tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/child-trafficking-14658/articlesChild trafficking – The Conversation2023-06-12T09:59:33Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2073872023-06-12T09:59:33Z2023-06-12T09:59:33ZIllegal migration bill: the concern for children’s rights keeping the House of Lords up all night<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531160/original/file-20230609-29-1wtswc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=131%2C51%2C4732%2C3026&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/dungeness-kent-uk-may-5th-2022-2152529247">Sean Aidan Calderbank/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://bills.parliament.uk/bills/3429">illegal migration bill</a> passed through the House of Commons earlier this year, but is being fiercely contested in the House of Lords. The bill is currently at the <a href="https://www.parliament.uk/business/news/2023/may-2023/lords-scrutinises-illegal-migration-bill/">committee stage</a> which allows the members to scrutinise the text and make amendments.</p>
<p>With only five days <a href="https://www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/house-of-lords-illegal-migration-bill-night-sitting-suella-braverman-b1086385.html">scheduled for this process</a>, the debate continued overnight on June 7 until 4am. Many were <a href="https://www.politicshome.com/news/article/house-of-lords-illegal-migration-bill-late-sitting">frustrated</a> with the unusually late sitting.</p>
<p>Peers <a href="https://hansard.parliament.uk/Lords/2023-06-07/debates/41061D9F-F385-4CF5-9B77-8EB8852381A3/IllegalMigrationBill">expressed concerns</a> about a number of provisions in the government’s plan to deter migrants from crossing the channel in small boats. But a key sticking point has been the issue of detention for immigration purposes, particularly of children. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2014/22/section/5/enacted">Immigration Act 2014</a> banned the detention of unaccompanied children (who have arrived in the UK without a responsible adult) for more than 24 hours at any one time. But there are still some circumstances where unaccompanied children are detained. For example, when awaiting an <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/asylum-age-assessments-children-home-office-high-court-uk-b1996272.html">age assessment</a> if the Home Office believes they are <a href="https://theconversation.com/children-are-sometimes-held-in-immigration-detention-in-the-uk-too-this-must-stop-98910">over 18</a>. </p>
<p>The new bill would allow the government to <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/illegal-migration-bill-factsheets/illegal-migration-bill-detention-and-bail-factsheet#:%7E:text=The%20bill%20will%20create%20new,a%20reasonable%20period%20of%20time">indefinitely detain</a> all asylum seekers who enter the UK illegally, including children and potential victims of trafficking.</p>
<p>In a strong condemnation of this aspect of the bill, Conservative peer Baroness Mobarik described detention without charge or trial as <a href="https://www.politicshome.com/thehouse/article/child-detention-illegal-migration-bill-misguided-stopped">“one of the most draconian powers the state has over the individual”</a>. She summed up the proposed reintroduction of child detention succinctly: “This cannot be right.”</p>
<p>If an unaccompanied child who arrives in the UK illegally is from a safe country of origin, they may be returned there even before they reach 18. Crossbench peer Baroness Butler-Sloss described a hypothetical situation where a 10-year-old could live and attend school in England for several years, only to be callously uprooted under the proposals. They could be removed at age 18 (or earlier) to a country where they may not know the language or have family or other connections. She described the bill as “quite simply … cruel.” </p>
<h2>Child victims of modern slavery</h2>
<p>Researchers and activists have been criticising the bill’s proposals that would deny certain protections and support to potential victims of <a href="https://modernslaverypec.org/assets/downloads/Modern-Slavery-PEC-Explainer-Illegal-Migration-Bill-v1.3.pdf">modern slavery</a>, including “unaccompanied asylum-seeking children” or “unaccommpanied children”. This label alone means refugee children are often excluded from the duties and protections that are afforded (at least in theory) to all children in England and Wales. </p>
<p>But the current protections are not as strong as activists may like, and children in particular face many barriers in the immigration system. Only <a href="https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/119973/pdf/">2% of child trafficking victims between 2019-2020</a> with irregular migration status in the UK were granted the leave to remain. This is despite being entitled to such protections under several aspects of international law.</p>
<p>As I <a href="https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/119973/pdf/">wrote in evidence</a> for Parliament’s <a href="https://committees.parliament.uk/work/7389/legislative-scrutiny-illegal-migration-bill/">human rights joint committee</a>, the proposals will have a detrimental impact on children. They may even increase the risk of child exploitation or going missing, as has already happened with asylum-seeking unaccompanied children in hotel accommodation.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/migrant-children-in-the-uk-are-going-missing-from-care-heres-how-to-protect-them-199646">Migrant children in the UK are going missing from care – here’s how to protect them</a>
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<h2>International law</h2>
<p>Measures to clamp down on irregular migration are often enacted in the name of combating modern slavery and trafficking. But they have had calamitous consequences for people entitled to protection under international law on refugees. Often, children are caught up in these policies.</p>
<p>During the remaining two days of committee stage, peers (including some from the Conservative party) will continue arguing for a number of amendments to the bill. <a href="https://www.politicshome.com/news/article/international-treaties-house-of-lords-illegal-migration-bill">One would prevent</a> the government from breaching international law relating to refugees and human rights.</p>
<p>One such treaty is the <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/convention-rights-child">Convention on the Rights of the Child</a> 1989, the most widely ratified human rights treaty in the world. While not immune to <a href="https://brill.com/view/journals/chil/28/1/article-p66_66.xml?language=en&ebody=full%20html-copy1">criticism</a>, it is pivotal in the protection of children’s rights globally. Under the convention, the UK government has clear obligations when it comes to the protection, care and treatment of unaccompanied or separated asylum-seeking children.</p>
<p>In this regard, the illegal migration bill has drawn a range of international criticism. The UN’s <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/treaty-bodies/crc">Committee on the Rights of the Child</a> urged the government to “<a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2023/06/un-child-rights-committee-publishes-findings-finland-france-jordan-sao-tome">repeal all draft provisions</a> that would violate children’s rights. This includes ensuring that all asylum-seeking and refugee children can access necessary support, and to guarantee that unaccompanied children have a right to apply for family reunification. </p>
<p>Researchers and activists <a href="https://modernslaverypec.org/assets/downloads/Childrens-Outcomes-Research-Summary.pdf">called on the home office</a> in 2022 to ensure that immigration and asylum system does not re-traumatise children or increase the risk of exploitation. They emphasised the negative impact of lengthy immigration procedures on young people.</p>
<p>Unaccompanied children are subject to considerable psychological harm as a consequence of the threat of detention and removal. The discretionary power of the home secretary to return <a href="https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/law/research/european-childrens-rights-unit/campaigns/vulnerable-children-in-a-hostile-environment/">Albanian unaccompanied minors</a> to Albania – as could happen under the bill’s proposals – may <a href="https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/119969/pdf/">violate their human rights</a>. </p>
<p>As long as children in the UK’s immigration system face restrictions and the removal of their rights, this bill will be in clear violation of <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/06/07/illegal-migration-bill-joint-civil-society-briefing-house-lords-second-reading">international law</a>. The attempt to push through an inhumane and punitive piece of legislation should alarm us all.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207387/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elizabeth A Faulkner receives funding from the British Academy, the Royal Irish Academy and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). </span></em></p>Provisions related to detention of children and protections for trafficking victims are the subject of ongoing debate.Elizabeth A Faulkner, Lecturer in Law, Keele UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1996462023-03-01T06:14:12Z2023-03-01T06:14:12ZMigrant children in the UK are going missing from care – here’s how to protect them<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511973/original/file-20230223-28-n7f09l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C7360%2C4902&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/childrens-hands-on-misted-window-775920718">Amir Bajric/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Separated children who <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jan/21/they-just-vanish-whistleblowers-met-by-wall-of-complacency-over-missing-migrant-children">arrive alone in the UK</a> are being placed in hotels by the Home Office – and many of them are then <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/audio/2023/feb/03/the-children-going-missing-from-home-office-hotels-podcast">going missing</a>. </p>
<p>On January 24 2023, the immigration minister announced that <a href="https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-200-unaccompanied-asylum-seeking-children-still-missing-from-uk-hotels-what-the-government-has-said-explained">200 unaccompanied children</a> were missing from UK hotels. These children are at significant risk of <a href="https://www.ecpat.org.uk/news/charities-call-for-action-on-children-missing-in-hotels#:%7E:text=Over%20100%20charities%20call%20for%20action%20on%20children,hotels%2C%20where%20they%20could%20be%20targeted%20by%20criminals">trafficking and exploitation</a>. To stop this happening, those involved in these children’s care should treat them like the children they are – and listen to what they need to feel safe.</p>
<p>Trafficking refers to when somebody has control of a child and moves, exchanges or transports them specifically to exploit them. They may be exploited before they reached the UK or upon arrival, and in a multitude of ways.</p>
<p>They may be forced to perform labour, or they might be sexually exploited. They might be placed in domestic servitude, as Olympian <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62123886">Mo Farah</a> was when he first arrived in the UK. Children may be used to grow or carry drugs. Sometimes there are multiple forms of exploitation happening at the same time. </p>
<h2>Lack of protection</h2>
<p>Children who arrive in the UK should be safeguarded through the existing child protection system, not through parallel systems established outside existing protection processes. Placing children in unregulated hotels removes essential oversight and safeguarding of these children. This “temporary” practice has been going on <a href="https://www.theweek.co.uk/news/uk-news/959506/why-the-home-office-is-using-hotels-to-house-child-asylum-seekers">since July 2021</a>.</p>
<p>Trafficked children are one of the groups most at risk of going missing in the UK. <a href="https://www.ecpat.org.uk/Handlers/Download.ashx?IDMF=bb993f93-9445-4f75-bc1e-d051d76ab668">Nearly one-third</a> of children who were identified or suspected of being trafficked went missing from local authority care in 2020 – 378 children. We have also known for years that children who go missing from care are <a href="https://letterfromsanta.nspcc.org.uk/globalassets/documents/research-reports/breaking-wall-silence-report.pdf">at risk of exploitation</a>. </p>
<p>In a 2009 report, colleagues and I found that children and young people often went missing when they arrived in the country and again after entering local authority care. We <a href="https://letterfromsanta.nspcc.org.uk/globalassets/documents/research-reports/breaking-wall-silence-report.pdf">made a series of clear recommendations around this</a>. Reports from <a href="https://www.ecpat.org.uk/heading-back-to-harm-a-study-on-trafficked-and-unaccompanied-children-going-missing-from-care-in-the-uk">2016</a> and <a href="https://www.ecpat.org.uk/Handlers/Download.ashx?IDMF=bb993f93-9445-4f75-bc1e-d051d76ab668">2022</a> also document children going missing from local authority care.</p>
<p>Helping these children starts with making them feel safe, so that they are comfortable telling people that they are victims of abuse or exploitation – and this can take time. But a key problem for children who arrive in the UK for the purposes of trafficking is that their needs are often ignored. Their cases are looked at as <a href="https://www.youthandpolicy.org/y-and-p-archive/issue-104/">immigration</a> or <a href="https://academic.oup.com/bjc/article/59/2/481/5129105">criminal justice</a> cases rather than through a child protection lens.</p>
<h2>Feeling safe</h2>
<p>I recently conducted research in partnership with children’s rights charity <a href="https://www.ecpat.org.uk/">ECPAT UK</a>. We worked with 31 young people in England and Scotland who had been trafficked into the UK. <a href="https://www.shu.ac.uk/helena-kennedy-centre-international-justice/research-and-projects/all-projects/stable-futures">We asked them</a> what would improve their lives, now and in the future. </p>
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<img alt="Boy smiling in classroom" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511981/original/file-20230223-25-7m6a9x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511981/original/file-20230223-25-7m6a9x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511981/original/file-20230223-25-7m6a9x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511981/original/file-20230223-25-7m6a9x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511981/original/file-20230223-25-7m6a9x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511981/original/file-20230223-25-7m6a9x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511981/original/file-20230223-25-7m6a9x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Children who have been trafficked deserve to feel safe.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/portrait-smiling-hispanic-boy-looking-camera-1104967028">Ground Picture/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>The young people told us that the systems and processes they found themselves in when they arrived in the UK were obstacles to reaching positive outcomes. These included the lack of a secure immigration status and the experience of waiting for legal papers over long periods. One young person awaiting a decision said: </p>
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<p>I don’t have paper. Not free. Still in prison.</p>
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<p>Some had experienced discrimination, or were not believed by professionals. One young person said: </p>
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<p>I used to go every single day to the social work office and talking to … the manager of the social workers. That’s what he told me, “Why don’t you go back to your country?” That’s what he say.</p>
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<p>The young people told us that they wanted to feel safe. They said that physical safety would come from having <a href="https://uobrep.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10547/315134/Safe-Accommodation-for-Sexually-Exploited-and-Trafficked-Young-People-Dr-Lucie-Shuker.pdf">a safe home</a> and place to live, such as having accommodation appropriate for their age or with trained foster carers: certainly not being alone in a hotel. As one young person said: </p>
