The Government recognises that online platforms are significant enablers of sexual exploitation. They must be responsible and held accountable for content on their sites, including taking proactive steps to prevent their sites being used by criminals. Victims of sexual exploitation make up a notable proportion of referrals to the National Referral Mechanism. The most recent annual statistics show that in 2025, sexual exploitation (either partly or wholly) accounted for 15% (3,607) of all referrals.

In December 2025, the Government committed within the “Freedom from Violence and Abuse: a cross-government strategy to build a safer society for women and girls”, to address many aspects of prostitution and sexual exploitation within England and Wales. Commitments include reviewing legislation, raising awareness among frontline agencies of what constitutes adult sexual exploitation, and strengthening police disruption of sexual exploitation. Further details on each of these commitments will be announced in due course.

The Government is also working closely with law enforcement to tackle the drivers of trafficking for sexual exploitation, including through operational activity aimed at tackling modern slavery threats, ensuring they have the tools they need to disrupt sexual exploitation facilitated online and targeting prolific perpetrators.

This financial year (2026/2027) the Home Office is providing over £10.7m to the Tackling Organised Exploitation (TOEX) Programme to improve the law enforcement response across a number of threat areas, including modern slavery and human trafficking, organised immigration crime, county lines, adult and child sexual abuse and exploitation. This funding is used to deliver a range of specialist intelligence and analytical capabilities across threats, including supporting law enforcement partners with an adult service website referral pilot, where adverts are referred to TOEX to support operational activity.

The Online Enablers Working Group, previously the Adult Services Website Working Group, is a multi-agency working group. The working group comprises of law enforcement, policing, policy officials and regulators, including the National Crime Agency, Home Office officials, police officers, TOEX and Ofcom. The Home Office does not intend to publish information or documents from meetings, as this could undermine future policy development.

The Home Office has provided dedicated funding to support law enforcement agencies to purchase software licenses to identify and tackle sexual exploitation as part of routine work and project work in the following financial years:

• In 2021/2022- £100,000 was made available to police forces in England and Wales
• Between 2022 and 2026, the Modern Slavery Fund supported the provision of software licences to international law enforcement partners in Romania and Brazil, with a total of £98,608 (mostly Official Development Assistance) allocated over this period. This activity aimed to strengthen the ability of law enforcement agencies to conduct more effective and timely investigations, improving the identification and safeguarding of victims of sexual exploitation trafficked across routes linking Brazil, Romania and the UK.
• In 2025/2026 – £356,000 was given to Bedfordshire police to pilot a national law enforcement hub for tackling sexual exploitation. Approximately £7,000 of this was made available to spend on licenses.

The Government recognises that online platforms are significant enablers of sexual exploitation. They must be responsible and held accountable for content on their sites, including taking proactive steps to prevent their sites being used by criminals. Victims of sexual exploitation make up a notable proportion of referrals to the National Referral Mechanism. The most recent annual statistics show that in 2025, sexual exploitation (either partly or wholly) accounted for 15% (3,607) of all referrals.

In December 2025, the Government committed within the “Freedom from Violence and Abuse: a cross-government strategy to build a safer society for women and girls”, to address many aspects of prostitution and sexual exploitation within England and Wales. Commitments include reviewing legislation, raising awareness among frontline agencies of what constitutes adult sexual exploitation, and strengthening police disruption of sexual exploitation. Further details on each of these commitments will be announced in due course.

The Government is also working closely with law enforcement to tackle the drivers of trafficking for sexual exploitation, including through operational activity aimed at tackling modern slavery threats, ensuring they have the tools they need to disrupt sexual exploitation facilitated online and targeting prolific perpetrators.

This financial year (2026/2027) the Home Office is providing over £10.7m to the Tackling Organised Exploitation (TOEX) Programme to improve the law enforcement response across a number of threat areas, including modern slavery and human trafficking, organised immigration crime, county lines, adult and child sexual abuse and exploitation. This funding is used to deliver a range of specialist intelligence and analytical capabilities across threats, including supporting law enforcement partners with an adult service website referral pilot, where adverts are referred to TOEX to support operational activity.

The Online Enablers Working Group, previously the Adult Services Website Working Group, is a multi-agency working group. The working group comprises of law enforcement, policing, policy officials and regulators, including the National Crime Agency, Home Office officials, police officers, TOEX and Ofcom. The Home Office does not intend to publish information or documents from meetings, as this could undermine future policy development.

