Academic and husband ‘kept slave in shed at £1.2m home’
A UNIVERSITY lecturer and her husband have been arrested over claims they kept a Polish builder as a slave in their garden shed for four years.
Pritpal Binning, 56, and her spouse Palvinder, 54, are suspected of holding him against his will while he worked on their five-bedroom £1.2million house in Hampshire.
The frail Polish man is said to have told staff at an NHS walk-in centre he was being forced to carry out building work in exchange for food.
He claimed the British couple had given him only a plastic sun lounger to sleep on and out-of-date food to eat, and that he had no toilet.
On one occasion while he was working he stopped to chat with a neighbour but was told off my Mrs Binning, a Southampton University health sciences lecturer, it is claimed. Officers from the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority raided the address in Chilworth, an affluent village home to several footballers.
The Polish man, who is in his 40s and has not been named, told officers he had been forced to live in the ‘absolutely freezing’ concrete shed. It is alleged he had no bedding and used a fridge and barbecue as a kitchen. Senior investigating officer Tony Byrne
said: ‘Just down the bottom of the garden there in a concrete shed. It’s absolutely freezing in there, there’s no bedding and no sanitary conditions there at all – there’s no toilet. ‘There’s a large amount of building work which corroborates what our potential victim has told us. In the 21st century, no-one should be forced to live in degrading and disgusting conditions.’ A neighbour said he had seen a white man working around the property.
Referring to Mr and Mrs Binning, he said: ‘They’ve lived here for at least 20 years – they were certainly nice when I went round there.
‘It’s shocked me hearing what has been reported to have happened. I have seen a white guy walking past my house with a trailer full of rubbish. He stopped to talk to my gardener once and she [Mrs Binning] came out and told him off for chatting.’
The gates of the Binnings’ large, cream-coloured home stood open yesterday, with a golden post box next to a house name sign.
A barely- started breeze block extension sat at the top of the driveway, with two parked cars – one a high-powered Lexus GS saloon – in front of a garage.
The breeze block shed, in which the Polish man claimed to have been forced to live, was visible in one corner of the garden. Officers said he had been admitted to the ‘National Referral Mechanism’, which ensures modern slavery victims and are given support. Both suspects have been released while investigations continue.
Speaking at her home yesterday, Mrs Binning refused to comment on the arrests, saying: ‘I know why you’re here. We’re not going to talk.’