Amendments to modern slavery guidance

This House regrets the Prime Minister’s announcement of 13 December 2022, which included the intention to remove the gold-plating in our modern slavery system and significantly raise the threshold someone must meet to be recognised as a victim of modern slavery; opposes the subsequent updates to Modern Slavery Guidance, which include new, impossibly high standards of evidence required within the timeframe to trigger referral to the National Referral Mechanism, a reduction of the Recovery and Reflection Period for survivors of labour abuse and sexual exploitation from 45 to 30 days, and the removal of the NRM Multi-Agency Assurance panel process, changes that make it harder for survivors to be identified and supported, and represent a regression in efforts to increase identification and support of modern slavery victims; supports comments by anti-slavery campaigners that the existing system was not gold plated but already beset by delays and poor support; calls on the Government to reconsider these plans in light of the potential exploitation and harms they will cause, particularly for vulnerable refugees and trafficking victims, which includes a high proportion of children and young people; proposes that the government adopt a transparent data- and evidence-driven approach, in consultation with anti-trafficking organisations, to improve decision-making, following calls from STOP THE TRAFFIK supported by Anti-Slavery International; and encourages the Government to return to tackling modern slavery as both a serious crime and a safeguarding issue, not an illegal immigration issue, in order to tackle its root causes and better protect vulnerable people.