Rescued from trafficking

“I want to be...Princess Fiona,” says the young woman, provoking gales of laughter from her friends. “I’ll be Lily of the Valley,” says another. More laughter – a group of five young women having a good time.

Choosing a new name by which to be known for this article is a giggle, yet there is a reason that these girls cannot be identified. Their youth group is for young women rescued from modern-day slavery having been trafficked to the UK for a life of crime, prostitution or domestic servitude.

The group is run by Ecpat (End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and the Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes) UK. Held at the charity’s base in central London, it provides a chance for girls to meet, have fun and gain new skills and confidence.

“Sometimes it’s just a social,” explains youth programme co-ordinator Debbie Beadle. “Sometimes that’s mixed with life skills to help them live independently or recover from their experiences, so we may do things like safe relationships, sexual health, nutrition, and money and budgeting.”

There are two rooms adorned with colourful artwork made by the young women. One is strewn with giant, squashy beanbags perfect for chilling out and chatting, but today the girls are in the adjacent training room busily cutting out pictures from glossy magazines.

“We’re making resolutions for 2013,” explains 21-year-old Fiona. “It makes your brain work, thinking about what you want and putting it down on paper, so it’s helpful.”

Sarah, 16, who is new to the group, has drawn a tiny, weeping figure with a black heart. “That was me,” she says. “My heart was black, hurting, crying all the time.” Underneath, she has pasted glittering handbags, glamorous women, smiling faces. “This is where I want to be,” she explains. “Happy, having friends, having nice stuff, a good education, a good position – my life changed.”

The group started in 2008. Now up to 10 girls aged between 15 and 21 attend weekly Friday afternoon sessions while others at school and college join in regular Saturday outings to the cinema, picnics and other social activities. Most are from Africa and Asia.

Beadle is currently working with 23 girls in total. Their stories are different but all traumatic. Many of the young women, who are referred by police, social workers, immigration solicitors, the Refugee Council and others, have children born as the result of sexual exploitation.

“At first, the girls are often very withdrawn and don’t speak much,” says Beadle. “It’s amazing to see the difference after a few weeks of just being with other young people.”

Lily, 18, is one example. “Lily didn’t talk at all when she first came and now she doesn’t stop,” teases Beadle. “That’s true,” says Lily. “I’m changed. When I came to this group I didn’t know anything. I can’t read, I can’t write, nothing. But now I’m okay. I have a lot of time for the group – it makes me happy.”

Some of the girls have been coming for several years. “I wondered whether they’d get bored,” says Beadle. “But it’s such an important thing for them to come every week to somewhere they feel safe and can meet other young people who understand what they’ve been through. At other support groups they always have people asking questions like, ‘Where are you from?’ ‘Why are you here?’ ‘Where are your parents?’ Here there are no questions.”

Meeting others who have had similar experiences is one of the most important benefits for Fiona. “You don’t want to be in a group where you’re the only one and the others don’t know what’s going on inside,” she says.

Beadle helps the girls get other support such as mentoring services, acts as an advocate for them in their dealings with social services and other agencies, and supports them through immigration or criminal proceedings.

Coming to the group – which was the winner of the 2012 Children & Young People Now youth work award – also helps the girls to understand their rights and collaborate with the often bewildering array of professionals involved in their cases.

Andy Desmond is a former police detective who worked with the human trafficking team at New Scotland Yard. He was involved in the rescue of a 14-year-old girl trafficked from Nigeria to the UK. “She had very little English and was very scared,” recalls Desmond, now an anti-trafficking consultant. “When I took her to the car I could tell it was the first time she had walked free.”

The girl’s evidence helped secure the conviction of a notorious trafficker and she went on to be supported by Ecpat. When Desmond met her again he was astonished. “The light in her eyes had come back. She was like a totally different person,” he says.

“Previously everyone she believed in and trusted had lied to her, abused her or put her in a situation where she would be raped. The group helps these girls learn to trust again. You see them rebuilding their lives and growing in confidence. I wish there were more like it.”

The Body Shop was the group’s main funder for three years and it is now supported by a number of grants from charities such as the Henry Smith Trust and Lloyds TSB Foundation, as well as fundraising. Ecpat would like to establish and run more groups to help the estimated 300 trafficked girls and boys coming to the UK each year from Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe and China.

