My Lords, I am co-chairman of the APPG on Human Trafficking and Modern Slavery and I am the vice-chairman of the Human Trafficking Foundation. I bitterly regret not putting my name to the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, which I was a bit slow to read.
I want to make three points. I entirely agree with what has been said already by noble Lords. First, on the point that the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, makes about the Act and the reputation, as it happens, Frank Field MP—now the noble Lord, Lord Field of Birkenhead—chaired a small group of two MPs and myself who advised Theresa May as Home Secretary on whether there should be a modern slavery Bill. More recently, the noble Lord, Lord Field, another MP and I wrote a report on how the Modern Slavery Act had managed over the years. It has already been said that this Bill drives a coach and horses through the Act. It is tragic that it is the same Conservative Government—a different Prime Minister, but the same Conservative Government—who, having put through one of the greatest and most innovative of Acts of Parliament, which was applauded around the world, now choose to behave like this. Of course, it will very adversely affect our reputation, as the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, has just said. That is really very sad.
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Secondly, it will have a disastrous effect, as has been said, on the people who are genuinely victims of slavery. They will be told by their traffickers that they will not have any recourse to any help if they try to escape—and, quite shortly, that is true. So there will be no exit, even if they could escape, from the fact that they either are in the state of slavery or they are removed to somewhere such as Rwanda, where they will never have been and will know no one.
Thirdly, there is the naivety of the Government in suggesting that people could assist the prosecutions by doing it from another country. We do not have enough prosecutions. The main way to deal with modern slavery is to prosecute the traffickers—those abroad who come here or can be found, and those who are in this country. There has been some success—but a limited success because you have to have witnesses to give the evidence. Even today there is not enough evidence given by witnesses, who are slow to come forward. I have to ask the Government: do they really think that if somebody is sent to another country against their will, having been already traumatised by being a victim of slavery, they are going to help the
Government who deported them to deal with their traffickers? It seems extremely unlikely. On those three points, I strongly support what is going on now.