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Anti-Slavery Day Bill

I draw the hon. Gentleman's attention to the conjunction that I used: I referred to the granting of an extendable 45-day recovery period and a one-year temporary residency permit in certain circumstances. He may argue that the latter should be automatic. I shall provide a little of the background to decisions on these matters. There is protection in immigration rules for victims of domestic violence, to whom we provide refuge and can provide indefinite leave to remain. That is desirable, and the House supported the idea. However, it has resulted, in a number of instances—I would say a significant number—of abuse of that route for organised immigration crime purposes, through the use of what I believe those in police enforcement call sleepers. We have had cases of women who have asked to be beaten up so that they can get indefinite leave to remain. It is a sad world, but one has to be aware of that. I am not suggesting that there is any evidence of such activity in this area; I am saying that we have an obligation to look at the individual when granting the 45-day recovery period and the one-year temporary residency permit. However, it would be foolish of me to say that 45 days is the be-all and end-all; we shall have to see. The policy is welcome and it is above the minimum required under the convention. In addition, the establishment of a national referral mechanism has provided for the systematic identification of victims within a framework designed to make it easier for organisations to co-operate and share information about potential victims. That brings us to the hoary old chestnut of data sharing. I think that civil libertarians sometimes need to get real about the obstacles that can be put in the way of well-meaning organisations. We have moved forward on that with support from all the parties and local authorities. We have not been reliant on the ratification of the convention to provide support to victims. We have invested £5.8 million in the POPPY project since 2003 to provide specialist support for victims trafficked into sexual exploitation. That includes as a minimum safe accommodation, advocacy, access to counselling, access to legal advice and interpretation services. The POPPY project has provided support to more than 500 victims of human trafficking since 2003. A further £3.9 million is being spent over the current and next financial years on specialist services for victims of all forms of human trafficking. That figure includes a grant agreement between the Home Office and Migrant Helpline to provide support and accommodation to identified victims of forced labour. That grant agreement represents a further development in the support mechanism for victims of forced labour. Migrant Helpline, our non-governmental organisation partner, supported 169 people between June 2008 and September 2009 and supported three police operations last year. That area of work has been enhanced by the creation of the pay and work rights helpline, through which the Greater London authority, the Employment Agency Standards Inspectorate, HMRC, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs—because of the link to agricultural labour—and the Health and Safety Executive work together to deal with multi-complaint issues. Victims of trafficking can also access the wider provision available to all victims of crime, including the Victim Support service, the service for victims of sexual crimes in England and Wales, on which we have spent £4.65 million, and increased funding for sexual assault referral centres, rape crisis centres and the Survivors Trust. Child trafficking is a particularly emotive issue for us all. Measures to care for children who are victims of trafficking need to be attuned to the vulnerability of children. The hon. Member for Totnes gave the example of Hillingdon. We have done a great deal of work on biometric fingerprint reading and biometric photographs, which are required on all visas, which means that we are now able to identify a person even if their passport has been destroyed. Identity fraud or misuse is a key weapon of the criminal, and through biometrics we now know who people are, which is a huge advantage in prosecutions and enforcement activities. Again, I wish that Liberty would pay attention to that point. Sometimes, the taking of data can help to protect someone's civil liberties. What if a victim of child trafficking were told, "We can't identify you, and we can't prosecute the criminal exploiting you, because we're not allowed to take data"? That is not a civil liberties argument by any stretch of the imagination. On the needs of children, we have established, by giving somebody the job of doing it, joint work with children's services, the police and other law enforcement agencies, the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre and, of course, the Human Trafficking Centre. The missing persons taskforce, which was launched by the Prime Minister recently, is looking at how that joint work can be improved. Recently, child trafficking training for immigration officers and other UKBA staff has been improved, and that ensures the continued awareness of our officers at the border. Let us remember that that now includes customs officials and immigration officials, and involves partnerships with police, including special branch—a special branch from outside London; I cannot remember the name—other specialist agencies and other parts of the security forces, including the intelligence agencies. We have published revised arrangements and guidance for Crown prosecutors, including on the consideration of cases concerning juveniles found on cannabis farms and involved in other criminal activities. We have stepped up our efforts to tackle the problem of potentially trafficked children going missing from care, the Hillingdon example being prominent in that regard. We have introduced further measures to raise awareness among practitioners and improve their ability to identify children who may have been trafficked into the UK through the application of the national referral mechanism. We also published "Safeguarding Children and Young People from Sexual Exploitation". A significant amount of work has therefore been done, but we are far from complacent on the issue. I have talked at some length to try to get across the desirability of that work, which is backed up by the Bill. Let me finish by repeating the offer that I made at the beginning of my remarks. We believe that drafting improvements could be made, but we do not want to stop the Bill, because that would not be right. However, there are some arguments that need to be had.