I didn't know I was a human trafficking victim till I was in my 50s – why did nobody rescue me?

When Rosemary* showed up at A&E in December 2019 with a very red eye, the doctor queried if she was struggling with depression. When she said no, he advised her to seek help from her GP. After her appointment with the GP, she was referred to social services for a mental health assessment with someone from adult social services. On the phone call, Rosemary mentioned to the social worker about how she had been made to work long hours in someone’s home with hardly any pay, had been sexually exploited, and had been forced to work for no money.

“I didn’t even know I was a victim of modern slavery and human trafficking,” the woman in her 50s, who now lives in the Midlands, told Big Issue. “This was when my rescue started.”

The social worker followed up the phone call with a referral to the police and Rosemary was soon put into the National Referral Mechanism (NRM), the government’s framework to identify victims of modern slavery and ensure they receive appropriate support.

• I was forced to work unpaid and never let out of the house. Modern slavery is all around us in the UK
• Reports of forced labour, sex trafficking and domestic servitude at record high in Britain
• Criminal gangs are taking control of vulnerable people’s homes and using them as drug dens

“She must have been trained,” Rosemary said about the social worker.

Rosemary was relocated from the south of England to a city in the middle of England, thinking that she would be able to start fresh now that she was free, but it was far from the happy story she had in mind.

She was placed in a safe house with five men and one other woman.

“The men smoked weed, were violent and tried to have sex with us,” she remembered.

She asked her social services to help move her out of the house into another accommodation where she felt safer as her mental and physical health were deteriorating, but the social worker she spoke to said they could only give her other housing if she could show her immigration status and had no recourse to public funds. Since she was in the NRM, it wasn’t something she could show.

After her NRM and asylum case were rejected, Rosemary appealed, and is still appealing both decisions. 

In October 2023, Rosemary was in hospital with constant vomiting. She was due to be moved to a hotel as she was being “kicked out” of the safe house.

“Paramedics referred me to social services to be rehoused in a safe and better house, and said I was not fit for a hotel,” she said. “The council overlooked my needs and did not get back to me.”

In November 2023, Rosemary was placed in a hotel where there was no heating and no hot water.

“I was just being referred between the GP and social services,” she said. “The council did nothing. I sat in that hotel for five months before being moved. Why did they even rescue me in the first place?” she asked. “What I’m experiencing now and what I experienced with my perpetrator were the same things.”

Back in 2021, the UK BME Anti-Slavery Network (BASNET) set out an action plan to address significant gaps in the modern slavery and human trafficking sector. One of the key recommendations was for all local authority staff to receive comprehensive training on modern slavery and its impact on victims. To assess the effectiveness of this recommendation, BASNET and charity After Exploitation sent a Freedom of Information request to 313 local authorities, and found that one in four local councils do not offer standalone training on modern slavery. 

“Local authorities are legally obligated to support survivors of modern slavery, and training is essential for fulfilling this duty effectively,” Naeema Ahmed, of BASNET told the Big Issue. “Best practice recommends that all staff in contact with survivors undergo comprehensive, recurring training on modern slavery, cultural sensitivity, and equality, diversity, and inclusion. However, many councils fail to meet these expectations, with 27% not offering standalone training.”

The most common form of training, as found in the FOI responses, was e-learning.

While legal duties imply a need for training, there is no universal mandate specifying the structure or frequency of such training, leading to vast inconsistencies across local authorities. 

“As first responders, local councils have a huge role to play in identifying and supporting survivors, so it is crucial that good quality training is provided to all staff on this complex crime,” Maya Esslemont of After Exploitation told Big Issue. “Comprehensive training on what exploitation looks like, the challenges facing survivors, and how to engage with survivors sensitively are some of the bare basics we should expect to see in first responder training, but sadly this standard was rarely met.”

Teresa* arrived in the UK on a visitor visa with her child fleeing persecution in her home country. She didn’t know she could apply for asylum upon arrival. 

With little money, she agreed to work for a family in exchange for a room. She worked 18 hours a day from 7am to 1am. She wasn’t allowed to leave the house and was threatened with deportation if she ever left. 

Someone at a food bank recommended Teresa get in touch with Latin American Women’s Rights Service, which she did, and was supported to start the first steps to get a referral into the NRM. While awaiting the outcome, Teresa faced destitution and was sexually assaulted in front of her child, leading to a referral into children social services, which was not responded to. 

It took a further two months for her referral into the NRM to be accepted. 

“The failure to implement effective training risks perpetuating inequalities and leaving survivors unsupported,” Ahmed said. “This not only undermines trust in local authorities but also hinders broader efforts to combat modern slavery.”

Change, according to Ahmed, can be achieved through national funding for standardised, recurring training, embedding equality, diversity, inclusion and cultural sensitivity into all training modules, and regular audits of training materials for relevance and inclusivity.

“First responders need to receive funding from government for the work they undertake identifying victims, referring them, and training staff to do so,” Esslemont concluded. “At the moment, all of this work is being done on a voluntary basis when it’s a matter of life and death for survivors. A lack of funding to fulfil this duty sends a message that modern slavery doesn’t need to be a priority, and it results in a lack of fair support for the councils and other first responders which do provide comprehensive training and referral support.”

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