London - Human
traffickers across Britain are preying on homeless people and
luring them into slave labour with promises of accommodation and
work, charities said on Monday, warning that growing numbers are
at risk of being enslaved with homelessness on the rise.
People sleeping rough are increasingly being targeted by
traffickers around homeless shelters, soup kitchens and support
groups, and tricked into modern slavery, several charities said.
"While modern slavery affects many sections of society, we
feel this group (homeless people) is particularly vulnerable,"
said Carly Jones, chief executive of the charity Sifa Fireside,
which is based in Birmingham, Britain's second-biggest city.
"There have been occasions outside our own service where
traffickers have been attempting to 'recruit' our clients,"
Jones told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by email.
At least 4,100 people slept rough across England on any
given night last year - a 16 percent increase on 2015 and more
than double the amount in 2010, according to the charity Crisis.
Homeless migrants are especially vulnerable to enslavement
as they are less likely to seek shelter or support from
charities for fear of being detained or deported, said Matthew
Downie, director of policy and external affairs at Crisis.
Many slavery victims are also at risk of ending up homeless
and being trafficked again, according to the charity St Mungo's.
"We have started to see an increase in people on the streets
that showed possible indicators of being victims of
trafficking," said Karen Savant of St Mungo's in London.
"They had photocopied documents, they had little
understanding of where they were, did not give a coherent story
about their situation, or let other people talk for them."
It is unclear how many homeless people in Britain are
trafficked or forced into modern slavery, as there is no
national database or system for recording such incidents.
In a recent high-profile case, nine members of a British
traveller family who enslaved 18 homeless adults to fund their
lavish lifestyle were jailed for a total of about 80 years.
At least 13 000 people are estimated by the government to be
victims of forced labour, sexual exploitation and domestic
servitude - but police say the true figure is likely to be in
the tens of thousands with slavery operations on the rise.
Britain is regarded as a leader in global efforts to combat
slavery, and passed the Modern Slavery Act in 2015 to crack down
on traffickers, force businesses to check their supply chains
for forced labour, and protect people at risk of being enslaved.
*Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of
Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights,
trafficking, property rights, climate change and resilience.