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<p>Protection for every young people from outside the UK is the first thing needed. Protection could be making him safe, for example, where to sleep and stay, and to get education … healthcare … friendships, I mean for protection.</p>
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<p>We found that young people with <a href="https://www.barnardos.org.uk/what-we-do/services/independent-guardian-service">independent guardians</a> – designated people who provide regular support to children who have been trafficked – felt listened to and heard, leading to this feeling of safety.</p>
<p>We also found that to improve the lives of these young people, the approach taken by the government and social care must be centred around the child, with an understanding of what they may have been through in the past. Children have rights – to be heard, to participate, to be able to develop their lives and make contributions to society. These principles should inform the work of professionals they meet. As another young person said: </p>
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<p>These young people, they’re going to be someone in the future and they’re going to give back all that help that they got from this government and it’s very important for young people and support workers to know all of this.</p>
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<p>For the first time, we know what young people would need to see for positive changes to happen in their lives. We have used this research to develop a “<a href="https://www.ecpat.org.uk/Handlers/Download.ashx?IDMF=9b159cee-80fb-4add-8460-2135889ae6a3">Positive Outcomes Framework</a>”. This includes 25 outcomes for the young person, such as “I can achieve and have dreams” or “I feel safe”. </p>
<p>The framework also includes 86 indicators which describe how these aims can be achieved. These include, for instance, “Young people can undertake vocational training and English classes simultaneously” or “Children report knowing where to go when they don’t feel safe and who to turn to”. </p>
<p>These young people should be seen as the young people and children that they are, and treated equally to other children in the UK. Our next step is to consider how this framework can be used in practice. This is difficult and complex territory but, if we are serious about the safety and wellbeing of these young people, recognising their rights and needs is a vital first step.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/199646/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Patricia Hynes received funding for this research from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), through the Modern Slavery Policy and Evidence Centre (MSPEC). </span></em></p>Children who arrive alone in the UK should be treated equally to other children.Patricia Hynes, Professor of Social Justice, Sheffield Hallam UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1869672022-07-20T14:43:58Z2022-07-20T14:43:58ZMo Farah: here’s why it is so difficult for trafficking victims to disclose their experiences<p>Sir Mo Farah recently revealed that he was trafficked into the UK at the age of nine for domestic servitude. In a BBC documentary, the long-distance runner said it took him three decades to publicly discuss what happened to him, partly because he wanted to block it out, and is only now piecing it together.</p>
<p>Farah’s experience shows how identifying trafficking cases is often dependent on disclosure – a person coming forward with their own story. But the disclosure of human trafficking, especially when it involves children or young people, takes time.</p>
<p>In my <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/486138/icta-horr86.pdf">own research</a> I have examined case files, interviewed and spoken with young people and adults who have <a href="https://www.antislaverycommissioner.co.uk/media/1277/between-two-fires-understanding-vulnerabilities-and-the-support-needs-of-people-from-albania-viet-nam-and-nigeria-who-have-experienced-human-trafficking-into-the-uk.pdf">experienced trafficking</a>. Identifying trafficking can be like building a jigsaw – a picture only emerges once the final pieces are added. In many cases, disclosure is the first step to getting protection and support, and for young people having someone to help them navigate the process is important. </p>
<p>We have known for years that disclosure is gradual and incremental. As a <a href="https://letterfromsanta.nspcc.org.uk/globalassets/documents/research-reports/breaking-wall-silence-report.pdf">2009 report</a> commissioned by the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children shows, identifying trafficking can be hindered by silence. Solicitors, police, social workers, youth workers and other health and education professionals noted that children and young people found it difficult to disclose information about their experiences, sometimes having been told not to articulate what had happened to them or being afraid of the consequences. </p>
<p>Seemingly in contrast with this, these same practitioners themselves found it difficult to identify cases, sometimes not believing what they heard from the young people. These two elements and other complex circumstances make it incredibly difficult for cases to be identified.</p>
<p>Disclosure of any form of child abuse can be influenced by the types and levels of abuse experienced. If a child has experienced greater than four types of trauma or maltreatment in a one year period, this is known as “polyvictmisation”. This describes the experience of many young people who have been trafficked, including Farah. According to the documentary, he was arriving at school unkempt, showing signs of neglect. He was also forced to work behind closed doors looking after children, cleaning, doing chores and generally being exploited. </p>
<p>Disclosure can be hampered by the control traffickers hold over young people, enforced through physical violence or less visible forms of coercion. At the age of nine, Farah would not have had any meaningful say in his trafficking and was told not to say anything to anyone about his circumstances. The burden of keeping that secret would have been immeasurable. But like many, Farah ultimately reached a point where he needed to tell someone.</p>
<h2>Deciding to disclose</h2>
<p>Knowing who to turn to to reveal abuse is not straightforward. A <a href="https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/media/1052/no-one-noticed-no-one-heard-report.pdf">2013 report</a> on the childhood experiences of abuse of 60 young men and women found that 90% of these young people had negative experiences of disclosure, where the person they confided in responded poorly. This report also found that young people disclosed for a variety of reasons, including not being able to cope with the abuse any longer, the abuse getting worse and wanting to seek justice.</p>
<p>Disclosures might be elicited, for example in interviews by Home Office officials dealing with a young person’s immigration case. Disclosures can also be accidental, like when a child is involved in an accident and other injuries are found. This is complex territory and, like Farah described, “blocking it out” for years could be an indication of the level of trauma experienced. </p>
<p><strong>Sir Mo Farah reveals his real name and experience being trafficked:</strong></p>
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<p>There are cases where children have actively tried to tell somebody about their abuse, where they purposefully present themselves at children’s services, but have been turned away, not believed, or worse, <a href="https://www.ecpat.org.uk/Handlers/Download.ashx?IDMF=bb993f93-9445-4f75-bc1e-d051d76ab668">returned to their traffickers</a>. </p>
<p>Children who have been affected by trafficking are often required to tell their story <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Trafficked-Young-People-Breaking-the-Wall-of-Silence/Pearce-Hynes-Bovarnick/p/book/9780415617543#">again and again</a>. This can be a traumatic experience for anybody, child or adult, trafficking victim or not. There may be feelings of guilt or shame associated, fear of unknown consequences, or a child may simply not have the right words to explain what is happening to them. </p>
<h2>Identifying trafficking</h2>
<p>The UK established a National Referral Mechanism in 2009 to proactively identify, protect and support victims of trafficking. Since then, there has been a <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/modern-slavery-national-referral-mechanism-and-duty-to-notify-statistics-uk-end-of-year-summary-2021">steady rise</a> in numbers of referrals of both adults and children, with a record 12,727 referrals in 2021, up 20% from the year before. </p>
<p>Of these referrals, 43% were for children from the UK and elsewhere. UK-born children were referred mainly for <a href="https://csnetwork.org.uk/assets/documents/Contextual-Safeguarding-and-County-Lines-Briefing_-Wroe-Oct-2019-FINAL.pdf">criminal exploitation</a>, while those from abroad were mainly trafficked for sexual and labour exploitation.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/mo-farah-was-trafficked-to-the-uk-the-governments-new-immigration-law-could-make-it-harder-for-modern-slavery-victims-to-receive-help-184286">Mo Farah was trafficked to the UK – the government's new immigration law could make it harder for modern slavery victims to receive help</a>
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<p>There is much more that could be done to help children who have been trafficked feel safe enough to disclose their experiences. Sadly, the UK’s immigration policies focused on deterrence are doing little to enable this. Farah said <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62137599">he was “relieved”</a> that the Home Office wouldn’t take action against him, but others who are not national sports heroes may not <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2022/jul/16/i-could-have-been-a-mo-farah-trafficked-boxer-denied-his-shot-at-olympic-glory-by-home-office?amp">receive the same assurance</a>.</p>
<p>Overall, a child needs to feel safe and secure to disclose abuse and exploitation. If young people do not have someone to turn to, do not think professionals will take them seriously, or have been disbelieved in the past, it is unlikely they will trust those same professionals to offer them protection or the safety they need.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/186967/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Patricia Hynes has received funding from the Modern Slavery Innovation Fund and currently receives funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council. </span></em></p>Sir Mo Farah took three decades to discuss what happened to him as a child.Patricia Hynes, Professor of Social Justice, Sheffield Hallam UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1442762020-09-13T19:51:23Z2020-09-13T19:51:23ZWhat lies beneath: tunnels for trafficking, or just a subterranean service? Time to rescue these spaces from the conspiracists<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352199/original/file-20200811-16-1bt1gkt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=177%2C0%2C2646%2C1812&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A tidal drain at South Yarra, Melbourne, in 2008. The installation of litter-trapping equipment now prevents access.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo: Victoria Kolankiewicz</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Digital communications have <a href="https://theconversation.com/are-conspiracy-theories-on-the-rise-in-the-us-121968">spread conspiracy theories more widely than ever before</a>, particularly in this uncertain and tumultuous year. QAnon, for example, is <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-conspiracy-theories-spread-online-its-not-just-down-to-algorithms-133891">a movement</a> that seeks to identify a “deep state” or “global elite” complicit in <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-church-of-qanon-will-conspiracy-theories-form-the-basis-of-a-new-religious-movement-137859">human trafficking, “Pizzagate” and the orchestration of a global pandemic</a>. One conspiracy theory “<a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-children-rescued-tunnels/fact-check-35000-malnourished-and-caged-children-were-not-recently-rescued-from-tunnels-by-us-military-idUSKBN23M2EL">going viral</a>” is that extensive operations are taking place to rescue children held in secret underground locales beneath densely populated cities. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-conspiracy-theories-spread-online-its-not-just-down-to-algorithms-133891">How conspiracy theories spread online – it's not just down to algorithms</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Tunnel networks beneath major Australian cities such as <a href="https://twitter.com/BushmansMum/status/1287181188860227586">Melbourne</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/timetowakeupsw1/status/1246785772268683265">Sydney</a> have <a href="https://www.facebook.com/sarah.shanahan.58/posts/10157286425985685">received similar treatment</a>. Misconceptions of their form and purpose are communicated via social media. The stuff of urban legends, once circulated among acquaintances, is now online. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1246785772268683265"}"></div></p>
<p>The misunderstandings of these spaces reveal a more glaring oversight: of wartime histories, transportation follies, essential services and the unique geologies and climates that require drainage infrastructure. These tunnels are hidden by necessity. But they are close enough to the surface to be easily accessible, preventing their use for any large-scale conspiracy.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/356898/original/file-20200908-20-1652fnm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A Facebook post of conspiracy theory linking Melbourne lockdown to children held captive in underground tunnels" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/356898/original/file-20200908-20-1652fnm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/356898/original/file-20200908-20-1652fnm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=596&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/356898/original/file-20200908-20-1652fnm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=596&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/356898/original/file-20200908-20-1652fnm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=596&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/356898/original/file-20200908-20-1652fnm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=749&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/356898/original/file-20200908-20-1652fnm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=749&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/356898/original/file-20200908-20-1652fnm.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=749&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Facebook post linking the Melbourne COVID-19 lockdown to children held captive in underground tunnels.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.facebook.com/sarah.shanahan.58/posts/10157286425985685">Facebook</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Why the fixation with tunnels?</h2>
<p>Abandoned or atypical urban spaces have <a href="https://theconversation.com/reopening-londons-mail-rail-why-its-so-hard-to-recreate-the-thrill-of-exploring-urban-ruins-54423">long piqued the public imagination</a>. Sites of abandonment are also associated with notions of freedom and excitement. Urban exploration has increased significantly within the past decade, amplified by social media sharing of imagery and aesthetics. </p>
