900 cases of modern slavery in region – half involving children

ALMOST 900 cases of modern slavery were investigated in the West Midlands last year with more than half of cases involving children, alarming new figures have revealed.

Suspected cases reached record levels in 2021, with 895 cases investigated by West Midlands Police.

The figure was a 22 per cent rise on the 731 cases investigated the previous year and includes 478 children, many of whom were likely exploited by criminal gangs.

Nationally some 12,727 potential victims of modern slavery were referred across the UK in 2021, a 20 per cent increase on the previous year (10,601), and the highest number since the NRM first began in 2009. And worryingly, around four in 10 (5,468) of these potential victims were children.

They were most commonly subjected to criminal exploitation, such as county lines, where gangs use vulnerable youngsters to transport drugs out of big cities and into smaller towns.

Last week a West Midlands Police crackdown on county lines dealers saw nearly £1 million of drugs seized and blocked from going onto our streets and more than 100 people arrests.

The most common nationality of potential victims was British, with 3,952 of them UK nationals (31 per cent).

Three-quarters of these potential British victims were children (2,981).

The next most common nationality of potential victims was Albanian (20 per cent), followed by Vietnamese (eight per cent).