The United Kingdom's Home Office has abandoned hundreds of potentially trafficked children, leaving them vulnerable and susceptible to exploitation, The Guardian revealed.

Data derived from a Freedom of Information request revealed that 1,871 children were identified as possible victims of trafficking following the Home Office's decision to drop them out of the system when they turned 18. 

In the UK, to get government support as a minor, a National Referral Mechanism (NRM) is required to assess the situation and provide governmental assistance. Data showed that almost 50% of victims who had been in the system, were abandoned at 18.

Moreover, figures showed that out of 2,634 children who turned 18 while waiting to be identified as victims, 70% completely vanished from the NRM. Almost half of the cases were dissolved by the government under claims that no consent was given to resume the process of victim identification, while the remaining 20% voluntarily withdrew from the system. 

However, The Guardian revealed that many children enrolled in the system were not aware that they needed to consent to resume the process after they turned 18, or that they had been enrolled in it. 

A wake-up call

Anti-trafficking organizations urged the immediate implementation of systematic reforms to protect the children. 

Eleonora Fais, the coordinator of the Anti-Trafficking Monitoring Group, a coalition of 17 UK-based anti-trafficking organizations, said “This data is a wake-up call. We urgently need to improve our services, so that children can receive the support they need.”

Patricia Durr, the chief executive of the children’s rights charity ECPAT UK, described the data as alarming, adding that “The findings underscore the urgent need for systematic reforms to ensure that young victims of trafficking are not left vulnerable and unsupported as they transition into adulthood.”

The proposed reforms involve implementing independent guardians for child trafficking across all councils in England and Wales, who would serve as advocates for young individuals. The most recent data indicates that only 6% of children exiting the NRM at the age of 18 received support through the government's modern slavery victim care contract, which aims to assist victims. 

Rachel Medina, the CEO of the Snowdrop Project, a charity in Sheffield offering lasting aid to modern slavery survivors, voiced concern. The charity, which submitted Freedom of Information (FOI) requests, highlighted that numerous children are slipping through the cracks in the systems designed to safeguard and assist victims of modern slavery, urging the government to take immediate action. 

The Home Office's consistent negligence

An Observer investigation published in January last year unmasked that gangs kidnapped dozens of asylum-seeking youngsters from a Home Office-run hostel in Brighton, in a pattern that appears to be repeated across the south coast.

A whistleblower for Home Office contractor Mitie, as well as child protection sources, recalls youngsters being grabbed from the street outside the hotel and rushed into waiting vehicles.

“Children are literally being picked up from outside the building, disappearing, and not being found. They’re being taken from the street by traffickers,” the source reported.

It has also been revealed that police repeatedly informed the Home Office that the hotel's vulnerable tenants – asylum-seeking children who had recently arrived in the UK without parents or carers – would be targeted by criminal networks.

In the last 18 months, over 600 unaccompanied minors have traveled through the Sussex motel, with 136 reported missing. More than half of these, 79, are still missing.