<p>Rumours abound of complex tunnel networks in major Australian cities, created in the wake of the second world war. Larger air raid shelters were often located close to urban settlement, but escaped use. They remained in public memory as mythology: bunkers can be located across Australia, from Dover Heights in Sydney, to Prospect and Glenelg in Adelaide. <a href="https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/the-only-air-raid-pipe-shelters-in-brisbane-still-remain-a-mystery-20190425-p51h4u.html">Over 20 air raid shelters exist in Brisbane alone</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Entrances to air raid shelter at Howard Smith Wharves, Brisbane" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352166/original/file-20200811-22-4u2nru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352166/original/file-20200811-22-4u2nru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352166/original/file-20200811-22-4u2nru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352166/original/file-20200811-22-4u2nru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352166/original/file-20200811-22-4u2nru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352166/original/file-20200811-22-4u2nru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352166/original/file-20200811-22-4u2nru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The entrances to an air raid shelter at Howard Smith Wharves, Brisbane.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Air_raid_shelters_at_Howard_Smith_Wharves_in_Brisbane_02.jpg">Kgbo/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The fabled “<a href="https://www.heraldsun.com.au/leader/north/a-tunnel-in-the-banks-of-the-merri-creek-has-finally-been-filled-in-by-darebin-council/news-story/5c811dc980967ebc61e9321ec222a0b4">Northcote Tunnel</a>” in Melbourne was the subject of decades of rumour. It was eventually found to be the result of a search for an underground stream, not the large-scale 1940s American construction it was said to be. </p>
<p>Tunnels beneath Sydney served similar purposes, either by design or as the result of a failed transport infrastructure project. The St James tunnels are a prime example. This “hidden” space is about to be converted to <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/st-james-tunnel-vision-plan-to-revive-abandoned-sydney-railway-20181001-p5073u.html">a tourism precinct</a>. </p>
<p>Beneath the streets of Melbourne, Sydney and beyond, mail and precious cargo were often transported about the city in underground tunnels from nearby railway stations or ports to parliament or the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Post_Office,_Melbourne">General Post Office</a>. </p>
<h2>So what are these spaces used for today?</h2>
<p>Today, urban tunnels carry telecommunications, gas, electricity, water and sewerage infrastructure.</p>
<p>Exact locations remain secret for security and operational reasons. Access is allowed in rare cases. In the case of the <a href="http://www.health.vic.gov.au/healthvictoria/sep11/tunnel.htm">Royal Melbourne Hospital steam tunnels</a>, members of the public can book a place on once-yearly tours. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352165/original/file-20200811-24-1b63gmi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Partially constructed tunnels and unused platforms at St James railway station, Sydney." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352165/original/file-20200811-24-1b63gmi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352165/original/file-20200811-24-1b63gmi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352165/original/file-20200811-24-1b63gmi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352165/original/file-20200811-24-1b63gmi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352165/original/file-20200811-24-1b63gmi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352165/original/file-20200811-24-1b63gmi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352165/original/file-20200811-24-1b63gmi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Partially constructed tunnels and unused platforms at St James railway station, Sydney.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:St_James_Railway_Station_Sydney_IMG_4450_(26443308184).jpg">Beau Giles/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Stormwater drains are most abundant in urban areas; perhaps this is why they feature so heavily in conspiracies. Where depressions, undulations or linear tracts of open space exist in the landscape, a stormwater drain is likely lurking beneath the surface. These drains are needed to divert rainwater from areas where hard surfaces would otherwise lead to flooding. </p>
<p>In Melbourne, the <a href="https://www.melbournewater.com.au/water-data-and-education/water-facts-and-history/history-and-heritage/timeline-our-history">Melbourne and Metropolitan Board of Works</a> started building these drains in the early 20th century. I have explored many of these complex networks, <a href="https://www.melbournewater.com.au/water-data-and-education/water-facts-and-history/flooding/drainage-system">over 1,400 kilometres of drains</a> that span almost all of metropolitan Melbourne and its fringes. These drains are literally beneath the feet of city dwellers: many would be surprised to find that a drain runs <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/a-plan-to-turn-melbournes-elizabeth-street-into-a-rainforest-canal-20150304-13uk1x.html">beneath the major thoroughfare of Elizabeth Street</a>, historically Williams Creek. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1287181188860227586"}"></div></p>
<p>The Metropolitan Water Sewerage and Drainage Board built similar infrastructure in Sydney. Open and closed conduits were built in concrete and brick — as well as bluestone in Melbourne, and limestone in Sydney — throughout the past century. Sydney’s stormwater network <a href="https://www.sydneywater.com.au/sw/water-the-environment/how-we-manage-sydney-s-water/stormwater-network/index.htm">totals 454 kilometres</a> of drains and spans 73 water catchments. These drains ultimately carry <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/environment/where-does-all-the-stormwater-go-after-the-sydney-weather-clears-20150430-1mx4ep.html">500 billion litres into Sydney Harbour or Botany Bay</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/our-legacy-of-liveable-cities-wont-last-without-a-visionary-response-to-growth-93729">Our legacy of liveable cities won't last without a visionary response to growth</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A drain on the Yarra River in South Yarra" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352197/original/file-20200811-18-1506vqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352197/original/file-20200811-18-1506vqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352197/original/file-20200811-18-1506vqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352197/original/file-20200811-18-1506vqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352197/original/file-20200811-18-1506vqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=483&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352197/original/file-20200811-18-1506vqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=483&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/352197/original/file-20200811-18-1506vqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=483&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A tidal drain at South Yarra, Melbourne, in 2008. The installation of litter-trapping equipment now prevents access.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo: Victoria Kolankiewicz</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Dangerous, yes, but for more mundane reasons</h2>
<p>These hidden spaces <em>can</em> be controversial or dangerous, but not for the reasons put forth by QAnon and its ilk. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-church-of-qanon-will-conspiracy-theories-form-the-basis-of-a-new-religious-movement-137859">The Church of QAnon: Will conspiracy theories form the basis of a new religious movement?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Social groups have emerged around drain exploration, with the Melbourne-based Cave Clan the best-known example. They have clear rules to ensure the safety of their members. “No drains when it rains” is one such rule: sudden rain can catch out explorers as water levels rise quickly inside drains. </p>
<p>Drownings have been reported in both <a href="https://www.news.com.au/national/graffiti-drain-survivor-i-wish-i-had-died/news-story/40a663ce61814480552ad5348ea0d698?sv=d13fa3e80fab16b57ee6743c223cf149">Sydney</a> and <a href="https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/fears-for-lives-of-underground-explorers/news-story/e9a23d2f83212308d5a3b8928700fa07">Melbourne</a>. The unpredictability of sudden torrential flows means these spaces are fundamentally unsuited to the purposes suggested in conspiracy theories.</p>
<p>Frequent visits by urban explorers would also quickly identify any secretive mis-uses of drainage infrastructure. This would equally apply to other underground spaces such as steam and service tunnels – maintenance staff would soon spot anything amiss.</p>
<p>More crucial, however, is that the design of these drains means they could not play any part in supposed trafficking networks. Some of these drains are large enough for adults to explore. The vast majority, though, are too small to be accessed, with diameters as narrow as 300mm. </p>
<p>Even the most cavernous drains would not be suitable for storage. Larger drains are designed to hold larger flows, often at a confluence of catchment areas. While they these drains <em>could</em> host human beings, they would be at risk of drowning whenever it rained. Tidal flows or litter traps can also prevent access.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/if-the-tide-is-high-our-sewerage-systems-wont-hold-on-14467">If the tide is high, our sewerage systems won't hold on</a>
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</em>
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<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1284427769393233920"}"></div></p>
<p>Child trafficking is a very <a href="https://theconversation.com/human-trafficking-and-slavery-still-happen-in-australia-this-comic-explains-how-112294">relevant</a> <a href="https://theconversation.com/jeffrey-epsteins-arrest-is-the-tip-of-the-iceberg-human-trafficking-is-the-worlds-fastest-growing-crime-120225">issue</a>, but it is certainly not taking place under cities across the nation. Rather than abandoning subterranean spaces to conspiratorial narratives or urban mythology, these spaces are important for other reasons. These point to the need to build a common understanding not only of their form and function, but also of the ethos underlying their existence, a concern for the common good. </p>
<p>That something as impressive and as everyday as our civic infrastructure inspires such fascination and fear is indeed curious. Ultimately, these spaces are too utilitarian to serve the purpose claimed by viral social media posts.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/144276/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Victoria Kolankiewicz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>What was once the stuff of urban legends now spreads virally through social media claims the tunnels beneath our cities are used for child trafficking. The truth is both more mundane and important.Victoria Kolankiewicz, Research Assistant, Australian Centre for Architectural History, Urban and Cultural Heritage, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1238902019-10-27T07:58:21Z2019-10-27T07:58:21ZWhy Nigerian women in Oyo state use child domestic workers<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/298267/original/file-20191023-119419-1t0l8x0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Child labour is still endemic in Nigeria. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Riccardo Mayer/Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Hiring domestic servants is a common phenomenon in Nigeria. More often than not this involves vulnerable children being made to work as live-in domestic servants mostly in middle class urban households. </p>
<p>Researchers <a href="https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/70575/WHO_RHR_HRP_11.05_eng.pdf">have investigated </a> what creates the supply of child labour, but few have attempted to understand the demand. My <a href="https://journals.uvic.ca/index.php/ijcyfs/article/view/11558">research</a> produced some pointers to why households use children as servants. This is why I chose to investigate factors that propel demand for domestic servants in Oyo State, southwest Nigeria. Oyo State is known as a <a href="https://punchng.com/oyo-becoming-hot-spot-of-girls-trafficking-nis/">hot-spot for child trafficking </a> – as source, transit and destination.</p>
<p>The results showed three categories of employers: newly married women, married women with grown-up children, and isolated widows and grandparents. Demand was driven by a number of factors, including having too much of a workload and the need for companionship. Another factor appeared to be the <a href="https://repository.upenn.edu/dissertations/AAI8316036/">declining </a> extended family structure and a growing preference for “outsiders” rather than family members to do household work. </p>
<p>Most of the children faced exploitation from traffickers as well as employers and lived in slave-like conditions. </p>
<p>Based on my findings I make some recommendations on what needs to be done – beyond Nigeria’s <a href="https://www.accesstojustice-ng.org/Child%20RIght%20Act%202003.pdf">Child Right Law</a>
which bans such practices – to prevent the exploitation of children. The study also recommends welfare programmes targeted at demanding households and an intervention strategy for the trafficked children. </p>
<h2>Hiring domestic servants</h2>
<p>Research participants listed a number of reasons they preferred a stranger to do the work in the house rather than a relative.</p>
<p>It meant that they could keep prying relatives at bay in the first months and years of their marriage. Also, they preferred an employee-employer relationship as this gave them more power over the individual. Also, some interviewees pointed out that they could mete out punishment to an employee that wouldn’t be tolerated by a family member. </p>
<p>However, not all employers were cruel. </p>
<p>The practice of fostering a member of the extended family has been widespread for centuries in Nigeria. But <a href="https://repository.upenn.edu/dissertations/AAI8316036/">the practice has been changing</a>.</p>
<p>Many of those I interviewed listed a number of reasons for not wanting to foster a relative. They cited cultural obligations and the enormous demands of having fostered children. This was particularly true if a child was orphaned. </p>
<p>The research found that age played a role in the demand for domestic servants. Young, newly married women said they took up paid employment once they had children. One respondent said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I never liked the idea of bringing a third party into my house but when we started bearing children and I have to go to work, I had no choice other than to secure an extra hand to help with the domestic demands. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Older women cited the need for companionship rather than performance of domestic chores. </p>
<p>The location of a husband’s job was also a factor. Women complained of boredom when their husbands were away at work stations outside the state. </p>
<p>Another critical factor was the number of children in a household, and their ages. The domestic tasks increase with the number of children; their age determines the attention they require. Pregnancy may also create a need for help <a href="https://journals.uvic.ca/index.php/ijcyfs/article/view/11558">with housework</a>. A respondent said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The reason was that I was pregnant, creating the need for somebody to start taking care of the children. All along, I have sisters and another relative living with me but they have all left for school. Their absence created a vacuum and when I took in (became pregnant), it was obvious that I needed somebody to assist me so I will not cause complications by overworking. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Our research found that households where husbands assist in performing domestic duties, though not common, often didn’t see the need for a domestic servant.</p>
<h2>What needs to be done</h2>
<p>Nigeria enacted the Child Right Act in 2003 to protect children from being separated from their parents and exposed to hazardous works. Although the law exists, not all the states have adopted it. At least 11 states in Northern Nigeria are yet to pass it due to the fact that its provisions is claimed to negate cultural practices and their belief. </p>
<p>But even those states that have adopted the law not much is being achieved in checking human trafficking of children or for domestic work. </p>
