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Human Trafficking

It is illuminating to hear what my hon. Friend did before he became a Member of Parliament. I thank him for that elucidation of how the Americans do it; it is an important point. I do not understand why we do not do it here. Will the Minister seriously consider it? Even though we have not yet signed up to the minimum standards of victim protection laid down in the Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking in human beings, we are still obliged to consider children’s best interests, not just from a moral point of view but as an international legal requirement under article 3 of the 1989 UN convention on the rights of the child, which was ratified by every country in the world except for the United States and Somalia. Yet when we discover trafficked children at ports of entry, we are still inclined to put them back on the next plane to the country from which they came. The snag in doing so is that such children are usually re-trafficked or their families are placed at risk. Immigration officials must be instructed not only to discover victims of trafficking but to challenge fake parents or guardians, who inevitably have tickets to return to the country from which they came within 24 hours of arrival. It is another simple thing. When children are accompanied by a parent or guardian, all immigration officers should check the date on the return ticket. If it is within 24 or 48 hours, questions must be asked.