What is the point of the Modern Slavery Act?

The Modern Slavery Act was first proposed almost 10 years ago by Theresa May when she was home secretary. The rationale behind this measure was that people, mainly women, were being trafficked from Europe and elsewhere to the UK either to work in the sex industry or forced to labour for nothing apart from rudimentary board and lodgings.

Bringing someone illegally into the country for any purpose has long been unlawful. The Modern Slavery Act did not serve any obvious additional purpose beyond demonstrating the Government’s abhorrence of the practice – legislation used as virtue signalling, in other words. Since no-one was prepared to risk being accused of supporting slavery by questioning whether there might be unintended consequences, it was given widespread political support.

Yet we now discover that the Act is being exploited to facilitate the illegal entry of economic migrants arriving on boats from France. Those who have come from countries like Albania who cannot legitimately or easily claim political asylum say that they have been brought into the country by modern slavers.

Chris Philp, the Tory MP who was immigration minister until recently, wrote in this newspaper that the threshold of proof required for a successful modern slavery claim had been reduced to an to “an absurdly low level”. The system is so lax that the approval rate is now over 90 per cent and once accepted the “modern slave” cannot be removed, even if they are a dangerous foreign criminal who has paid for a passage to the UK. This measure needs to be amended to make it work as intended, and if that is not possible, repealed.