<p>The government has a great deal of work to do. It needs to make a conscious effort to implement the law. Companies can also play a role. Childcare facilities must be established in organisations while closing hours for women should be reduced to enable them attend to domestic roles.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/123890/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Oludayo Tade does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Middle-class Nigerians employ children in their homes for a range of reasons.Oludayo Tade, Researcher in criminology, victimology, electronic frauds and cybercrime, University of IbadanLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1238762019-09-26T13:35:09Z2019-09-26T13:35:09ZKenya takes next steps to replace children’s homes with family care<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/293617/original/file-20190923-54759-19xjauo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Children play on a see-saw at Nyumbani AIDS orphanage on the outskirts of the Kenya capital Nairobi.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Stephen Morrison</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Kenya has taken <a href="https://www.unicef.org/protection/files/Kenya_CP_system_case_study.pdf">significant steps</a> to place family-based care at the centre of its child protection system. This is a break from the decades-old practice of privately-run institutions providing institutional care for disadvantaged children. These institutions largely fed off the effects of poverty, lack of access to services and education, disability and family breakdown.</p>
<p>There are still an <a href="http://www.kenyanews.go.ke/programme-to-de-institutionalize-childrens-homes-roll-out/">estimated</a> 40,000 children in 830 children’s homes across Kenya. Most are privately-run. Comprehensive information on the actual number of institutions and children living in them is unavailable. But a count is under way in five of the country’s 47 counties.</p>
<p>Research has shown that institutional care is <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4130248/">inherently harmful</a> to a child’s development and well-being. It places children at increased risk of neglect, physical and sexual abuse as well as exploitation. Children are also more likely to suffer developmental delays that result in poor mental health, academic failure, and increased chances of behavioural problems later in life.</p>
<p><a href="https://bettercarenetwork.org/sites/default/files/Institutionalization%20of%20Children%20in%20Kenya%20-%20A%20Child%20Rights%20Perspective.pdf">Research</a> also shows that most children are placed in care because of poverty – not because they don’t have families.</p>
<p>Family is universally <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx">recognised</a> as the natural and fundamental unit of society and the necessary basis of social order. This is endorsed by the <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx">United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child</a> and the <a href="https://www.unicef.org/esaro/African_Charter_articles_in_full.pdf">African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child</a>. So too does the Constitution of Kenya recognise this.</p>
<p>In this sense institutionalising children runs counter to Kenya’s traditional approach to children being cared for by extended families or friends in their own communities.</p>
<h2>A new approach</h2>
<p>Two years ago Kenya announced a long-term <a href="https://mtotonewsblog.wordpress.com/2017/10/15/kenyas-first-step-towards-deinstitutionalization-of-children/">action plan</a> to end the institutionalisation of children. It also placed a <a href="https://nairobinews.nation.co.ke/news/government-protect-kenyan-children">moratorium on the registration of institutions</a>.</p>
<p>This built on <a href="http://www.bettercarenetwork.org/sites/default/files/Guidelines%20for%20the%20Alternative%20Family%20Care%20of%20Children%20in%20Kenya.pdf">alternative guidelines for care</a> introduced in 2014.</p>
<p>Kenya’s national policy efforts have recently been deepened further. The governor of Murang'a county in central Kenya has signed a <a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/eh24yh3gxyk7b5u/Governor%20Wa%20Iria%206%20September%202019%20Declaration.pdf?dl=0">declaration</a> to protect the rights of children. The declaration – championed by Stahili Foundation in Kenya and Leiden University in the Netherlands – is the first significant step taken by a county to address this particularly vulnerable population.</p>
<p>The governor’s action is significant because, under Kenya’s Constitution, powers and resources have been devolved from national level to the counties. Counties now have the responsibility of safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and mobilising resources on their behalf. Other functions transferred to the county governments include pre-primary education, health, development, and the running of children’s care facilities.</p>
<p>The hope is that other governors will follow suit, and that this in turn will speed up Kenya’s transition from an out-dated form of caring for vulnerable children to one that’s relevant to the 21st Century.</p>
<h2>Strengthening families, not institutions</h2>
<p>Most African countries have weak oversight of child protection services. On top of this, institutions have become lucrative money-making businesses in a number of countries. Reflecting a phenomenon which has been called the <a href="https://prezi.com/_9mtczip-0be/orphan-industrial-complex/">“orphan industrial complex”</a> residential care institutions, which are often not registered with authorities, are being fuelled by money obtained through donations and <a href="https://theconversation.com/volunteer-tourism-whats-wrong-with-it-and-how-it-can-be-changed-86701">“voluntourism”</a>. This means that children’s rights are often violated.</p>
<p>The recruitment of children to orphanages for the purpose of exploiting them for financial gain is child trafficking. This was reported in a number of countries by the <a href="https://www.state.gov/child-institutionalization-and-human-trafficking/">2018 US Department of State Trafficking in Persons Report</a>. Prosecutions are seldom forthcoming, if at all.</p>
<p>Murang’a County is not immune to this problem. Child <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/videos/world/2017/03/08/cfp-kenya-nairobi-orphanage-sevenzo-pkg.cnn">trafficking</a> to institutions as well as other forms of abuse and exploitation, are <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-slavery-conference-orphanages/calls-mount-to-stop-orphanages-exploiting-poor-children-to-lure-money-tourists-idUSKCN1NJ0AE">well-documented</a>.</p>
<p>Against this background, the current Kenyan care reforms and local initiatives such as the Leiden Declaration designed to end institutionalisation and strengthen family-based care take on added significance.</p>
<p>The declaration sets out a series of commitments to protect children by reforming the way in which children are cared for in the county. The governor’s commitments include enacting a Children’s Bill to enhance protection, strengthening the county’s social work force, and establishing a children’s office and ombudsperson.</p>
<h2>A global trend</h2>
<p>Kenya is not alone in the reform of care systems for children. Countries across the world – and the continent – are dismantling institutional care and redirecting resources towards family support and strengthening other forms of family-based alternative care. These include kinship and foster care.</p>
<p>Rwanda, for instance, is <a href="http://ncc.gov.rw/fileadmin/templates/document/STRATEGY_FOR_NATIONAL_CHILD_CARE_REFORM.pdf">poised</a> to make the country institution-free. It’s already closed <a href="https://ktpress.rw/2019/07/who-are-500-rwandan-children-remaining-in-orphanages/">29 of the 35 institutions in the county</a>.</p>
<p>Neighbouring Uganda has also taken important steps in the same direction. Last year, not a single child was admitted to a children’s home in the <a href="https://bettercarenetwork.org/sites/default/files/Assessing%20Alternative%20Care%20for%20Children%20in%20Uganda_FINAL_tr-18-250.pdf">pilot</a> district of Tororo.</p>
<p>Sudan, a predominantly Muslim country, has similarly committed to a system that explicitly rejects institutional care. As a result, it has strengthened its care system called <a href="https://assets.hcch.net/docs/845a058f-5369-4230-8524-82c481a9f63c.pdf">kafala</a> and provided preventive services.</p>
<h2>What next</h2>
<p>The Leiden initiative comes ahead of the United Nations General Assembly expected to adopt a <a href="https://www.sos-childrensvillages.org/news/2019-un-resolution-on-the-rights-of-the-child">resolution</a> on children’s rights to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CRC/Pages/PartnerCRC30.aspxlink">Convention</a> on the Rights of the Child. The resolution will focus for the first time on the issue of children without parental care.</p>
<p>This is an important opportunity for member states to review progress made in preventing unnecessary family-child separation and providing appropriate alternative care, and to recommend specific actions to strengthen care reforms globally.</p>
<p>Change starts at the local level as Murang’a county in Kenya is doing to ensure that children are protected. This is precisely what is needed across the globe.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/123876/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Julia Sloth-Nielsen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Kenya announced plans in 2017 for a long-term action plan to end the institutionalisation of children.Julia Sloth-Nielsen, Professor, Department of Public Law and Jurisprudence, University of the Western Cape and Professor of Children's Rights in the Developing World, University of Leiden, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/871162018-01-19T14:12:53Z2018-01-19T14:12:53ZHow trafficked children are being hidden behind a focus on modern slavery<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/202410/original/file-20180118-158528-1slfyko.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">shutterstock</span> </figcaption></figure><p>The crime of modern slavery has received much attention in the last few years. The British government introduced the <a href="http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2015/30/contents/enacted">Modern Slavery Act</a> in 2015, and the prime minister, Theresa May, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/30/we-will-lead-the-way-in-defeating-modern-slavery/">said she wanted</a> “tough new penalties to put slave masters behind bars where they belong”.</p>
<p>But what exactly do we mean by “modern slavery”? According to the <a href="http://www.antislaverycommissioner.co.uk/">UK’s Anti-Slavery Commissioner</a>, modern slavery <em>is</em> human trafficking. But they are not the same thing – and putting them under the same title puts some victims at risk of being ignored.</p>
<p>The term “modern slavery” invokes a moral outrage that no one would disagree with. There are frequent <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/42719044/modern-slavery-nail-salons-using-trafficked-individuals">news stories</a> of vulnerable people being forced to work in appalling conditions and “slave drivers” being prosecuted for labour exploitation. The new focus on labour exploitation requires businesses to demonstrate supply chain transparency and produce “modern slavery statements” to show that it is not taking place in their companies. </p>
<p>But this focus also detracts from other forms of trafficking that are taking place. Child trafficking, in particular, remains hidden by all the attention focused on modern slavery. Children are not likely to be visible in labour markets, which are dominated by adults – a factor exacerbated by the clandestine operations of traffickers exploiting children within private homes, cannabis factories or brothels.</p>
<p>We already know that children and young people who are trafficked are not just exploited for their labour. Children can be bought, sold and resold by abusers who mistreat them sexually and physically, or use them to commit crime. </p>
<p>We need to uncover the exploitation and harm of children in forms which are not yet recognised as child trafficking. Children being sold the dream of modelling contracts in London, Paris or Milan, for example, who instead experience drug abuse, sexual exploitation and rape.</p>
<p>The present economic focus of modern slavery is far too narrow and adult-focused. </p>
<p>The UK has just started to make inroads into understanding what human trafficking is, how it happens, the impact on victims and the many forms it can take. So why change what we call it? </p>
<h2>An opportunity missed</h2>
<p>The Modern Slavery Act was an opportunity to make it easier for victims to come forward. But the legislation took a different direction, focusing on prosecuting those abusing labour for profit. </p>
<p>It also introduced tougher penalties for traffickers and gangmasters – yet shockingly, more <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9767000/9767836.stm">victims were being prosecuted</a> for crimes associated with trafficking than traffickers. Later, in response to concerns that victims continued to be criminalised, the Act introduced a statutory defence clause for them.</p>
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<p>Yet for children, that clause involves a “reasonable person test”, which places onus on the children themselves to provide evidence of their trafficking, in order to access protection from prosecution. But how can a child <em>prove</em> they were psychologically manipulated, coerced or sold a convincing story of the hope of better life opportunities? </p>
<p><a href="http://opus.bath.ac.uk/50783/">New research</a> with children who have been trafficked has highlighted that a system which is meant to support victims remains <a href="http://opus.bath.ac.uk/50783/1/GEARON_Alinka_PhD_Thesis_29_5_16.pdf">focused on immigration and prosecution</a>. This approach does not help children, or support them to escape conditions of slavery. </p>
<p>In some situations, when children have come forward to the police or immigration officials, they have been not been believed and instead been <a href="http://opus.bath.ac.uk/50783/">left in the hands of traffickers</a> – even when the children were explicitly stating they were being hit, beaten, used or sold for sex. Children are arrested and prosecuted for trafficking-related crimes and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2013/dec/20/trafficking-victims-forced-crime-let-down-police">some end up in adult prisons</a>.</p>
<p>Until this changes, children will remain hidden and continue to suffer multiple and repeated abuse. Urgent reform is needed. </p>
<p>The research with trafficked children also highlighted that when they approached frontline agencies for help, they were too often <a href="http://opus.bath.ac.uk/50783/">met with racism and xenophobia</a>. They felt they were not listened to and not believed in an immigration-driven system. Yet the Home Office, with its economic and immigration focus, continues to be responsible for tackling “modern slavery” including child trafficking. </p>
<p>The system is not helping. We need to listen to what victims of trafficking abuse are actually telling us. In the UK, the Department for Education should urgently take control of child trafficking as a child protection and welfare problem to better address the harm and abuse children suffer. </p>
<p>Child trafficking is not a migration or immigration issue – and the motive for dealing with it should not be economic or prosecution focused. Children need help from adults to stop abuse and exploitation. Their protection should be the priority above all other matters.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87116/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alinka Gearon does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Young victims remain at risk because current laws are focused on concerns over immigration and the economy.Alinka Gearon, Lecturer in Social Work specialising in child trafficking and child protection, University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/664612016-10-06T15:09:16Z2016-10-06T15:09:16ZFrom trafficked minor to British citizen: Tunde Jaji’s dramatic journey<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/140360/original/image-20161004-20239-1j22a47.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=32%2C211%2C2140%2C1746&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Tunde Jaji with his old teacher and the mayor of Bournemouth. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kurt Barling</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In nearly 30 years as a journalist, very few stories have stuck with me as long as this one. In late September, 24 years after he arrived in the UK illicitly, I watched as Tunde Jaji took his oath of citizenship in the council chamber of Bournemouth town hall. “I am just so relieved,” he told me. “Now finally perhaps I can stop looking over my shoulder. I can finally be me.”</p>
