4. Trafficking people for exploitation

(1) A person commits an offence if he arranges or facilitates the arrival in the United Kingdom of an individual (the “passenger”) and— .

(a) he intends to exploit the passenger in the United Kingdom or elsewhere, or
(b) he believes that another person is likely to exploit the passenger in the United Kingdom or elsewhere.

(2) A person commits an offence if he arranges or facilitates travel within the United Kingdom by an individual (the “passenger”) in respect of whom he believes that an offence under subsection (1) may have been committed and— .

Trafficking

57. Trafficking into the UK for sexual exploitation

(1) A person commits an offence if he intentionally arranges or facilitates the arrival in the United Kingdom of another person (B) and either:

(a) he intends to do anything to or in respect of B, after B’s arrival but in any part of the world, which if done will involve the commission of a relevant offence, or
(b) he believes that another person is likely to do something to or in respect of B, after B’s arrival but in any part of the world, which if done will involve the commission of a relevant offence.

(2) A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable— .

Article 4
Prohibition of slavery and forced labour

• No one shall be held in slavery or servitude.
• No one shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labour.
• For the purpose of this Article the term “forced or compulsory labour” shall not include:

The European Union has taken action in respect of trafficking in human beings since the 1990s. The main legal instrument used for this purpose has been Council Decisions. They therefore do not carry the same legal obligations on member states as directives or regulations. Nevertheless, the Brussels Declaration (Council Framework Decision on combating trafficking in human beings 2002 (2002/629/JHA), the Council Framework Decision of 2003 on combating sexual exploitation of children and child pornography (2004/68/JHA) as well as the proposals for Council Decisions of 2009 (Proposal for Council Framework Decision on preventing and combating trafficking in human beings and protecting victims

This protocol was ratified by the UK Government in February 2009 – as had been recommended in the Concluding Observations of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child in 2008.
Its Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution, and Child Pornography requires States Parties to ensure that their criminal laws prohibit and punish:

• Offering, delivering or accepting, by whatever means, a child for the purpose of . . . engagement of the child in forced labour;
• Offering, obtaining, procuring or providing a child for child prostitution; or
• Producing, distributing, disseminating, importing, exporting, offering, selling or possessing . . . child pornography.

The 2005 Convention was ratified by the UK on 17 December 2008 and came into force on 1 April 2009.

Its objectives are three fold:

1. to prevent and combat trafficking in human beings and guarantee gender equality;
2. to protect the human rights of the victims of trafficking, to design a comprehensive framework for the protection and assistance of victims and witnesses, while guaranteeing gender equality and ensuring an effective investigation and prosecution of trafficking; and
3. to promote international cooperation on action against trafficking in human beings.

The Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, supplementing the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime, contains the first internationally agreed upon definition of human trafficking. Section 3 states:

“Trafficking in persons” is the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation…