Written question asked by John MacDougall (Labour) on Tuesday, 8 July 2008, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Monday, 14 July 2008. It was answered by Lord Coaker (Labour) on Tuesday, 15 July 2008 on behalf of the Home Office.

Human Trafficking

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what recent steps she has taken to stop human trafficking; and if she will make a statement.

Answer: [holding answer 14 July 2008]: On 2 July we published the update on the United Kingdom Action Plan on Tackling Human Trafficking and on the same day announced the outcomes of Operation Pentameter 2.The original action plan was published in March 2007. It outlines the Government's end to end strategy to tackle human trafficking and to identify and protect victims. The update reports on progress since then and sets out new actions—85 in total, up from 62 actions originally.Operation Pentameter 2 was a major success. It resulted in the arrest of 528 people and the recovery of the 167 victims of trafficking for sexual exploitation. A total of 15 victims of trafficking for sexual exploitation were recovered in Scotland.We remain committed to tackling this horrendous crime and continue to make progress towards our overall aim of ensuring the UK becomes a hostile environment for the traffickers. This will be further reinforced by the ratification of the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings before the end of 2008.

Secondary information