The Home Office has provided dedicated funding to support law enforcement agencies to purchase software licenses to identify and tackle sexual exploitation as part of routine work and project work in the following financial years:

• In 2021/2022- £100,000 was made available to police forces in England and Wales
• Between 2022 and 2026, the Modern Slavery Fund supported the provision of software licences to international law enforcement partners in Romania and Brazil, with a total of £98,608 (mostly Official Development Assistance) allocated over this period. This activity aimed to strengthen the ability of law enforcement agencies to conduct more effective and timely investigations, improving the identification and safeguarding of victims of sexual exploitation trafficked across routes linking Brazil, Romania and the UK.
• In 2025/2026 – £356,000 was given to Bedfordshire police to pilot a national law enforcement hub for tackling sexual exploitation. Approximately £7,000 of this was made available to spend on licenses.

The core objective of Universal Credit is to support people who are out of work or on a low income to enter work, earn more, or to prepare for work in the future, and claimants are generally expected to undertake certain work-related activities in return for financial support.

Any work-related requirements are agreed in discussion with the claimant and will always be tailored in light of a claimant’s circumstances, ensuring they are realistic and achievable. Work coaches have the flexibility to personalise work-related requirements for claimants based on the impact of any health condition, caring responsibilities, or other circumstance.

A sanction is only applicable where a claimant fails to undertake their agreed activity without good reason. Before a sanction decision is made, claimants are always asked to provide their reasoning, and several safety measures, including checking for any vulnerabilities, are in place before deciding whether a sanction is applicable. These include: checking to see if the claimants circumstances had changed and if the requirement remained reasonable; considering whether the claimant had undertaken alternative activity that means the requirement was met; and reviewing any known vulnerabilities and their impact on a claimant’s ability to meet their requirements.

If a claimant is sanctioned and can demonstrate that they cannot meet their most immediate and essential needs, we also have a system of recoverable hardship payments. These needs can include heating, food, and hygiene.

DWP’s commitments to the violence against women and girls (VAWG) Strategy will help align us with the wider cross government ambition to tackle sexual exploitation. This includes strengthening the training and guidance provided to frontline staff and Domestic Abuse SPOCs, ensuring they are better equipped to recognise and respond to all forms of VAWG, including sexual exploitation. In addition, DWP is rolling out its 5-year plan for safeguarding following the Written Statement in December 2025.

On 18 December 2025, the Government published ‘Freedom from Violence and Abuse: a cross-government strategy to build a safer society for women and girls’, which includes a commitment to review how the law addresses prostitution to ensure it better protects women and girls.

The Home Office engages regularly with organisations that represent people who have engaged in prostitution/selling sex and people who have been sexually exploited, the police and other relevant stakeholders.

The Epstein scandal exposed a culture that didn't value the lives of women. It is utterly contrary to what the Prime Minister stands for and the values at the heart of a government tackling misogyny in schools, halving violence against women and girls and overhauling how our criminal justice system serves victims.

The Crown Estate is an independent commercial organisation, and the Government is not involved in its operations and day-to-day decision making.

The Crown Estate has confirmed that its leases contain a nuisance clause that prohibits illegal or immoral use, and that it enforces those leases in accordance with applicable law.

The Crown Estate has confirmed that its residential lease arrangements do not require monitoring or recording the identities of a leaseholder’s private visitors. Such monitoring would be incompatible with privacy and data protection requirements and with the long-established covenant owed to leaseholders under landlord-tenant law.

Criminal justice is devolved to Scotland and Northern Ireland. The Home Office is responsible for legislation in England and Wales. Under the current law in England and Wales, the acts of buying and selling sex are not in themselves illegal. There are existing offences related to sexual exploitation in the Sexual Offences Act 2003 including causing or inciting prostitution for gain, controlling prostitution for gain, and paying for the services of a prostitute subjected to force, threats or any other form of coercion or deception.

On 18 December 2025, the Government published Freedom from violence and abuse: a cross-government strategy to build a safer society for women and girls, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/freedom-from-violence-and-abuse-a-cross-government-strategy. In this strategy, the Government committed to reviewing how the law addresses prostitution (this includes brothel keeping legislation) to ensure it better protects women and girls. Further details will be set out in due course. The Home Office engages regularly with organisations that represent sex workers, sexually exploited adults, people trafficked for sex, the police and other relevant stakeholders.