<p>When he vowed to uphold the values of democracy and an open society that respects difference it was a demonstration that human wrongs can be overcome with just solutions. But first let me take you back to where it all began.</p>
<p>In October 2006, Lynne Awbery, a special needs education specialist, approached me to explain she had taken in a former pupil who had been a domestic slave. At first I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Jaji had been in domestic service with a Nigerian family in the London borough of Haringey from around the age of eight.</p>
<p>For the best part of a decade, the family he stayed with cleverly disguised this abusive relationship. Despite attending Haringey schools for more than 12 years, no-one in authority questioned the legitimacy of the relationship between him and his carers. </p>
<p>Only when the illegally claimed child benefits were stopped as he turned 16, did things turn sour. Threatened with deportation because the family had kept no official paperwork for him, he was forced to share his plight with a few trusted friends.</p>
<h2>Confirming his identity</h2>
<p>Jaji’s fundamental problem was similar to that of most trafficked children: he had no paperwork which established his true identity or his right to remain in Britain. That’s when he turned to the dyslexia teacher who had helped him at school. Awbery faced a wall of silence and bureaucratic indifference wherever she turned to seek paperwork that could prove who he was. Without this he could make no claim to stay in the UK. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, having passed his 18th birthday there was a very real threat of deportation. If Jaji had been stopped by the police his status could have been legitimately questioned and he could have been deported back to Nigeria, a country he no longer knew.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/articles/2007/01/12/kurt_slavery_over_feature.shtml">Over several months</a> I sought to verify his claim that he had been in London for the 14-year period that is required for an illegal migrant to start regularising their status.</p>
<p>Despite being at local schools for his entire childhood it took veiled journalistic threats to the local primary school to get them to delve back into their original hand-written ledgers for primary school entries.</p>
<p>When Jaji and I went to his old school several teachers recognised him. The September 1992 entry for new starters showed his name. My investigation had proven he had been in the country long enough to apply to regularise his status.</p>
<h2>Application to remain</h2>
<p>Meanwhile, my investigation turned to Lagos, Nigeria, where we searched the official registry archives for a birth certificate. Not only did we eventually find this, but also made the sad discovery of his mother’s death certificate. Despite being told by the Nigerian family that his mother was dead, she had only recently passed away. Here was <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/8855190.stm">more evidence of the cruelty he had endured</a>.</p>
<p>Armed with this documentation, immigration lawyer Martina Flanagan prepared a dossier we hoped would stay deportation. There was an agonising wait while the Home Office considered his application to remain in Britain.</p>
<p>Jaji had a dream to pursue a career in animation and for this he needed to go to university. He recalls how it was drawing that had preserved his sanity as a child. But it looked as if he would also have to forgo his university place because his immigration status was taking so long to settle.</p>
<p>Impressed with his artistic talent, the University of Bournemouth were extremely sympathetic to his case. Even if they have been educated in Britain, it remains very difficult for children with ambiguous immigration status to attend university now that fees of £9,000 have been introduced.</p>
<p>With some extra persuasion on my part, Jaji was allowed to begin his course and shortly afterwards he was given indefinite leave to remain in the country, ironically on his 21st birthday. I felt my journalistic duty was done once the authorities recognised the legitimacy of his claim to stay in Britain. Nevertheless, we have remained friends.</p>
<p>Jaji graduated in 2009 and while he is still following a dream of publishing his first graphic novel he has continued to earn his living in retail.</p>
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<h2>Citizenship</h2>
<p>That brings us back to Bournemouth in late September. An English seaside retreat for generations and a retirement destination for senior citizens it has also become Jaji’s home. It was here he had decided to finally take the plunge and to save the several hundred pounds he needed to pass a rather difficult citizenship test to become a British citizen. His journey has been a testament to his talent, determination and resilience to overcome the trauma of a lost childhood in domestic servitude. </p>
<p>Jaji has been lucky too. Awbery didn’t walk on by and he is now a part of her extended family. She too was in Bournemouth to watch his citizenship ceremony with her husband. This was a moment that tugged on the emotions.</p>
<p>For hundreds of other trafficked children and unaccompanied minors <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-37528227">languishing in refugee camps</a> in Calais and Dunkirk the rules are still unclear and they face not only the indifference of officialdom but an uncertain and troubled future.</p>
<p>It makes you wonder, given the UK as a nation can’t apparently care for many such vulnerable people, what kind of values Jaji was really pledging himself to with his oath of allegiance in Bournemouth.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/66461/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kurt Barling does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Ten years ago as a BBC special correspondent Kurt Barling broke the story of a teenager who had been abused as a domestic servant. Now he reports on what happened next.Kurt Barling, Professor of Journalism, Middlesex UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/648402016-09-08T09:31:23Z2016-09-08T09:31:23ZWomen are being traded as slaves on WhatsApp – here’s how the UN can act<p>The members of the United Nations Security Council hear terrible stories from conflict zones with alarming frequency. So it takes a truly horrific tale to bring them to tears.</p>
<p>Yet as officials in the Council listened in December to Nadia Murad Basee Taha bravely <a href="http://freedomfund.org/blog/5380/">recount</a> her torturous ordeal as an Islamic State sex slave, some wept openly. When she fell silent, she received a rare ovation.</p>
<p>Murad is returning next week to the UN to be inducted as a Goodwill Ambassador for the Dignity of Survivors of Human Trafficking. Since her last visit, the Security Council has <a href="http://www.un.org/press/en/2015/sc12165.doc.htm">requested a report</a> from the Secretary-General on human trafficking in conflict, and what can be done about it. </p>
<p>The council should act soon – because the problem appears to be rapidly getting worse.</p>
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<h2>Is slavery making a comeback?</h2>
<p>International law is clear that slavery is never allowed, anywhere, any time. Yet the best estimates suggest that <a href="http://www.globalslaveryindex.org/findings/">45.8 million people</a> alive today are enslaved.</p>
<p>Armed groups have long forced vulnerable people into sexual exploitation, military service, and forced labor including construction, cleaning work, digging trenches, mining and agriculture. Some people displaced by conflict in South-East Asia may even end up <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2014/jun/10/supermarket-prawns-thailand-produced-slave-labour">catching and processing the fish</a> that ends up in our supermarkets.</p>
<p>But today, organizations such as Islamic State and Boko Haram are openly encouraging and organizing slavery on a scale not seen since World War II.</p>
<p>More than <a href="http://www.yazda.org/abductees/">5,000 Yazidi women, children and men</a> are thought to be enslaved by Islamic State right now. The organization has set up <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-30573385">slave registries and markets</a>, openly advocates for the revival of slavery through official mouthpieces, and has even issued <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/usa-islamic-state-sexslaves-idUSKBN0UC0DZ20151229">“how-to” manuals</a> on slavery. Increasingly, the group <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/islamic-state-losing-fighters-and-territory-increasingly-turns-to-child-bombers/2016/08/22/bc611ce6-687a-11e6-8225-fbb8a6fc65bc_story.html">relies on forced child recruits</a> as <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-islamic-state-recruits-and-coerces-children-64285">suicide bombers</a>.</p>
<h2>Slavery in a social media age</h2>
<p>This is not just Iraq and Syria’s problem. Like conflict, the problem of slavery has become international. A recent UN Commission of Inquiry <a href="http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/HRCouncil/CoISyria/A_HRC_32_CRP.2_en.pdf">found</a> that men from Algeria, Australia, Belgium, Egypt, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Libya, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey and Uzbekistan have participated in Islamic State’s enslavement and human trafficking crimes. Other armed groups, such as Boko Haram, are following suit.</p>
<p>This is partly because of social media. In the past year, the <a href="http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/HRCouncil/CoISyria/A_HRC_32_CRP.2_en.pdf">UN reports</a>, fighters have used the encrypted communications app Telegram to set up online slave auctions, circulating photos of captured Yazidi women, including their age, marital status, current location and price.</p>
<p>Recently, a member of Islamic State attempted to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/isis-fighters-appear-to-be-trying-to-sell-their-sex-slaves-on-the-internet/2016/05/28/b3d1edea-24fe-11e6-9e7f-57890b612299_story.html">sell two enslaved women on Facebook</a>. Displaced female Syrian refugees in Lebanon have been <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/apr/30/syrians-forced-sexual-slavery-lebanon">traded on WhatsApp</a>, and Islamic State <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/06/how-isis-became-the-worlds-deadliest-tech-start-up">relies increasingly</a> on secure apps such as Surespot and Threema for its communications. </p>
<h2>How the UN can help</h2>
<p>Faced with this, what can the Security Council possibly do?</p>
<p>The answer is quite a lot, according to a <a href="http://unu.edu/fighting-human-trafficking-in-conflict">new report</a> published by United Nations University (which I co-wrote). Published with support from the UK Mission to the United Nations and others, and drawing on input from more than 100 experts from across sectors and around the world, the report argues that the Security Council has significant untapped leverage on this issue.</p>
<p>For a start, the Security Council could clearly denounce involvement with this crime against humanity, and encourage states to punish any of their nationals who are involved. The council could also consider a special international tribunal to address Islamic State’s war crimes and crimes against humanity, including enslavement.</p>
<p>There is a lot the council could do to monitor and disrupt human trafficking connected to armed conflicts. This would involve mechanisms to monitor specific groups’ involvement in trafficking, as well as online and real-word hotspots. Members of the council should figure out why existing sanctions that already apply to involvement in human trafficking – including those for <a href="https://www.un.org/sc/suborg/en/sanctions/1267">Islamic State</a>, <a href="http://www.un.org/press/en/2014/sc11410.doc.htm">Boko Haram</a> and in <a href="https://www.un.org/sc/suborg/en/sanctions/1970#current%20sanctions%20measures">Libya</a>, the <a href="https://www.un.org/sc/suborg/en/sanctions/1533">Democratic Republic of Congo</a> and <a href="https://www.un.org/sc/suborg/en/sanctions/751">Somalia</a> – are not being used effectively to address it.</p>
<p>The council could also help protect those displaced by conflict – at present at a high of more than <a href="https://s3.amazonaws.com/unhcrsharedmedia/2016/2016-06-20-global-trends/2016-06-14-Global-Trends-2015.pdf">65 million people</a>. These people are especially vulnerable to human trafficking. UN agencies and states can do more to identify, assist and protect civilians in trafficking hot spots, through rapid reaction capabilities, reporting task forces and information campaigns.</p>
<h2>Enlisting the private sector</h2>
<p>The Council can also encourage the private sector to help. The Security Council could work with the financial, technology and recruitment sectors to develop guidance to prevent their value-chains being tainted by human trafficking in conflict. The council has taken <a href="http://www.enoughproject.org/blogs/un-throws-weight-behind-effort-curb-conflict-minerals">similar steps</a> to prevent industry from profiting from conflict minerals. Why not do the same in relation to human trafficking in conflict?</p>
<p>The technology sector has another key role to play. Social media providers may be able to use location data and content to identify people vulnerable to trafficking, and warn them of particular risks. The London Metropolitan Police has released online <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2016/jan/12/syrian-mothers-urge-uk-women-not-to-take-their-families-to-war-zone-video">videos</a> of Syrian migrant women warning foreigners about the realities of life under Islamic State, to counter fraudulent recruitment and trafficking. Social media providers can ensure these messages get to the right audience.</p>
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<p>Nadia Murad Basee Taha’s testimony last December was powerful and moving. Her appointment as a goodwill ambassador signals the UN’s ongoing commitment to support victims.</p>
<p>Now it is up to the Security Council to take action, with partners in the private sector and beyond, to ensure that more people do not suffer her terrible fate. Without such steps, all the council’s applause will ring hollow.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/64840/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James Cockayne works for United Nations University. The report cited here received funding from the Permanent Mission of the UK to the UN, the Permanent Mission of Liechtenstein to the UN, Thomson Reuters and Grace Farms Foundation.</span></em></p>Slavery is making a comeback, thanks to Islamic State and Boko Haram. But the UN can help.James Cockayne, Head of Office at the United Nations, United Nations UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/566862016-03-30T04:25:09Z2016-03-30T04:25:09ZTanzania can’t stop child labour without fixing its school system<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/115985/original/image-20160322-32320-8s9klb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Tanzanian children are kept out of school for a number of reasons.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">James Akena/Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Children are particularly vulnerable to being forced into labour, trafficked from rural areas to cities and then trafficked again within cities. They can’t communicate assertively and are physically powerless next to most adults. </p>
<p>In <a href="http://www.dol.gov/ilab/reports/child-labor/findings/2014TDA/tanzania.pdf">Tanzania</a>, just more than a quarter of children aged between five and 14 – approximately three million children – are working rather than attending school. Many have been forced into this situation by adults.</p>
<p>Tanzanian children are kept out of school for a number of reasons: the <a href="http://www.edqual.org/publications/workingpaper/edqualwp21.pdf/">costs</a> associated with uniforms and supplies; the long and potentially unsafe distances from many rural areas to the closest schools; and a lack of awareness among parents about the far-reaching benefits of education. </p>
<p>Pupils in Tanzania, whether in urban or <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/255618736_Distance_to_School_School_Attendance_and_Child_Labor_Evidence_from_Rural_Tanzania">rural</a> areas, often have to travel large distances to and from school. In cities like Dar Es Salaam, some children travel up to 60kms from home and often miss their first morning lessons. They are then punished by teachers. It also takes them hours to make the return journey. </p>
