Resource

Imagine you had been exploited by your own father since childhood. Through his connection to an extended criminal gang, you were trafficked through multiple countries while you were still under 18. These gang members operate both in the UK and abroad. They are in constant contact, threatening your mother and siblings overseas and visiting them to intimidate you.  You can hear your family screaming on the calls.  
 
You are in foster care in the UK but you feel you can’t speak to anyone about what’s happening because you fear it would put your family at greater risk. The gang forces you to transport drugs in the UK  under threat of harming your loved ones.  You know it is wrong, but you feel you have no choice. This is about your family’s lives.  

You’re caught, arrested and convicted even though it is recognised that you were criminally exploited. After serving your sentence, you don’t offend again.  

It takes years for you to open up to professionals about what happened to you. Eventually, you access support for trafficking survivors in the UK. You realise you’re not alone, many others have gone through similar experiences. You start to learn how to protect yourself from your traffickers.  For the first time, you feel hopeful about the future and begin therapy to address your trauma.  

Then, years after your offence, you’re told that because of that conviction you might be barred from receiving the same support that helped you rebuild your life and enabled you to finally see a future for yourself. It might all disappear.  

This is just one of the kinds of cases we have seen at the Helen Bamber Foundation over the past year, where a survivor of trafficking has been threatened with the application of so-called ‘Public Order Disqualification’ to their case. Our colleagues at Asylum Aid have seen similar cases, including a vulnerable woman who, while she was homeless, used a false identity document to earn money to eat and then was years later blocked from support.    

Benefits of identification and support 

Survivors of trafficking in the UK can access support such as weekly financial payments, housing, accommodation and independent emotional and practical help through the National Referral Mechanism (NRM), the framework for identifying and protecting victims of trafficking and modern slavery. However, under current law, the Home Office can disqualify survivors on ‘bad faith’ or ‘public order’ grounds from even being confirmed as a victim through the NRM, let alone accessing this vital assistance.  

Receiving a positive final identification decision (a ‘Conclusive Grounds’ decision) through the NRM can often be transformative to survivors. Not only can it feel personally validating to finally have recognition of the awful crime they faced, but it can sometimes lead to non-British survivors regularising their immigration status in the UK (either through a grant of temporary permission to stay here through the NRM or if their experiences have a connection to an immigration or asylum claim).  

For many survivors, the NRM can often be the first time they have received any meaningful support or have had a professional recognise what happened to them.  

The UK offers this assistance as it recognises that trafficking and modern slavery is a “serious crime that violates human rights” and that survivors’ needs are complex, requiring support from multiple professionals from a range of disciplines. Despite this, survivors can be disqualified on ‘public order grounds’ even when their offence is related to their criminal exploitation. At present, the decision to apply a disqualification is at the discretion of the Home Office. However, section 29 of the Illegal Migration Act 2023, if enacted, would go one step further by making disqualification automatic.   

Devastating impact of disqualification 

The impact of disqualifications on survivors cannot be underestimated. For an Asylum Aid client, her only option for housing was through the NRM. After years of homelessness in the UK, she had finally been given a place to stay, only to once again be threatened once again with being back on the streets.  

From our experience, even the threat of a public order disqualification being applied to a case can be destabilising to survivors and can present as a huge blow to their confidence and hope for the future.  

In December 2025, the High Court in the case of ABW v SSHD  found that the Home Office’s approach to making disqualification decisions has to date been unlawful. While the Home Office has applied to appeal this judgment, they have had to pause all public order disqualification decisions in the meantime. This has been widely welcomed and the judgment has already had an impact in other disqualification cases this year. However, many of our clients are still disqualified or are facing disqualification and remain in limbo until the Home Office agree to withdraw their disqualifications as a result of the judgment in ABW.  

A key part of addressing trafficking and modern slavery is the ‘non-punishment principle’ which aims to ensure that survivors of trafficking are not criminalised for acts they were forced to commit. But in recent years we have seen more and more harmful measures being implemented, leaving survivors afraid to seek help from authorities for fear of criminalisation, detention and removal. Disqualifications like these do not resolve broader immigration concerns, they simply deny people life-saving support. The recent High Court judgment has been a significant step in the right direction. Now we need further action from the government to ensure that survivors of trafficking receiving meaningful support, rather than being punished for the exploitation they have endured.