Child trafficking

Child trafficking is the term given to the illegal movement of children into the country. The majority of children who arrive here in this way have been promised a good job or education.  Sometimes their parents have been persuaded to entrust them to others for a better quality of life. Once here, they are almost always exploited for financial gain. Some of the ways in which such exploitation can take place are:

• sex work or prostitution
• domestic servitude
• sweatshop and restaurant work
• drug dealing
• credit card fraud
• benefit fraud
• drug mules or decoys for adult drug traffickers
• forced marriage
• trade in human organs; and in some extreme cases
• ritual killings

All children who have been exploited will suffer some form of physical or psychological harm. Agencies must work together to safeguard them and promote their welfare. In order to do this effectively, people first need to be able to recognise when children have been trafficked and to understand the particular vulnerabilities to which this makes them susceptible.