The trafficking of children and young people: Implications for work with sexually exploited children and young people

Concerns about ‘new’ and different processes through which young men and women can be sexually exploited, have attracted increasing attention in the last decade. As noted above, the exploitation and the trafficking of young people for work in prostitution has a long history. However, a renewed focus has been placed on the vulnerability of young people who are trafficked into and within the UK resulting in a sudden plethora of publications and policy guidance documents (HO 2006b, Harris and Robinson 2007, CEOP et al 2007, ECPAT 2007, Craig 2008, DCSF 2008e). This chapter will focus on the question of safeguarding children and young

people who are trafficked into the country, referring in particular to those who are trafficked for the purpose of sexual exploitation. I want to identify some of the tensions that exist within debates about trafficked young people: tensions about the identification, referral and resource allocation to meet young people’s

vic-

Is the young person who is trafficked into the UK ‘kidnapped’ from abroad as a victim of ‘modern-day slavery’, or are they, possibly with their family, taking some dangerous, ill-informed risks by paying traffickers to take them away from poverty and war?