Who are the victims of slavery in our county?

A total of 268 potential victims of modern slavery were referred to Sussex Police for investigation in the first nine months of 2020, because their exploitation or trafficking took place in the county. The figure includes 97 children, and represents a 9.8 per cent increase on the same period during 2019 – despite fears the pandemic could push slavery networks and their victims further underground. Some idea of where victims in Sussex tend to be from can be gleaned by looking at separate figures published by the Home Office. These show that of the 40 potential victims referred by police to the National Referral Mechanism (NRM) – the UK’s apparatus for identifying and supporting victims – between April and September 2020, the majority were from the UK (24). Meanwhile, three victims were Albanian and two were Vietnamese. However these figures do not tell the whole story as they only include potential victims referred by police and not all ‘first responders’ who have the power of referral – which include council workers, immigration officers and firefighters. When it came to the type of activity the 40 potential victims had been involved in, most were categorised as ‘criminal’ or ‘labour and criminal’, while four were possibly being held as sex slaves. Sussex Police’s DCI Kris Ottery said modern slavery captured a ‘really wide range of criminality’ in range of different settings in Sussex. It could involve local people being exploited in construction, factories or agriculture, or being moved around for sexual exploitation or for use in supplying drugs. Or people may be recruited from abroad and set up in the county by their exploiters, who might impose a debt bond on them as a result of this facilitation. DCI Ottery said modern slavery could be taking place in what appeared to be legitimate employment, where ‘people are potentially legitimately employed but somebody else is skimming wages or taking fees from them for various aspects of their life – whether it be accommodation, getting them transport, getting them into work, recruitment’. Then there was county lines, where illegal drugs are transported from one area to another, usually by children or vulnerable people who are coerced into it by gangs. DCI Ottery said this was becoming ‘more and more prevalent’, and ‘something we have experienced a fair amount of in our coastal towns in particular’. Following a major drugs swoop in Crawley last February, which involved raids at ten properties, four people were referred to specialist support services as potential victims of modern slavery, while two men were interviewed on suspicion of human trafficking offences, according to police. Elsewhere in West Sussex, five people believed to be being held as slaves were rescued from a fishing boat in Shoreham Port in November and two others arrested.

In East Sussex, two women who were allegedly being exploited through debt bondage and forced to work as prostitutes were removed from a business. Across the UK, almost 30 potential victims of modern slavery were referred to police forces every day on average during the first nine months of 2020. Home Office figures show 7,576 potential slavery and trafficking victims were referred to the NRM – an increase of 4.2 per cent on the same period in 2019. However charities say the NRM figures are an underestimate of the true extent of slavery in the UK, as adults need to consent to a referral. It also relies on designated first responders such as police being aware of the programme and how to refer victims – something the Human Trafficking Foundation says is lacking. A recent study in the Cambridge Journal of Evidence Based Policing, which examined cases of Vietnamese nationals arrested for cannabis cultivation in Surrey and Sussex, found police demonstrated ‘ignorance’ and a lack of awareness of modern slavery. “Even when officers had concerns about modern slavery, no appropriate crime was recorded and no formalised investigation followed,” the study said. DCI Ottery said many Sussex Police officers had undergone specialist training about how to engage with victims. “There’s a lot of investment into trying to ensure that we give the best possible service.”