For example, on 16 July 2025, the Home Office launched a public call for evidence on how the Government can improve the process of identifying victims of modern slavery and human trafficking, including for victims of sexual exploitation. This call for evidence provided an opportunity to hear views of survivors, first responders, law enforcement and prosecution services, devolved administrations, non-governmental organisations and any groups or people with an interest in the modern slavery victim identification system. The call for evidence closed on 8 October 2025 and a report summarising the key findings and themes will be published early this year.

Criminal justice is devolved to Scotland and Northern Ireland. The Home Office is responsible for legislation in England and Wales. Under the current law in England and Wales, the acts of buying and selling sex are not in themselves illegal. There are existing offences related to sexual exploitation in the Sexual Offences Act 2003 including causing or inciting prostitution for gain, controlling prostitution for gain, and paying for the services of a prostitute subjected to force, threats or any other form of coercion or deception.

On 18 December 2025, the Government published Freedom from violence and abuse: a cross-government strategy to build a safer society for women and girls, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/freedom-from-violence-and-abuse-a-cross-government-strategy. In this strategy, the Government committed to reviewing how the law addresses prostitution (this includes brothel keeping legislation) to ensure it better protects women and girls. Further details will be set out in due course. The Home Office engages regularly with organisations that represent sex workers, sexually exploited adults, people trafficked for sex, the police and other relevant stakeholders.

For example, on 16 July 2025, the Home Office launched a public call for evidence on how the Government can improve the process of identifying victims of modern slavery and human trafficking, including for victims of sexual exploitation. This call for evidence provided an opportunity to hear views of survivors, first responders, law enforcement and prosecution services, devolved administrations, non-governmental organisations and any groups or people with an interest in the modern slavery victim identification system. The call for evidence closed on 8 October 2025 and a report summarising the key findings and themes will be published early this year.

Criminal justice is devolved to Scotland and Northern Ireland. The Home Office is responsible for legislation in England and Wales. Under the current law in England and Wales, the acts of buying and selling sex are not in themselves illegal. There are existing offences related to sexual exploitation in the Sexual Offences Act 2003 including causing or inciting prostitution for gain, controlling prostitution for gain, and paying for the services of a prostitute subjected to force, threats or any other form of coercion or deception.

On 18 December 2025, the Government published Freedom from violence and abuse: a cross-government strategy to build a safer society for women and girls, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/freedom-from-violence-and-abuse-a-cross-government-strategy. In this strategy, the Government committed to reviewing how the law addresses prostitution (this includes brothel keeping legislation) to ensure it better protects women and girls. Further details will be set out in due course. The Home Office engages regularly with organisations that represent sex workers, sexually exploited adults, people trafficked for sex, the police and other relevant stakeholders.

For example, on 16 July 2025, the Home Office launched a public call for evidence on how the Government can improve the process of identifying victims of modern slavery and human trafficking, including for victims of sexual exploitation. This call for evidence provided an opportunity to hear views of survivors, first responders, law enforcement and prosecution services, devolved administrations, non-governmental organisations and any groups or people with an interest in the modern slavery victim identification system. The call for evidence closed on 8 October 2025 and a report summarising the key findings and themes will be published early this year.

The trafficking of women and girls for sexual exploitation is a truly horrific crime. This Government has set out a mission to halve violence against women and girls in a decade, and we will use all the levers available to us to deliver this ambition. This is why the recently published Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy includes a series of measures to tackle sexual exploitation and to better support victims and survivors.

Victims of sexual exploitation make up a large proportion of referrals to the National Referral Mechanism. The most recent annual statistics show that in 2024, sexual exploitation (either partly or wholly) accounted for 17% (3,266) of all referrals. Of these, the majority of those referred were females (79%; 2,564).

The Government is working closely with law enforcement to tackle the drivers of trafficking for sexual exploitation, including through law enforcement activity aimed at tackling modern slavery threats and targeting prolific perpetrators. Also, the National Police Lead for modern slavery is leading Project Turnstone, which will develop a new framework for investigating modern slavery and includes a suite of products to guide forces to identify and tackle sexual exploitation.

To support victims to escape and recover from their exploitation, the Modern Slavery Victim Care Contract provides support to adult potential and confirmed victims of exploitation and trafficking in England and Wales. This support includes safe accommodation where necessary, financial support and a support worker to help them access wider support services, including medical treatment, legal aid, legal representatives, and legal advice.

We recently ran a public Call for Evidence on how the Government can improve the process of identifying victims of modern slavery, including for victims who have been trafficked for sexual exploitation. Following analysis of the responses from this Call for Evidence, we will consider whether any future policy changes are needed.