Questions Without Notice from Party Spokespeople

Part of 2. Questions to the Leader of the House – in the Senedd at 2:54 pm on 16 May 2018.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Julie James Julie James Labour 2:54, 16 May 2018

Yes, indeed. We have the first anti-slavery co-ordinator in Wales, and he's been working very hard on a system, alongside all of our partners, to make sure that we have the multi-agency hubs working together to ensure that, when people do come forward, we're able to swiftly process them, take them to places of safety, and get the prosecutions in place as swiftly as possible. There have not been many so far, but we're very confident that more are coming. There are three problems, however, the first of which is the issue around the hostile—now called 'compliance'—environment. We do not want people who come forward and who have been the victims of modern slavery to find themselves without any status and, in the worst of cases, faced with deportation. We particularly don't want women who are trafficked to be in that position, often fleeing domestic violence as well. So, we have had liaison with the Home Office to discuss unintended consequences of the several regimes coming together, which we fear are stopping people coming forward because they fear that they'll be put into a worse position. But we have been very much praised in Wales for our anti-slavery co-ordinator and his efforts to bring the services together, and we're very pleased with that.