Scotland's Trafficking and Exploitation Strategy 2025

Background

What is human trafficking?

Human trafficking and exploitation (trafficking) are human rights abuses which are often complex and hidden crimes. It involves the illegal practice of recruiting, transporting, receiving, controlling, or exchanging people to exploit them, mostly for profit. Victims can be exploited for labour, sex and criminal purposes as well as for domestic work, organ harvesting, or other purposes.

The Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Scotland) Act 2015 sets out that an offence of human trafficking is committed when a person is recruited, transported, harboured, received or controlled with the intention to exploit, or knowledge of likely exploitation. Any one of these actions, alongside the intention to exploit or knowledge of likely exploitation, is sufficient for an offence to be committed. Arranging or facilitating any of these actions with an intention to exploit or while knowing that the person is likely to be exploited also counts as an offence under the Act.

International human trafficking treaties and conventions

The Palermo Protocol (the Protocol) was adopted by the United Nations (UN) in November 2000 as part of the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime. It was the first legally binding instrument with an internationally recognised definition of human trafficking. This definition provides a tool for the identification of victims and for the detection of all forms of exploitation which constitute human trafficking. Countries that ratify this treaty must criminalise human trafficking and develop anti-trafficking laws in line with the Protocol’s legal provisions. The United Kingdom ratified the Protocol in 2006.

The Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings by the Parties (ECAT) was brought into force on 1 February 2008. ECAT is an international treaty which provides a comprehensive framework for combating human trafficking following a human-rights based and victim-centred approach. While building on existing international instruments, ECAT goes beyond the minimum standards agreed upon in them and strengthens the protection afforded to victims. ECAT is the first international legal instrument to take a human rights-based approach to the fight against human trafficking. It has a comprehensive scope of application in that it applies to all forms of trafficking and to all victims of trafficking. In addition, an important added value of ECAT is the monitoring mechanism set up to supervise its implementation by State Parties. The UK ratified ECAT in 2008.

The EU Anti-Trafficking Directive 2011/36/EU on preventing and combating trafficking in human beings and protecting its victims came into force in 2011. This Directive lays down minimum common rules for determining offences of trafficking in human beings and punishing offenders. It also provides for measures to better prevent trafficking and to strengthen the protection of victims. The UK has opted into this Directive. A further important convention is the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) which was ratified by the UK in 1951, and came into force in 1953. It is incorporated into domestic law through the Human Rights Act^[4] 1998. Article 4 of the ECHR and of the Human Rights Act prohibit slavery and forced labour.

More information on the international treaty obligations and conventions can be found in Annex B.

Scottish and UK legislation

The Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Scotland) Act (the 2015 Act) was passed unanimously by the Scottish Parliament in 2015. The Act sets out the legal definition of the offence of human trafficking and the exploitation relevant for the purposes of human trafficking offences. These are:

• slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour
• prostitution or sexual exploitation
• removal of organs
• securing services and benefits.

The Act introduced two new offences both of which carry a maximum penalty of life imprisonment. The two offences are:

• human trafficking
• slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour.

Sections 9 and 10 of the 2015 Act require Scottish Ministers to secure support and assistance for adult victims of human trafficking where there are reasonable grounds (as determined through the NRM) to believe an adult is a victim of human trafficking and/or slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour.

Section 11 of the 2015 Act places a duty on Scottish Ministers to provide an independent child trafficking guardian for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, where there is reason to believe they might have been, or are at risk of being, trafficked. Following a consultation, the new Independent Child Trafficking Guardians (ICTG) service, Guardianship Scotland, launched on 1 April 2023.

Section 12 of the 2015 Act ensures that where there is uncertainty over a person’s age, and there are reasonable grounds to believe they may be a child, they are presumed to be under the age of 18 for the purposes of support and access to services until their age is formally established.

Section 35 of the 2015 Act required Scottish Ministers to produce a Trafficking and Exploitation Strategy and this was published in 2017. The Strategy centred on three action areas:

• Action Area 1 – identify victims and support them to safety and recovery
• Action Area 2 – identify perpetrators and disrupt their activity
• Action Area 3 – address the conditions that foster trafficking and exploitation.

The Strategy also covers child trafficking which brings together the elements of the three action areas which relate to children who are, or may be, victims of human trafficking and exploitation.

The UK Parliament passed the Modern Slavery Act 2015 (MSA) which came into force in 2015. Although the MSA primarily relates to England and Wales, some provisions do extend to Scotland. The Home Office provides the following overview of the Act’s provisions:

• it ensures that perpetrators receive suitably severe punishments for modern slavery crimes (including life sentences)
• it enhances the court’s ability to put restrictions on individuals where it’s necessary to protect people from the harm caused by modern slavery offences
• it creates an independent anti-slavery commissioner to improve and better coordinate the response to modern slavery (UK-wide)
• it enables the secretary of state to make regulations relating to the identification of and support for victims
• it makes provision for independent child trafficking advocates
• it introduces a new reparation order to encourage the courts to compensate victims where assets are confiscated from perpetrators
• it requires businesses over a certain size to disclose each year what action they have taken to ensure there is no modern slavery in their business or supply chains (UK-wide).

More information on Scottish and United Kingdom legislation can be found in Annex B.