<p>In rural areas, a lack of reliable public transport exacerbates the great distances. Pupils in <a href="http://allafrica.com/stories/201510260379.html">these areas</a> have to cross farms, forests and rivers to reach schools, which can make them physically vulnerable – and targets for those who abduct and traffic children.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:358647/FULLTEXT01.pdf">Poverty</a> is a huge driver of child labour. Children may be sent away from their homes to work; they may go to live with extended family after losing their parents to HIV/AIDS and be forced to “earn their keep”. They may, in some cases, choose to leave home without their parents’ permission and start working.</p>
<p>There is <a href="http://www.immigration.go.tz/downloads/Anti-trafficking%20in%20Person%20Act%202008.pdf">legislation</a> in place to prevent human trafficking, but it’s clear this is not being used well enough by the East African nation to protect its children. Could at least part of the solution to this human rights crisis lie in improving the primary school system and children’s access to it? </p>
<h2>A flawed education system</h2>
<p>Tanzania has made significant progress in the past decade-and-a-half towards achieving <a href="http://unchronicle.un.org/article/towards-universal-primary-education-experience-tanzania/">universal primary education</a>. It has also done well to boost gender parity by getting more girls into school. </p>
<p>This was achieved during the implementation of the <a href="http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/">Millennium Development Goals</a>, translated by Tanzania into the country-wide Primary Education Development Program. But after an initial burst of success, this ambitious plan seems to be stagnating. </p>
<p>In 2002, the program’s launch year, total enrolments in Standard 1 <a href="http://www.hakielimu.org/files/publications/document71progress_pedp_en.pdf">shot up</a> by 43.1%. They then started to tail off and didn’t rise again <a href="unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0019/001907/190771e.pdf">until 2007</a>. There are two groups of Tanzanian children in Standard 1: those who are starting primary school and those who are repeating the first grade.</p>
<p>The government hoped that the program would, after a few years, clear the backlog of children not enrolled in school and that any subsequent increase in enrolment would reflect natural population growth. This is not happening. In fact, increases in enrolment are much lower than the population growth, which means that the enrolment rate is <a href="http://www.unicef.org/tanzania/SITAN_Mainland_report.pdf">actually declining</a>. </p>
<p>The number of children repeating Standard 1 <a href="http://www.its.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/volvocenter/VREF/ACET_FUT_UCB_schooltravel.pdf">has risen</a> to an average of 10% each year since the program’s inception. This suggests inadequacies either in the school environment, weaknesses in teaching or children’s general school readiness.</p>
<p>The children I’ve described above are those who are actually able to attend school. What about those who are kept away because they’re forced to work?</p>
<h2>Neglected and forgotten</h2>
<p>Some children – <a href="http://www.dol.gov/ilab/reports/child-labor/findings/2014TDA/tanzania.pdf">about 21.6%</a> of those aged between seven and 14 – attend school in Tanzania while working part time. They usually sell groundnuts, cashews, fruit and other snacks at public beaches, bus stations and along highways, especially during the peak evening hours. </p>
<p>This is not necessarily a bad thing: research <a href="https://theconversation.com/global-standards-miss-the-nuance-in-local-child-labour-41367">has suggested</a> that more flexible school systems can support children who must work to assist their families.</p>
<p>But, as I pointed out earlier, around three million Tanzanian children simply don’t go to school at all during the crucial primary school years. They work full-time, doing gruelling jobs as <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2013/08/28/tanzania-hazardous-life-child-gold-miners">miners</a> or domestic workers. </p>
<p>Since they never attend schools, many of these children remain illiterate into adulthood. They are very unlikely ever to become functioning members of the formal economy, which means the country is denied some the human capital it requires to grow.</p>
<p>These working children also suffer emotionally, separated from their families and – as research from around the world has proved repeatedly – <a href="https://thectrp.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/ht_impact_on_children_41081.pdf">deeply traumatised</a> by their experiences. </p>
<h2>Support is needed</h2>
<p>There are several ways in which the government could start to improve the lot of Tanzania’s children. </p>
<p>The first is financial. Government should provide subsidies to pupils to cater for indirect or hidden costs such as uniforms, textbooks, sanitary towels for girls and transport. This could help to mitigate against absenteeism and drop-outs, especially for children from poor families. Money could also be redirected to build hostels within school compounds so that children don’t have to travel long distances each day.</p>
<p>There is also a need for the government, through schools, to sensitise Tanzanian families to the importance of education. So that people start to understand how one child’s education can improve their own lives, their families prospects and even, in the long run, the country’s economy. </p>
<p>Finally, the government can’t just give up on those children who already seem lost to the system. There must be systems in place to help them integrate into schools and continue – or start – their education.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/56686/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Simon Ngalomba does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Child labour in Tanzania is driven largely by poverty. More must be done to keep children in school so their skills aren’t lost to the economy in the long run.Simon Ngalomba, Lecturer in Educational Foundations, Management and Life Long Learning, University of Dar es SalaamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/534642016-03-22T13:21:32Z2016-03-22T13:21:32ZWhy child trafficking spikes after natural disasters – and what we can do about it<p>When a <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/topical-events/nepal-earthquake-april-2015">7.8 magnitude earthquake</a> struck Nepal in April 2015, it killed well over 8,000 people and turned much of the country into a disaster zone. 17 days later, as recovery operations were getting established, a <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/12/nepal-hit-by-second-huge-earthquake">7.3 magnitude quake</a> caused further destruction.</p>
<p>In the desolation, chaos and widespread panic that followed, a surge in child trafficking was almost inevitable, just as it was after the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/jan/05/tsunami2004.internationalaidanddevelopment">2004 tsunami in southern Asia</a>, the <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/americas/01/27/haiti.earthquake.orphans/">2010 earthquake in Haiti</a>, the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2011/nov/02/trafficking-on-rise-horn-africa">2011 drought in the Horn of Africa</a>, the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/20/typhoon-haiyan-children-vulnerable-unicef">2013 typhoon in the Philippines</a>, and many other natural disasters besides.</p>
<p>So why do these disasters make children so vulnerable to trafficking – and what can be done about it?</p>
<p>UNICEF <a href="http://www.unicef.org/protection/Textbook_1.pdf">defines child trafficking</a> as “the act of recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of a child for the purpose of exploitation either within or outside a country”. The exploitation of trafficked children can take many forms, including forced prostitution, labour, marriage, militia service and domestic servitude, but it nearly always means dirty and dangerous work for little or no pay. Sexual abuse and enforcement through threat and violence often feature, too. According to the <a href="https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/global-report-on-trafficking-in-persons.html">UN Office on Drugs and Crime</a> (UNODC), the most common form of human trafficking (79%) is the trafficking of women and girls for sexual exploitation. </p>
<p>It’s difficult to get accurate and current statistics on trafficking because generally only those survivors who are identified and rescued can be counted, and there is no single monitoring organisation. In 2001, the International Labour Organisation estimated that worldwide there are some <a href="http://www.antislavery.org/english/slavery_today/trafficking/">2.5m people</a> who have been trafficked. The <a href="https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/global-report-on-trafficking-in-persons.html">UNODC</a> suggests that an average 20% of these are children, with a much higher fraction in many developing countries and regions. </p>
<h2>Poverty plus disaster</h2>
<p>In Nepal, as in other developing countries, birth registration is poorly enforced, making children difficult or impossible to track in any system. People living with poverty are especially vulnerable to the false promise of a better future, and in an economy that depends heavily on dividends from migrating workers, desperation can lead people to consider risky opportunities. </p>
<p>Families are often enticed by the offer of well-paid work for their child in another region or country. They may even be given an advance against the child’s anticipated earnings, and trafficked children hope to improve their lives and send money back to their families. But when they arrive at their destination, they find that the situation is very different.</p>
<p>In most poor societies, it’s the girls who are more readily taken out of school (or never sent in the first place). Parents may believe that education is wasted on a girl whose destiny is to marry and leave home. That leaves them open to persuasion that the opportunity to go away and gain “life experience” is in their daughter’s best interests. Girls – especially those with disabilities or from ethnic minorities or certain castes – are therefore particularly vulnerable to exploitation and abuse.</p>
<p>A <a href="http://www.ilo.org/public/english//region/asro/bangkok/library/download/ticsa4.pdf">2001 estimate</a> suggested that 12,000 girls are trafficked from Nepal to India annually for prostitution, a horror highlighted in the book and movie <a href="http://www.soldthemovie.com">Sold</a>. But this number took no account of any other trafficking from or within Nepal – <a href="http://www.taughtnottrafficked.com">current estimates</a> put the annual total at around 20,000.</p>
<h2>Vulnerability amplified</h2>
<p>It’s easy to see how a natural disaster can amplify the conditions that enable and attract traffickers. The immediate disruption of state and civil society institutions, particularly schools, means the usual child protection systems aren’t in place. Regulatory mechanisms and border controls are also in chaos. </p>
<p>Under the cover of rescue efforts, traffickers (often women) can pose as religious leaders, relief workers or representatives of government-accredited employment agencies promising jobs. Sometimes these tricks are mere opportunism, but sometimes they are the well-organised work of national and transnational criminal groups. </p>
<p>The people they exploit are extremely vulnerable. With family breadwinners killed or injured, land and livelihoods destroyed and food and shelter hard to come by, people are more inclined than ever to take desperate actions. </p>
<p>Children separated from their families may be believed missing or dead. The assumption, genuine or otherwise, that a child is an orphan makes them especially vulnerable. Sadly, some families even send their children to orphanages because they can’t afford to care for them. These “orphans” may be trafficked directly or otherwise subjected to <a href="https://theconversation.com/earthquake-orphans-what-nepal-can-learn-from-haiti-41165">illegal adoption</a>, sold to well-intentioned families from richer nations. </p>
<p>The following <a href="http://kathmandupost.ekantipur.com/news/2016-01-27/many-dolakha-children-missing-after-earthquake.html">story from Nepal is typical</a> and tells of seven children who have disappeared from a small village. Their parents believed they were sending them to a Buddhist monastery in India:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“We had to lie to police so that my son could leave the village with the Lamas,” said a parent of one of the children. “We are happy because the Lamas had promised to educate my son and send him home after three years.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Since their departure shortly after the earthquakes, none of the children have been heard from and their location remains unknown.</p>
<h2>What can be done?</h2>
<p>Less than two months after the Nepal quakes, <a href="http://www.unicef.org/media/media_82328.html">UNICEF reported</a> that 245 children had been intercepted and saved from trafficking. That number has shocking implications for how many might not have been so lucky. Dr Tshering Lama of <a href="http://www.childreachnp.org">ChildReach Nepal</a> recently estimated that “hundreds if not thousands of children will have been trafficked as a direct result of conditions caused by the earthquakes”.</p>
<p>In the direct aftermath, UNICEF worked in collaboration with the Nepali government on a range of responsive and preventative measures, and with civil society and a number of national and international NGOs to <a href="https://theconversation.com/getting-children-back-to-school-is-the-next-priority-for-nepal-earthquake-recovery-42131">prioritise getting children back into school</a> as quickly as possible.</p>
<p>A fundamental strategy to prevent child trafficking in Nepal is to keep children in schools, protecting their right to education and a safe environment. Campaigns such as <a href="http://www.taughtnottrafficked.com">Taught Not Trafficked</a>, working in partnership with survivors’ group <a href="http://shaktisamuha.org.np/about-us/introduction/">Shakti Samuha</a>, promote crucial awareness and have been providing education, shelter, legal aid, vocational training and counselling before, during and after the quakes. </p>
<p>But more than that, it’s essential that child trafficking everywhere is not treated as a symptom of natural disasters. It must be recognised as a scourge that requires co-ordinated international action, including advocacy and awareness integrated across all programmes that work with vulnerable children and their families and communities. In this way, agencies will be prepared to respond quickly and effectively when – not if – the next disaster strikes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53464/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anna Childs does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The destruction wrought by two earthquakes in Nepal opened up a major opportunity for child traffickers.Anna Childs, Academic Director for International Development, The Open UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/534772016-01-22T15:54:36Z2016-01-22T15:54:36ZReal and Atletico Madrid transfer bans won’t halt trafficking of young players in football<p>Two of Spain’s biggest football clubs, Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/35313998">will be banned</a> from registering players for the next two transfer windows after breaching rules that regulate the transfer of under-18s. While such punishment is a welcome sign that FIFA takes the welfare of children seriously, its current scattergun approach to punishing clubs who transgress the rules is clearly not working.</p>
<p>The two Spanish clubs are accused of breaching a <a href="http://www.fpf.pt/Portals/0/Documentos/Centro%20Documentacao/FIFA/regulationsonthestatusandtransferofplayersapril2015e_neutral.pdf">FIFA regulation</a> that prohibits the international transfer of players under the age of 18. There are some exceptions, including that transfers between two clubs in Europe can take place from the age of 16, and when a young player’s parents move to the country in which the club is based for reasons unrelated to football. </p>
