Human Trafficking: A young person's solution?
By Emily Lanham, paralegal in a London chambers.
In her spare time she is a Director of the youth project Big Voice London.
I
n July, against the backdrop
of an escalating migrant crisis
and an, as yet unsympathetic,
governmental approach, we
invited sixth formers from across
Greater London to come and discuss
modern day Human Trafficking, law
and policy.
This was the 2nd summer school Big
Voice London has run to date, following
last year’s successful project on
Fracking. The aim was to engage young
people with the legal debate around the
Modern Slavery Bill and to encourage
them to voice their opinions as we
taught them how to navigate the more
technical aspects of law.
This article doesn’t intend to delve
too deeply into what the students
discussed, discovered or designed in
terms of policy; the report is online for
all who are interested to read. It does,
however, intend to discuss the mind set
of those young people and the way in
which the decisions were reached.
There were two main aspects to
what the students considered Human
Trafficking to involve; at a basic level
it was humans vs. humans. On one
side, there were the traffickers and the
smugglers (in the students new look at
legislation these would fall under the
same heading) and on the other, the
migrants and refugees. Both of which
they considered to be one and the
same: people.
I say this because they were not
using statistics, replacing names with
numbers. Instead they considered one
example of each, on a human level,
and escalated that upwards to attempt
to contemplate the numbers we were
discussing.
Secondly, they looked long term.
It always amazes me how forward
thinking these students are when
it comes to solutions. It isn’t about
making small concessions that change
things now; but big changes that may
dramatically reduce problems over
time.
Initially, they discussed education.
Educate those in countries that
experience high levels of trafficking and
help them avoid falling prey to those
who seek to exploit them. Rehabilitate
and educate those who made it to
the UK but who cannot seek refugee
status. Transform holding centres into
schools, create ambassadors, create
a global network of prevention tactics
that support each and every home
country to do the best by their victims.
This was, in part, a response to
the question of “what if we can’t let
everyone in, what if we can’t afford
it?” A question which often splits the
room; the scaremongering of the local
newspapers giving our students a
slightly warped view of refugees and
migrants. There was a unanimous
desire to find a solution though and
education seemed immediately the
best investment. We are often told that
education is the cure for poverty, for
hunger, for peace.
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