple, forced marriage is a crime so the criminals or, failing that, the government governing the criminals has to pay! This should be such a basic part of law enforcement, baffling!

If someone sets fire to your house and the fire brigade have to rescue you, you don't pay. If someone locks you in your car and the police have to get you out, you don't pay. Why is this any different?

How are they not billing those costs to the parents (along with prosecuting them)?

It shouldn't be up to me (tax payers) to cover the costs here. surely the scandal is that it is happening in the first place, with the lack of convictions the cherry on top. This time line...

The other one that springs to mind as similar was the criminal compensation people refusing compemsation for victims of csa even when the perpetrators had been found guilty in a court of law.

Their justification was that they believed the victim had consented, and the conviction showed guilt in law but not necessarily in fact.

So they were prepared to undermine the criminal justice system quite severely in order to keep money from victims of csa & grooming.

Things in common

Victims usually female
Victims usually young
Crime involves sex

Interesting.

Things should be named exactly what they are, to stop the ability to pussy foot around legalities.

Force marriage = Kidnap

kidnap trying selling that "as we need to recoup the costs from the Victim"

Quite talking. It must be one of the easiest crimes to solve-Its going to be done at least at the parents request, even if the actual deed is done by an uncle or family friend. They need to come down on them like a ton of bricks. What's the point of the law if the perpetrators know they can do what they like without being prosecuted?

wow. which other crimes should the UK taxpayer recoup the costs of protection /rescue from the intended victim? imagining the variations in all those police dramas on telly when our heroes start to issue an invoice to the person they just saved, if they have the temerity to only have permanent leave to remain rather than full citizenship. will it be a set price for prevention of any crime like prescription charges or a sliding scale according to the seriousness of the crime prevented? or perhaps an itemised bill for actual expenses incurred?

Unjustifiable and an absolutely block-headed interpretation of the rules requiring the FCO to recoup its costs.

Forced marriage carried a penalty of up to 7 years in prison, but it seems to be rarely prosecuted.

This is what’s weird. It should surely be an open and shut case, when the girl/woman concerned has been rescued. Why is there no automatic prosecution of those parents?

Once again punishing those vulnerable without a voice, it's disgusting!

She failed to protect herself and got in trouble overseas.

Only herself to blame.

Why should taxpayer bail her out.

Etc.

Essentially blocking subsequent employment is to add insult to injury.

Dunno

Seems with this one the authorities have realised that if it's a crime involving a woman, likely to be young, and sex, then actually its her own fault and she should be punished.

Even when its bloody obvious you’re british the draconian new rules make it impossible to get a job without a passport. How are these women supposed to earn the money to pay back the government?

It’s horrific, isn’t it. I’m so glad the Times is making a lot of noise about this. Absolutely unforgivable.

They say that it’s the same fee as anyone else is charged for repatriation, but most other people who need repatriating haven’t been the victims of a criminal plot to imprison them and quite possibly torture and rape them too. Most other people who need repatriating will have freely chosen to go where they went and will have taken out travel insurance which will cover the cost. Most people who need repatriating will have a job back home and/or family members who can help them out.

Whereas these are young women still in education who’ve been illegally imprisoned in horrific circumstances, sometimes for years, who clearly have no job, no home, whose families are the very ones who put them in that position so clearly have no family support either. It’s absolutely mind-boggling that the Foreign Office could think this was a fair comparison.

Given that these women are victims of a criminal act that was conceived and initially executed in the UK (with the parents tricking the young women into travelling, and presumably paying these “re-educators” for their services) I can’t see how there is the remotest justification for this. The parents should be having the shit prosecuted out of them and all reimbursement should be coming from them/their assets.

Or we could just scrap the whole idea of charging victims of crime for being rescued from the criminals.

It is such a shame that such good work is being done in rescuing girls and young women from FM but that it is fouled up like this in conclusion. I very much hope the Times’ reporting brings about a change here.

Forced!

Not forces!

So the foreign office previously reviewed this and decided to waive for victims of forces marriage (aka "getting themselves into trouble abroad") for 16 and 17 so it's not like this has been off the radar, they reviewed and actively decided to continue to apply these charges to women over 18 who are British citizens and illegally kidnapped and prob raped etc.

The costs are about £10K a year whoop de doo yes that seems totally worth recouping from these women. And taking their passports is awesome given that presumably it will be exactly what their captors did too

Very upsetting.