Home Office relying on ‘flawed’ evidence to deport modern slavery victims, lawyers warn

Exclusive: Country guidance provided to caseworkers to inform asylum decisions for people trafficked from Vietnam and Albania ‘significantly misleading’ and can have ‘horrendous human consequences’, experts say

Guidance used by Home Office caseworkers to assess whether people trafficked to the UK can be sent back to Vietnam or Albania is said to be 'significantly misleading' (AFP)

Modern slavery victims are being deported to countries where they are at high risk of further exploitation because the Home Office is relying on a flawed interpretation of evidence, lawyers and researchers have warned.

Guidance used by caseworkers to assess whether people trafficked to the UK can be sent back to Vietnam or Albania – the two most common nationalities for modern slavery victims in Britain – is “significantly misleading” about the risks, one told The Independent.

The situation has “horrendous human consequences” if trafficking victims are refused asylum and returned to countries where they are unlikely to receive adequate protection.

Government figures show 1,705 Albanians were identified as potential modern slavery victims by the UK’s National Referral Mechanism (NRM) last year, making it the most commonly referred foreign nationality, while 887 referrals were of Vietnamese origin, making it the second-most commonly referred.

Victims identified through the NRM can apply for asylum if they wish to remain in the UK due to fear of returning to the country from which they were trafficked.

Home Office “country policy and information notes”, designed to inform caseworkers about the human rights situation in various countries, include factual evidence and a summary about safety.

The section on people-trafficking for Vietnam states that “where a person fears they are at risk from being re-trafficked [on being returned to the country] they are likely to be able to access protection from the state”.

However, a report published last month by Asylos, a charity that produces its own reports on country-of-origin information, found many victims were at serious risk of re-trafficking in Vietnam due to economic vulnerability, problems accessing social services, stigma and unpaid debts to traffickers.

It also found that recognition by the NRM as a victim of trafficking would not automatically confer the same status with officials in Vietnam, making them potentially ineligible for assistance.

The report included one example of a Vietnamese boy who was trafficked from the country twice, once to China, and then once to Laos for sex exploitation, before he was found in Poland.

For Albania, the Home Office’s guidance makes almost no mention of boys and young men, which experts said leads to the impression that male victims do not face any issues that would entitle them to asylum in Britain.

However, Asylos last year found boys and young men in Albania are being targeted for exploitation by groups associated with organised crime, some of which have links within the UK.

David Neale, legal researcher and formerly a barrister at Garden Court Chambers, told The Independent that the Home Office guidance on both Vietnam and Albania “painted the country of origin as able to protect the person adequately when that’s very often just fundamentally not the case”.

He noted that the government’s assertion that victims were likely to be able to access effective protection from the state in Vietnam was “flatly contradicted” both by the Asylos report and by some of the information included in the Home Office’s own guidelines.

“It’s wholly wrong to say that in general people are going to be able to avail themselves of sufficient state protection because in a lot of cases they’re just not. They’re not going to be recognised as trafficking victims at all, and whatever services might be available are just not going to be made available to them,” he said.

“Sometimes the Home Office conclusions are significantly misleading. Yet they are presented as if they are evidence when the country summary is not evidence and is in my view extremely problematic and potentially very misleading and I think does mislead a lot of people.”

Mr Neale said the “misconceived” guidance was part of a “culture of refusal” within the Home Office that he said was “set up to disbelieve people and to try and paint the country of origin as able to protect the person adequately when that’s very often just fundamentally not the case”.

He said negative asylum decisions based on this guidance risked “absolutely horrendous human consequences” for the victims.

“They’ll go to appeal, but if they’re unrepresented or not well represented, the judge may not be cognisant of all these issues around the Home Office narrative and they just accept the Home Office narrative, and they could end up in detention – they could end up removed,” he said.

“Equally, they could end up living an underground life in the UK for a long period with no access to legitimate work or benefits, which obviously makes people extremely vulnerable to re-trafficking and abuse and labour exploitation.

“And even if they’re able to get legal representation to appeal, people can be waiting months or years for their appeal, during which they’re likely to be on a minimal level of support – unable to work and claim mainstream benefits. And of course people throughout this period are vulnerable to re-trafficking.”

Maya Pritchard, UK project coordinator at Asylos, said of the Home Office policy guidance: “It’s an interpretation, and we have identified many instances in which the information has been misrepresented, relying on certain bits of information over others, which has obscured the evidence.”

She added: “The problem is if you have Home Office decision-making that’s flawed at the beginning, it leads to lots of children and young people being wrongly denied asylum and then having to rely on luck to get a good solicitor who is aware of this evidence – which most aren’t.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “We are steadfast in our commitment to protect victims of modern slavery and for perpetrators to be brought to justice. Information notes are based on rigorous research, we work closely with other governments and organisations to prevent re-trafficking, and removals from the UK are only enforced when the courts and the Home Office conclude it is safe.”