by HANA BUSHNAQ 

When it comes to human trafficking, no fact is more solid than that not one country is completely immune to it. But to see the problem happening in England in such big numbers and under the supposedly watchful eye of security personnel is daunting. Young women arrive from Eastern European countries to work as maids or au pairs. So many of them instantly get sold or auctioned off at the airport coffee shops or restaurants. This is so alarming that it verifies the belief that much more needs to be done to solve this problem.

The numbers are in the thousands, but are almost impossible to pin down completely. In 2003, 4000  were estimated to have been brought in to the UK. The number is expected to have risen since. A rather surprising fact is the finding that some UK nationals are also victims of trafficking, but their numbers are practically nonexistent. However, the conditions that make them vulnerable are known. These are girls from poor backgrounds who work in massage parlours. They get ito debt with the parlour owners and become slaves as a means of paying their debts. Manchester, where a lot of the girls find themselves, is dubbed the “sauna capital of Europe”. 85 per cent of the women come from overseas.  However, it is argued that it is almost impossible to get someone out the country against their will so the movement of UK citizens is thought to take a city-to-city nature. Thousands of child slavery cases were also found by child protection and human rights organizations.

The challenges faced by the police are plenty. By now the police know that there might be trafficking in every area, but the problem is that it is hidden by the communities. For example, a Poppy Project private research found out that evidence of off-street prostitution was found in all of London's 33 boroughs.  The Poppy Project is a London-based scheme that provides support and accommodation for the victims. The police need to be better trained to look for the alarming signs. The victims might say they are alright, but they could be afraid of the traffickers. Police should look for signs that imply that they are locked up against their will at night among others as clues for additional probing. According to Det Sgt Jon Gross: “Unless a force is set up to look for it, you won't necessarily find it.”  

Another aspect of the problem in England is the violence in which the victims have to live. According to the findings of the Helen Bamber Foundation, victims face horrific brutality. They are raped and beaten as soon as they meet their “employers”. So many nights, they aren’t fed to help keep them slim. They can't afford to complain or not serve their clients well because if the client is not happy, this means additional beatings and punishment by their captors. They are expected to serve 20 men a day, and work very long hours.

It is shameful for this to be happening in a year like 2005, in a country that was then president of the European Union. The UK prioritized human trafficking during its presidency. The UK Human Trafficking Centre was opened last year to coordinate the law enforcement approach to the problem. Some successes were made. Between January and July of 2006, 84 trafficked women were saved, 230 arrests made and more than £250,000 seized. All this becomes very trivial when one knows that officers were only able to visit 10 per cent of sex establishments.  It becomes even more trivial when we remember that we shouldn’t be worrying about freeing slaves in 2007, 200 years since England’s parliamentary act to abolish slave trade. It brings to focus that legislation, solving poverty and increasing controls are all overstated quick fixes. Maybe we should be rethinking our entire moral systems. The whole world shares this plight and this must mean that so many of us have denounced their most basic values.

HANA BUSHNAQ is a research associate at Islamica Magazine.