<p>Following investigations by FIFA, football’s governing body said it <a href="http://www.fifa.com/governance/news/y=2016/m=1/news=atletico-de-madrid-and-real-madrid-sanctioned-for-international-transf-2755486.html">had found</a> irregularities in the registration of underage players fielded by Real and Atletico, and imposed the transfer bans for all players as well as fines. Both clubs plan to appeal the sanctions. </p>
<p>When FIFA handed down a similar ban to FC Barcelona in 2014, it <a href="http://www.fifa.com/governance/news/y=2014/m=4/news=spanish-barcelona-sanctioned-for-international-transfers-minors-2313003.html">was clear</a> that it viewed the moving of a child across an international border for the purposes of playing the game to be contrary to the child’s best interests. </p>
<p>Clubs that uncover the next superstar from abroad and secure their services for minimal cost have a lot to gain both commercially and in sporting success. But transfers can have a potentially damaging impact on a child’s well-being, development and enjoyment of family life. </p>
<p>In 2009, the then-UEFA president, Michel Platini, <a href="http://www.uefa.org/about-uefa/president/news/newsid=801478.html">described</a> the uprooting of a child from their home country and paying them to play football in Europe as a form of child trafficking. But many within football (including <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/wenger-dismisses-platini-transfer-plan-1785287.html">Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger</a>) were vociferous in their defence of the child welfare practices of major European football clubs. </p>
<h2>Opportunity cost</h2>
<p>It is true that the academies of clubs such as Barcelona, Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid (as well as many within the UK) have excellent reputations for nurturing their players. They <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/27/sports/soccer/la-masia-a-model-for-cultivating-soccer-players.html?_r=3&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1415819298-BQRgetw0iHsNOy/yVEnmMw&">place a high value</a> on educational opportunity and personal development, as well as offering elite football training. </p>
<p>But FIFA does not see providing a young player with the bells and whistles experience of an elite football academy as a defence to a violation of its regulations. This defence was unsuccessfully <a href="http://www.fcbarcelona.com/club/detail/article/official-statement-from-fc-barcelona-on-the-sanction-imposed-by-fifa-s-disciplinary-commission">argued by Barcelona</a> in its challenge to the 2014 sanction.</p>
<p>There is also a murky side to the recruitment of young footballers from abroad. <a href="http://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/the-lost-boys-9781472914958/">Significant evidence</a> exists of “trafficking” networks operating in developing regions of the world, exploiting the dreams of young boys from very poor backgrounds to become professional footballers. <a href="http://ec.europa.eu/sport/library/documents/study_on_sports_agents_in_the_eu_en.pdf">Rogue agents</a> promise trials at major European clubs for a fee paid by the player’s family, which often never materialises. </p>
<p>Players who do travel to Europe, often on false documents, have found themselves <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/15296412">abandoned</a> following an unsuccessful or nonexistent trial, with no formal immigration status and no way of returning home. Last year, the International Centre for Sports Security <a href="http://s.telegraph.co.uk/graphics/projects/football-the-dark-side-of-transfers/index.html">told The Telegraph</a> it has heard estimates that there are up to 15,000 trafficked players in Europe. </p>
<h2>Are outright bans the answer?</h2>
<p>The bans imposed on Atletico and Real – for the two transfer windows in July-August 2016 and January 2017 – seem to be a concerted effort by FIFA to target transgressions by major European clubs. Up until relatively recently, cases had focused on smaller clubs. The Danish club, FC Midtjylland, <a href="http://jurisprudence.tas-cas.org/sites/CaseLaw/Shared%20Documents/1485.pdf">complained</a> to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in 2009 that it was being made a scapegoat for practices in relation to young foreign players that were known to be deployed by Europe’s elite clubs. </p>
<p>But we cannot assume that an outright prohibition on the international recruitment of young players is the most effective way of protecting the welfare of child footballers. The ban on under-age transfers has been in place since 2002, yet a buoyant international trade in young footballers still exists. So questions remain about how effective it is. </p>
<p>The potential benefits of a successful career in football for a child from a developing region of the world whose educational and professional opportunities are limited should not be forgotten. There is a fine balance to be struck between protecting a child’s welfare, and denying them the opportunity to train at an elite football academy. This could give them the chance of enjoying a highly lucrative career playing a sport they love – and bring positive effects on their health and educational opportunities. </p>
<p>Instead of imposing an outright ban on international transfers of minors, FIFA’s efforts might well be better targeted at what happens when they do take place. Regulations should ensure that transfers happen with the maximum regard for the child’s right to access education and the highest possible standards of healthcare, and to maintain close contact with their parents. Alongside robust sanctions against rogue agents who effectively operate as people traffickers, this approach might well prove a more effective tool in safeguarding the welfare of young players.</p>
<p>A new approach is needed: the current sanctioning of European clubs for violations of FIFA’s regulations has not proven to be an effective way of addressing the more insidious side of the recruitment of young foreign players.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/53477/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Eleanor Drywood does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Prohibiting the transfer of under-18s hasn’t stopped it happening. Football needs a new approach.Eleanor Drywood, Senior Lecturer, Liverpool Law School, University of LiverpoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/520162015-12-11T10:54:48Z2015-12-11T10:54:48ZWhat the next FIFA president could do to tackle child trafficking in football<p>South African mining tycoon Tokyo Sexwale <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/oct/27/tokyo-sexwale-confirms-fifa-candidacy-president">announced</a> his candidacy to be the next president of FIFA <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/oct/27/tokyo-sexwale-confirms-fifa-candidacy-president">and declared</a> that “football is not broken … it is heartbroken”.</p>
<p>While much of the former apartheid-era political prisoner’s <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-34868723">11-point manifesto</a> seems predictable, he is the only one of the <a href="http://www.fifa.com/about-fifa/news/y=2015/m=11/news=ad-hoc-electoral-committee-admits-five-candidates-for-fifa-presidentia-2732125.html?intcmp=fifacom_hp_module_news">five eligible candidates</a> running in FIFA’s February election who has pledged to tackle what he terms the “crass exploitation” and “abhorrent child trafficking practices” that are rife within world football. In a rallying cry to protect the “future stars of the game”, Sexwale has vowed that “zero tolerance” will be shown to those who have violated the rights, hopes and dreams of youth footballers across the world.</p>
<p>His plans to tackle what has been called <a href="http://www.skysports.com/football/news/20438/7620180/footballs-slave-trade">football’s “slave trade”</a> are commendable, but a number of questions remain on how to achieve this.</p>
<p>Since the turn of the millennium, a chain of <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-33595804">headline reports</a> by media networks, <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/beyondslavery/james-esson/modern-slavery-child-trafficking-and-rise-of-west-african-football-academi">human rights activists</a>, and <a href="http://www.academia.edu/11140286/Displacing_childhood_labour_exploitation_and_child_trafficking_in_sport">academics</a> have painted a bleak picture of football’s exploitative underbelly. They have documented rogue agents extorting cash payments for European odysseys that never transpire and crooked coaches enticing talented young recruits out of school. “Illegal” academies have also been uncovered that are converting raw adolescent talent into richly valuable capital assets. The trafficking of teens abandoned on route to foreign countries, with others left homeless at the endpoint of their journey also has been exposed. Former Watford footballer Al Bangura <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34849619">has spoken</a> of how he was brought to the UK from Sierra Leone as a child with the hope of a football contract but which turned out to be a trick to force him into male prostitution. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105061/original/image-20151209-15549-3db2wt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105061/original/image-20151209-15549-3db2wt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=774&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105061/original/image-20151209-15549-3db2wt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=774&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105061/original/image-20151209-15549-3db2wt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=774&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105061/original/image-20151209-15549-3db2wt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=972&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105061/original/image-20151209-15549-3db2wt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=972&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105061/original/image-20151209-15549-3db2wt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=972&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">South African Tokyo Sexwale is standing for FIFA president of FIFA.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters</span></span>
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<p><a href="http://www.fifa.com/sustainability/news/y=2008/m=10/news=culture-foot-solidaire-protecting-youth-920094.html">Culture Foot Solidaire</a>, an NGO in Paris which seeks to raise awareness of the issue, <a href="http://www.playthegame.org/news/news-articles/2007/prevention-programme-proposed-to-stop-football-trafficking/">estimated in 2007</a> that there were over 7,000 young Africans living in France alone after failing to get signed by a club, while an <a href="http://www.skysports.com/football/news/20438/7620180/footballs-slave-trade">undercover report</a> by Sky Sports News in 2012 concluded that more than 20,000 youth footballers have been trafficked into Europe in recent decades.</p>
<h2>The law needs more teeth</h2>
<p>Yet, despite such forceful criticism, there remains a lack of legal precedent for the successful prosecution of trafficking violations in football, and those legal challenges that have emerged have fallen flat. </p>
<p>Particularly insightful was <a href="http://www.playthegame.org/upload/Magazine%202005/themanwhotraced442slaves.pdf">the complex legal case</a> brought by Belgian senator, Jean-Marie Dedecker in 2001. His <a href="http://www.playthegame.org/news/news-articles/2005/footballs-trafficking-in-third-world-athletes/">extensive investigations</a> into the exploitation of Nigerian youth footballers in Belgium failed to yield a single prosecution under the <a href="https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/what-is-human-trafficking.html">UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons</a>. </p>
<p>Should Sexwale be successful in the race for the FIFA presidency, any attempt to make good on his promise must begin with the establishment of an international working group on the subject. This could be tasked with fostering dialogue and co-operation between law enforcement agencies, national governing bodies, clubs, agents and <a href="http://www.fifpro.org/en/">Fifpro</a>, the professional players’ union.</p>
<h2>Deregulation is not helping</h2>
<p>The global landscape of the game has changed irrevocably in the past two decades, as money and the media have fuelled the growth of highly lucrative football economies across Western Europe. Clubs morphed into transnational corporations, agents emerged as the game’s influential gatekeepers, and academies mushroomed as the search for talent – scratch that, cheaper talent – rapidly expanded across South America, West Africa and beyond.</p>
<p>Never has it been more urgent, then, for FIFA to safeguard the welfare of youth footballers through robust governance and the redistribution of its revenue streams towards the global monitoring of its <a href="http://www.fpf.pt/Portals/0/Documentos/Centro%20Documentacao/FIFA/regulationsonthestatusandtransferofplayersapril2015e_neutral.pdf">regulations on the status and transferal of players</a>. Yet the reality couldn’t be further removed, with FIFA’s passive and weak leadership encapsulated by its <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/mar/31/football-agents-fifa-reforms">decision to deregulate the agent industry</a> in April 2015. At the same time, the <a href="http://www.fifa.com/about-fifa/committees/committee=1882032/index.html">Player Status Committee</a>, which monitors the status and transfers of players, has largely failed to stem the routine infringements that have gone without prosecution at all levels of the game. </p>
<p>Turning the tide of football’s deregulation will demand a systemic shift in FIFA’s priorities. A judicious starting point for the next president might be the redeployment of a greater portion of football’s <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/news-and-comment/what-is-fifa-how-much-is-it-worth-and-who-votes-for-the-president-10281482.html">astronomic wealth</a> towards the fight to safeguard its future integrity.</p>
<h2>Migrants with dreams of football stardom</h2>
<p>Images of haphazardly-built boats packed with human cargo, perilous sea journeys <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/migrant-crisis">over the Mediterranean</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/fences-in-calais-protect-ministers-not-refugees-46366">young men ensnared</a> at the summit of Europe’s razorwire fences have become emblematic of a contemporary “migrant crisis”. Football, and its exploitative forms of entrepreneurial opportunism, are also linked to this broader crisis. </p>
<p>In fact, in the context of West Africa, the <a href="https://darraghmcgee.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/entering-the-field-child-trafficking-in-football/">powerful allure</a> of football as a vehicle of migration can only be understood against the dire predicament of a young people who find themselves unable to procure the basic means to work, wage and wedlock, and willing to risk life and limb in the search for more prosperous futures. </p>
<p>Education programmes and awareness campaigns on the risks of football migration might well be a fruitful starting point for FIFA’s next president. Still, the creation and execution of a long-term strategic blueprint to tackle the issue of child trafficking hinges not just on the ethical reform of FIFA, but on the need to recover some modicum of social justice and accountability in a football industry now <a href="http://basijcssc.ir/sites/default/files/Ethics,%20Money%20and%20Sport-%20This%20sporting%20Mammon.pdf">dominated by a wealthy elite</a> at the top of the game.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52016/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Darragh McGee does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Tokyo Sexwale, one of the candidates for football’s top job, has pledged to end what has been called ‘football’s slave trade’.Darragh McGee, Lecturer, University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/421082015-05-25T01:28:53Z2015-05-25T01:28:53ZYour child is missing. Would you want their adoption to be easier?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/82659/original/image-20150522-12512-1l7iadh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'Millions of children in overseas orphanages ... would dearly love to have parents', claims Tony Abbott, and his government is making intercountry adoption easier.
