ABSTRACT
Trafficking of human beings constitutes a major global and international issue and is described by many to be the ‘modern form of slavery’.1 The UK is one of the major destination countries, and the UK’s Action Plan Against Trafficking details the steps already taken and those needed to be taken in order to tackle trafficking.2 As part of the Action Plan, the then Labour Government committed to ratifying the Council of Europe Convention on Action Against Trafficking in Human Beings 2005 (hereafter ‘the Convention’) and eventually did so in December 2008. Due to the ratification of the Convention it could be argued that the Labour Government constructed trafficking as primarily a human-rights issue. This chapter will, however, show the extent to which trafficking as a criminal-law issue has had, and continues to have, a major impact on domestic law. It will be argued that the Labour Government was more concerned with adopting increasingly punitive approaches to prostitution, approaches which, if uncritically adapted by the Coalition Government, will only increase the vulnerability of all of those engaged in prostitution, as opposed to protecting the human rights of victims of trafficking. In order to develop this argument, the chapter will critically analyse two
aspects of the criminal law: the definition of trafficking as contained in Sections 57-9 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (SOA) and the new strict liability offence of purchasing sexual services from a prostitute who is subject to force, etc. The chapter will argue that the criminal law goes much further than is required under the Convention, but not in a positive manner. Indeed, it will be contended that the new strict liability offence potentially contravenes the Convention.
