Modern Slavery Bill — House of Lords, 2015-02-23
Topic: Law and Crime
Margaret Omolola Young (Crossbench, Unknown): This amendment is intended to close a gap in the law, which currently does not provide sufficient avenues for all victims of modern slavery to seek remedies for damages and the suffering that they have endured. Again, I have to thank Parosha Chandran and Klara Skrivankova for their contributions in working on this amendment. I would also like to say how much I appreciate the work of all the NGOs which have contributed to our work on the Bill. They have done a fantastic job Very few victims have been able to receive remedies and compensation so far. This civil remedies amendment would provide an effective means to reduce the financial profitability of slavery, create a further deterrent effect and enable victims to be adequately compensated for the harm done to them. This proposed new clause does not seek to replace the existing remedies, such as those provided in employment law, but to add a more effective route to remedies that has been absent in English law and that, as experience from elsewhere shows, can be an effective means to enabling victims to get redress Those victims who have suffered physical harm will still of course be able to use existing remedies, but Amendment 16 is targeted at those for whom such routes remain out of reach. These are, for example, cases where there is an absence of direct physical harm but that involve debt bondage, abuse of an individual’s position of vulnerability, psychological control, threats of denunciation to the authorities, extortionate recruitment fees, and the threat or carefully nurtured fear of violence. Such actions are recognised in international definitions of trafficking and seen as indicators of forced labour. These are the very circumstances experienced by many victims of modern slavery, especially those exploited for their labour. This provision would, for example, allow a civil claim for forced labour to be brought against businesses or a gangmaster which have used and demeaned eastern European or British men for the purposes of slavery or forced labour, which have abused the men’s vulnerabilities to exploit them for profit and also imposed on them bonded debts via extortionate recruitment fees or accommodation charges for filthy living conditions, and which have failed to pay wages owed As I pointed out in Committee, when I brought forward an earlier iteration of this amendment, a further significant advantage of a civil remedy is that it is not dependent on criminal prosecution of offenders and can be brought where no criminal investigation has taken place. It was put to me during the debate in Committee that this proposed change in the law might not be necessary as the existing law is sufficient. I was grateful at that time for the helpful comments made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, my noble and learned friend Lady Butler-Sloss, who is supporting this amendment, and my noble and right reverend friend Lord Harries. I also thank the Minister for taking the time to write to me about this matter after the debate In his letter of 8 December 2014, the Minister took the view that there exist common law and statutory torts, which may be relied on in civil proceedings for damages. I have consulted a number of legal experts on this matter—experts on the issues of human trafficking and forced labour, as well as experts on civil and tort law outside these areas. The advice I have received was unanimous: that the existing remedies are inadequate as they do not provide appropriate routes to redress for all victims. The various examples from civil law described in the Minister’s letter are unable to give due weight to the factors and circumstances encountered in situations of trafficking and slavery. None reflects the elements of control and exploitation inherent in such situations or the subtle means of control assumed over victims by traffickers. One might consider that false imprisonment comes closest to reflecting the element of control over an individual’s life. However, the traditional focus in jurisprudence is on the restraint of physical liberty, and there is no guarantee that the more insidious and very common forms of restraint, such as the confiscation of a passport or the use of vulnerable immigration status to control victims, would be found to amount to false imprisonment. Similarly, the types of individual instances of assault, battery or harassment that can arise in a forced labour scenario may be inadequately represented by existing torts. The long-term nature of abuse and the elements of control of the vulnerable may be quite different from those that arise in other situations.