AIBU to think human trafficking only happens in foreign countries and not in this country?

[Acrazybimbo]

I’ve been hearing a lot about trafficking lately and always thought it only happens in foreign countries but rarely if ever in the UK as it’s never been a thing or talked about round here. I know a random thread to start but how in this country do they get away with it in this day and age with technology being how it is?

The term sex worker minimises what these poor women are, they are prostituted women. To me a sex worker is the bastard that pimps them out.

I am a barrister and have represented victims of human trafficking who were brought into the UK by people ordinarily resident here. Often they have been brought in on the (now defunct) migrant domestic worker visa, or just an ordinary visitor visa (on an ordinary commercial flight) and they then disappear. Many are mistreated and made to work for no pay.

Because unfortunately it's difficult, time consuming and takes a multi agency response to do it properly.
It's easy to go in, arrest people and shut it down, but that just deals with the people on the ground, not the organisers. The organisers will simply cut their losses and move on somewhere else.

Actually, the CL model is evolving and there is national discussion about changing this definition as the line controllers are more frequently using kids in their home locations with less travelling involved. So it's more the controllers who are moving about, but they still use mules - teenagers on trains and buses are still very very common and it's still trafficking.

However, a key element remains the exploitation of people, particularly children, and the trafficking can also be for sexual offences, grooming and mules....

We had training on how to spot when I worked for McDonald's (and it must have been four or five years ago now!)

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/aug/21/civil-servant-kept-nigerian-woman-in-servitude

This is the sort of case I've been involved in.

And this charity works with trafficked people and is a good resource if you want to know more about the topic (and you can give them money if you like!)

https://atleu.org.uk/

Human trafficking and slavery absolutely does happen in this country although I think the meanings of both words has been expanded. To me, human trafficking implies force or coercion (willing to be corrected in my understanding though). People on small channel boats don't look like they're being trafficked to me, they look like very keen participants (apart from children obviously). I've seem them described as being trafficked and the boat organisers human traffickers.

Actually yes!
Some do arrive on small private planes. They can be surprisingly affordable and are almost never subject to immigration checks. Criminals have cottoned on to this.

Also, read the story of Mo Farrow. Absolutely extraordinary.

People coming willingly can still be trafficked though because they don’t know what’s waiting for them when they arrive.

Surrogacy is human trafficking. What else do you call the rental of a woman's uterus and exchanging money for a living breathing baby? That living breathing baby has no say in what's done to it, and it doesn't want "genetic" parents, it's only known established connection is with the woman that gives birth to it.

And of course human trafficking happens in this country, those trafficked women fill Brothels and have to "work off their debt".

This gives you examples and obviously county lines is part of it

Welshwabbit I've come across similar involving people brought here as "au pairs" or "nannies" with the "employers" seemingly oblivious of:

• uk minimum wage laws
• EU working time directives (at the time)
• the fact that you cannot reduce wages to nothing by providing accomodation and meals
• the fact that you cannot take someone's passport away
• uk rules about annual leave and bank holidays
• uk requirements to operate tax/nic for employees

I'm sure the people involved would never in a million years have classfied what they did as modern slavery but that is exactly what it was.

What are your grounds for saying the U.K. is ‘probably one of the worst countries’? Do you actually have grounds for saying it, or is it just what you like to think?

@ExitChasedByAPanda I'm in a much, much better place now- life is very lovely. Not perfect but then who's is?

WTF? Do you never read the news?

Agree wth all the posters on here regarding traffickign.

Will add that I think why people like OP might be a bit confused at first, or questioning if British people are trafficked, is because of movies and tv. We've all seen that police drama about human traffickers "shopping" for pretty blonde girls or whatever, and the frantic search to find her as her family worry themselves sick.

The reality is that most trafficking victims were already vulnerable. For all the reasons mentioned for ones coming from other countries but those same sort of vulnerabilities exist for people born here. They are poor, or perhaps don't have family/are down on thei rluck etc. Trafficers aren't "stealing" middle class teenagers from brighton.

I think there is an element of people traffickers knowing that our border control and immigration system is creaking do badly that it is easy to disappear people here. When it takes 5 years to process asylum cases people, even if they are caught and have to claim asylum are hanging round, and can more easily be forced to work for gangs. The boring way of dealing with this would be to adequately fund public services including immigration and border control. The red meat way is to bang on about Rwanda and small boats.

I think it's time to change direction. It's all well and good sitting back, gathering evidence, and waiting/watching until you can catch a small number of "higher ups", but the number prosecuted is tiny and it takes years and a lot of resources to close down one supply chain. I just don't think it's working.

I think it would be far better to hit it hard at street level and aim to prosecute the more "mid range" people involved in the logistics/operation at lower levels. Yes, it doesn't get the top, but realistically, we're getting so few of them anyway.

This "wait and get the top people" approach is clearly failing as drugs, weapons and people trafficing is just continuing to rise. We need a new approach.

So because our systems are admittedly far from perfect, you’re assuming that the same doesn’t happen elsewhere?

I am an interpreter. In our work, we meet so many people trafficked here ! Men, women, old people, teenagers, even children. So many.... 😔😔

No, but we have the slowest asylum processing times in Europe. If someone is going to be processed in a year and sent home the traffickers won't get as much ' value' as they will out of someone who is here for 5 years, and can be so easily lost in the system. We have hundreds if asylum seekers who the authorities have no idea where they are. They aren't living it up on benefits in 6 bedroom houses. They are probably living somewhere as slaves working for criminal gangs.

I agree. Keep hitting the low level operations. Seize assets even if they have little value. It will make setting up again quickly unprofitable.

It will benefit local communities as legitimate nail bars/car wash etc will be able to operate.

Trafficking of British nationals, particularly young British national is a huge issue, and they are very difficult to help. A foreign national can be returned to their own country, but where can a British national be returned to? The same place where they were trafficked from in the first place- often with little parental oversight or input, for whatever reason. Or they would not have been so vulnerable in the first place. And often, they immediately get trafficked again. For a British 14 year old, with no father and a disengaged mother, there can be no way out

Where I used to work we had agency workers through a local agency, turned out they were all trafficked, the agency housed them all at high cost ie most of their wages and sent them out to work. The owner would even bring them to work in his big fancy car and try to talk to our regular staff, he was a smooth talking creep. Police involved all the carers moved on to god knows where he was shut down and no idea what happened to him and his family.