5. Will the Leader of the House make a statement on anti-slavery measures in Wales? OAQ51583

Yes. We are determined to do all we can to make Wales hostile to slavery. We are working with our multi-agency partners to raise awareness of slavery, providing multi-agency training, supporting victims and assisting in bringing perpetrators of this heinous crime to justice. 

I thank the leader of the house for that answer, but Wendy Williams, HM inspector of constabulary, has said:

'While modern slavery cases can be complex and require significant manpower, many of the shortcomings in investigating these cases reflect deficiencies in basic policing practice. We found inconsistent, even ineffective, identification of victims', which led to investigations being closed prematurely.

'As a result, victims were being left unprotected, leaving perpetrators free to continue to exploit people' as nothing more than commodities. Can you please give us assurances that this is not happening in Wales, given that the Wales anti-slavery group tell us that there are 10,000 anti-slavery ambassadors in Wales, and yet we have the stark statistic that, to date, there has only been one prosecution across the whole of Wales?

Well, we're the first and only country in the UK to appoint an anti-slavery co-ordinator, and we've established the Wales anti-slavery leadership group to provide strategic leadership and guidance on how we tackle slavery in Wales. The Member will be very well aware that slavery is a very complex ground to investigate and prosecute, which is why we've worked with our partners to develop a joint-training provision for law-enforcement senior investigating officers and crown prosecutors and crown advocates. Working with our partners in 2017, we delivered a consistent standard of anti-slavery training to almost 8,000 people across Wales, and I'll take this opportunity, Deputy Presiding Officer, to urge anyone with information about slavery to report incidents to the police, as all reported incidents are investigated and previous reporting has led to people being brought to justice or disrupted the activity entirely.