Many more victims
Trafficking is notoriously well hidden so there are likely to be very many more victims, whose struggles do not end once rescued. Often a young person’s age is disputed, which can affect whether they are taken under the wing of children’s services or perhaps placed in less suitable adult accommodation.

Victims can find it difficult to get suitable education and housing or access benefits. Ecpat UK works closely with the Refugee Support Network, which provides mentors for most of the girls, helping them to gain basic English language skills. Many have little or no English and may not have been to school before, explains Hannah Elwyn, mentoring programme co-ordinator at the Refugee Support Network. “They may have been illiterate in their native language or the education system may have been very different, so part of what we do is helping them learn how to learn,” she says.

It can take years for young women to talk about some of their experiences or feel safe from the “JuJu spells” and threats used by traffickers to control them. Sometimes young people who end up in the UK as a result of trafficking are simply not believed and treated as criminals rather than victims.

“There is a culture of disbelief because some find it hard to believe what these young people are saying is actually happening in this country,” says Ecpat advocacy officer Chloe Setter. “They don’t understand why people might actually arrange to come here or how they get into these situations. They don’t understand what it is like for someone living in extreme poverty who will do anything for the hope of an education.”

Some victims disappear, often returning to their captors because of the hold they have over them. However, Ecpat chief executive Bharti Patel believes matters are improving, with initiatives such as the youth group playing a vital role in raising awareness of the issue.

“The young people are the ones that provide us with the direct evidence and understanding of what it is like to be a victim of trafficking,” she says. “They help point us to solutions – what they as children or young adults growing up with these experiences need to ensure their long-term wellbeing, and what kind of protection we need to put in place to better care for others.”

Guardianship campaign
Trafficking is now an acknowledged problem, but Patel says professionals need to be even more sensitive to the possibility that a young person might be trafficked. This might, for instance, mean asking questions about a young person dropping off a child at nursery while they ought to be at school themselves. Ecpat is also campaigning for a guardianship system for child victims of trafficking to ensure all trafficked children benefit from the attention of one person who would listen to them and be a constant source of support, with the legal authority to help make decisions in their best interests.

Meanwhile, 22-year-old Vivian, who has attended the group since 2008, say it has made a huge difference: “It helps raise awareness of child trafficking and make improvements. We’ve got to travel and meet a lot of people – big people. It’s great to be part of it.”

Back round the craft table, the girls talk about the jobs they aspire to. Fiona wants to be a hairdresser, Vivian a teacher and Lily has ambitions to become a bank manager. Carol, 17, the quietest and a newer member, is keen to improve her English and go to college while Sarah wants to be a lawyer, social worker or police officer. She wants to help others in the same way Ecpat has helped her, she explains.

“When it was very difficult, they made me understand things will change,” she says. “They have helped me a lot, changed my life and I can’t thank them enough.”


VIVIAN'S STORY

Vivian* was 12 when she left her family and 13 when she arrived in the UK.

“I was in West Africa living in a small village and went to live with a lady because we had money problems and my mum was finding it difficult to take care of us. The lady’s friend in the city needed someone to look after her baby. She said she was going to take care of me and pay me so my mum said that was fine. Then she told me we were going to travel but I didn’t know where we were going. I didn’t see my mum or family. A taxi just came and picked us up and we went to the airport. We got to Heathrow then drove to the house and that was it.

“She said she was going to send me to school. But I was just working, cooking and cleaning. She didn’t give me any money or anything but when they sent me to buy milk at Tesco she would sometimes say ‘keep the change’.

“In the beginning the lady was kind but after two to three years she started behaving badly towards me. When she came back home and I hadn’t finished cleaning she would get upset. I’d have to keep quiet because she was my master – that’s the way I saw it.

I had to say ‘yes’ to everything. I didn’t have any choice. Sometimes I felt really down. I could see children outside having a good time and thought ‘Why is it not me?’.

“Eventually I found out about social workers, went to the social services department and told them my story. When I got to Ecpat I was surprised because I thought I was the only person in this situation but then I realised there are lots of other girls out there that need help.”

*All the girls’ names have been changed.

Download government practice guidance, Safeguarding Children Who May Have Been Trafficked