Thursday 18 October is Anti-Slavery Day in the UK. A day intended to draw awareness to the fact that human trafficking remains a growing phenomenon. There are more people enslaved worldwide today than there were 200 years ago in the lead up to the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade.

Vulnerable men and women are being trafficked into the UK and exploited by others for profit. This can be through forcing them into prostitution, domestic servitude or begging.

Coinciding with Anti-Slavery Day, the first report has been published by the Inter-Departmental Ministerial Group (IDMG) on human trafficking in the UK. The report assesses the extent of human trafficking and the prevention work being done to stop more people becoming victims.

CARE has been working to support two Bills in the UK which seek to tackle human trafficking and sexual exploitation.

Lord McColl of Dulwich has been campaigning in the Houses of Parliament for greater assistance and support for victims of human trafficking through a Private Member’s Bill and an amendment to the Protection of Freedoms Bill. Safe and secure accommodation, access to legal representation and a legal guardian for child victims feature amongst a number of other provisions for victims in Lord McColl’s Bill. A shocking 301 of the 942 rescued trafficked children in the UK went missing from local authority care between 2007 and February 2010.

Encouragingly, following a debate during the Protection of Freedoms Bill, the Minister of State for Crime Prevention and Anti-Social Behaviour Reduction agreed to ask the Children’s Commissioner for England to conduct a review of the care of trafficked children and recommend a course of action to the Government. This review was referred to by the IDMG’s first report.

Elsewhere in the UK other political figures are also championing the cause of the vulnerable. In Stormont similar robust action on trafficking is being led by Lord Morrow. His Human Trafficking and Exploitation Bill contains a variety of measures to help and support victims of trafficking, to aid the prosecution of traffickers and to raise awareness of the issue in Northern Ireland. It also further seeks to tackle the demand that fuels human trafficking by criminalising paying for sex.

The consultation on the proposals in the Bill ends on Anti-Slavery Day, but if you live in Northern Ireland you can still champion change by encouraging your MLA to support the Bill – you could write an email or send a letter to them. You can find your MLA’s contact details at www.writetothem.com.

Human trafficking is a dehumanising crime which is having a devastating impact on people’s lives here in the UK and around the world. Today we can choose to follow in the footsteps of Wilberforce and others and seek to abolish modern-day slavery.