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.intercountryadoption.gov.au/">Screenshot/Intercountry Adoption Australia</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Imagine for one moment your child went missing. It’s a common enough event worldwide for today, May 25, to be declared <a href="http://www.missingpersons.gov.au/awareness/campaigns/youthchildrens-day">International Missing Children’s Day</a>. Surely you would expect no stone to be left unturned to find your child - even if took six months, a year, or two. </p>
<p>But how would you feel if your child was permanently given to someone else before this happened? This is exactly what happens to many families around the world. Parents are targeted by recruiters and children are bought or <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/china/archive/2013/07/kidnapped-and-sold-inside-the-dark-world-of-child-trafficking-in-china/278107/">stolen and sold</a>. Other children are lost, separated by war or disaster, or left for temporary safekeeping in children’s homes.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Some intercountry adoptions involve children stolen from their parents.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Pushing adoption of ‘millions of orphans’</h2>
<p>Last week, Prime Minister Tony Abbott <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/new-agency-to-guide-parents-who-want-to-adopt-children-from-overseas-20150516-gh34d8.html">launched a new government agency and website</a> promoting intercountry adoption, and repeated <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-business-of-orphanages-where-do-orphans-come-from-38485">the dubious claim</a> that “there are millions of children in overseas orphanages who would dearly love to have parents”. It’s part of a multi-million-dollar <a href="http://www.intercountryadoption.gov.au/">service for prospective and adoptive parents</a> intended to speed up adoptions of children from overseas. </p>
<p>The website rehashes what prospective and adoptive parents already know through state and federal departments. There is no information for adult intercountry adoptees, no additional post-adoption support, no research publications – apart from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare <a href="http://www.aihw.gov.au/adoptions/">yearly reports</a> – and no information about who is staffing this call centre. All in all, it’s a costly exercise for not much return. </p>
<p>The same pressures we see operating in Australia are <a href="http://www.brandeis.edu/investigate/adoption/">more intense at the international level</a>. For <a href="http://aaf.sagepub.com/content/24/2/45.short?rss=1&ssource=mfc">over 60 years</a> the focus of many national governments and adoption agencies has not been on re-uniting children with their families. Instead the aim has been to adopt children as quickly as possible.</p>
<p>Over the years many cases have shown that even when families do find their children they are not returned once separation is made permanent through adoption. These cases become more complicated, adversarial and unresolvable the older children become.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The case of an Indian family whose daughter was kidnapped for adoption is not an isolated one.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>‘Quick and easy’ runs counter to proper process</h2>
<p>The <a href="http://www.hcch.net/upload/outline33e.pdf">subsidiarity principle</a> outlined in the <a href="http://www.hcch.net/index_en.php?act=text.display&tid=45">Hague Convention provisions on adoption</a> requires governments to consider in-country solutions first. This is one of the issues scheduled for discussion at the <a href="http://www.hcch.net/index_en.php?act=progress.listing&cat=8">Special Commission meeting</a> of the Permanent Bureau of the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH) in June 2015. </p>
<p>According to the <a href="http://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx">Convention on the Rights of the Child</a> and the subsidiarity principle in the Hague Convention on intercountry adoption, children have a right to be raised by their families, families are entitled to support, and suitable <a href="http://www.unicef.org/protection/alternative_care_Guidelines-English.pdf">in-country alternative care must be provided</a>. </p>
<p>Where intercountry adoption is an option, re-unification is usually not extensively pursued if at all. Not finding the child’s family, or failing to provide families with support, turns on the green light for adoptions to proceed. Children become “abandoned” or <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-business-of-orphanages-where-do-orphans-come-from-38485">“orphans” on paper</a> for this purpose.</p>
<p>For many, the convention on adoption is interpreted as a means to make adoption happen quickly. Thus, if re-unification with family members takes too long, adoption can be considered (see chapter six of the Hague Convention <a href="http://www.hcch.net/upload/adoguide_e.pdf">Guide to Good Practice</a>). </p>
<p>Few resources are committed to a child’s right to their family and culture. A child’s right to their family is often <a href="https://www.brandeis.edu/investigate/adoption/bgop-ed.html">over-ridden by a Western view</a> of what “family” means and a sense of urgency for permanency through adoption. Intercountry adoption in the “best interests” of children is well resourced. </p>
<p>This presents complex questions as children should have stability, but there are other ways of providing good care and stability until the need for adoption is properly determined. The mantra of “children looking for a permanent family” is often used in adoption circles to justify adoption, but at what point does “permanent family” no longer mean their own family? It is important that children are not legally separated from their families and countries until all avenues, including family assistance, are legitimately exhausted.</p>
<p>The risk is that influential parties who support speedier and easier adoptions will use the Hague meeting in June to push for time frames that will effectively extinguish re-unification possibilities and legitimise unnecessarily speedy processes.</p>
<p>Searching and re-unification are time-consuming and resource-intensive. But these processes are not impossible and are undertaken by some international and smaller organisations. An Australian adoptee was even able to find his own family in India using Google Earth.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">One adoptee in Australia tracked down his own family in India using Google Earth.</span></figcaption>
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<p>A problem arises when the agency tasked with finding a child’s family is often the same one facilitating adoptions. Some seem to believe that there is nothing wrong with an open market in children where children move seamlessly across borders in both directions much like goods and services in global economies and trade agreements. Others have a commitment to safeguarding children’s rights and the rights of families affected by adoption who do not have a voice, and are concerned about the long-term effects on everyone when adoptions are not conducted well.</p>
<p>Adoption as the permanency solution appears to have taken on a religious fervour to the exclusion of all else. But one size never fits all.</p>
<h2>Focus must be on original family first</h2>
<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_adoption">Open adoptions</a> will also be under discussion at the Hague as a means of offering a remedial response to the separation of families. Where adoption does occur, open adoption is important.</p>
<p>However, the realities of intercountry adoption may mean this is just an aspiration – assuming the definition refers to open and continuing relationships between the children, their families and adoptive families. Because there are no enforcements for adoptive parents to continue such costly and emotionally difficult arrangements, it is likely to remain aspirational. </p>
<p>A small number of adoptive parents most certainly do establish and maintain contact, especially in those cases where they have discovered corruption or child trafficking. These adoptive parents have gone out of their way to find the child’s family, placing the child’s needs first.</p>
<p>It would be a sad day if discussions about the subsidiarity principle resulted in setting time frames to speed up intercountry adoptions, instead of redirecting resources to re-unification, family sustainability and appropriate in-country care before adoption is considered. A proper process benefits everyone. </p>
<p>So what should “proper process” mean? I suppose it comes down to what you would expect if it was your child who was missing.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/42108/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Patricia Fronek does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Most of the world’s ‘orphans’ are not orphans at all and many are caught up in a global trade in meeting demand for adoption. Making intercountry adoption easier adds to the risks for these children.Patricia Fronek, Senior Lecturer, School of Human Services and Social Work, Griffith UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/367632015-01-28T19:22:08Z2015-01-28T19:22:08ZShopping for children: Australian adoption market puts them at risk<p>On Sunday, January 25, Prime Minister Tony Abbott released a little more detail about his <a href="http://www.pm.gov.au/media/2015-01-25/intercountry-adoption-support-service-help-families">plans for adoption</a> in Australia. Although specifics are still pretty thin on the ground, the announcement makes <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Legal_and_Constitutional_Affairs/Intercountry_Adoption_Bill/Submissions">the concerns</a> that I and others raised previously very real.</p>
<p>Since coming to power, Abbott has turned to lobbyists for his information on adoption and what should be done. He ignores the advice of skilled practitioners, respected Australian adoption researchers and organisations such as International Social Services (<a href="http://www.iss.org.au/">ISS</a>) and <a href="http://www.unicef.org.au/">UNICEF</a>.</p>
<p>From the beginning, the approach to adoption has been clouded in secrecy and bias towards the <a href="http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2015/01/25/deborra-lee-furness-commends-new-agency">wants of lobbyists</a>, ignoring important stakeholders like adoptees for whose benefit adoption should be all about. The best interests of children are paramount, according to the <a href="http://www.hcch.net/index_en.php?act=conventions.listing">UN conventions</a> to which Australia is party. </p>
<p>There are several very worrying elements of this latest announcement.</p>
<h2>Advocacy ‘shop’ ignores conflicts of interest</h2>
<p>The first is the language Abbott uses. From the beginning Abbott has used the language of adoption as a service for adopters, not children. More concerning is the use of the word “shop” when he promises to:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… make it simpler to adopt children from overseas.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Words are important. “Shop” paints a picture of commercial transactions and places the emphasis on children as a commodity, which is distressing and offensive to many in the Australian adoption community, especially to adoptees. “One-stop shop” might be government lingo but its use shows a deep lack of understanding on the part of the government about adoption issues and the impact of these policies.</p>
<p>Second, Abbott has not named the agency that will be running this new “shop” and whose role will be to advocate for the needs of prospective adopters, not children. He <a href="http://www.pm.gov.au/media/2015-01-25/intercountry-adoption-support-service-help-families">said</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Prospective parents have told me they simply don’t have anyone advocating for them. Now there will be someone to guide them and support them.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Speculation is rife about lobbyist-led agencies and the potential for <a href="http://www.law.uq.edu.au/ht-child-trafficking#childinter">profit-driven trafficking</a> in finding children for Australian families under these arrangements. The speculation is fuelled by leaks from lobbyists who have access to privileged information and by the replication of the words of lobbyists in government media releases. Intercountry adoption has already been handed over in principle in New South Wales with the <a href="http://www.kidsguardian.nsw.gov.au/adoption/accredited-agencies">accreditation</a> of an adoption-driven lobby group announced via their online groups.</p>
<p>On Wednesday, the Attorney-General’s Department <a href="http://www.ag.gov.au/USASPinvitation">invited US adoption agencies</a> to work with Australia.</p>
<p>Third, “trained staff will advocate on [adopting parents’] behalf”. There is no mention of the role of qualified professionals in this new “shop”. Any de-professionalisation of services that should be for children, combined with deregulation and blatant disregard for safeguards, is not in the best interests of children in Australia or overseas and has the potential to cause harm.</p>
<p>Abbott is handing over communications with prospective parents and the new role of advocating on their behalf for quicker adoptions with overseas countries to one agency. This is a <a href="http://www.ndtv.com/article/world/australia-simplifies-overseas-child-adoption-653369?site=full">simplification</a> of the adoption process that ignores conflicts of interest and other ethical concerns, establishes prospective parents as customers and risks placing pressure on agencies in sending countries.</p>
<h2>New policy based on myths</h2>
<p>Unfortunately, I was unable to accept the invitation to go to a <a href="http://www.iss.nl/research/conferences_and_seminars/periodic_conferences_debates_and_seminars/international_forum_on_intercountry_adoption_global_surrogacy/">scholarly meeting</a> on intercountry adoption that brought together international researchers in The Hague late last year. The reports from this forum are <a href="http://www.iss.nl/news_events/iss_news/detail/article/69824-wps-596-601-papers-of-the-international-forum-on-intercountry-adoption-and-global-surrogacy/">now available</a>.</p>
<p>These expert reports clearly dispel the adoption myths that there are millions of children available for adoption and who want parents. Abbott insists on perpetuating these myths when he claims:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>There are millions of children in overseas orphanages who would dearly love to have parents. </p>
</blockquote>
<p><a href="http://repub.eur.nl/pub/77406">One report</a> paints a real picture of the families who do exist and lose their children to adoption. <a href="http://repub.eur.nl/pub/77404">Another report</a> stresses that under no circumstances should private or independent adoptions such as those favoured by high-profile lobbyists take place, no adoptions should occur after disaster and the demand from Western commentators for more children is a problem.</p>
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<p>Finally, despite assurances that changes to Australian immigration laws would relate to only a limited number of countries, the list <a href="http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/abbotts-plan-to-overhaul-adoption-laws/story-fni0cx12-1227195694112?nk=a0155642e39d72df592d84e12a0c505d">has expanded</a> to the United States, Poland, Vietnam, Latvia, Kenya, Bulgaria and <a href="http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/adoption-revamp-offing-oz-report">Cambodia</a>. Australia has effectively handed over responsibility to ensure ethical adoptions to these countries. Once again there has been little real consultation or engagement within Australia except with pro-adoption lobbyists. </p>
<p>I hope Australia will not join the ranks of <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/national/evidence-of-trafficking-of-indian-children-for-illegal-adoption-emerges-20140124-31e84.html">those countries</a> whose adoption stories are overwhelmingly negative. It is children, their families and their adoptive parents who ultimately experience the fallout when human rights and international conventions are ignored, <a href="http://www.humantrafficking.org/uploads/publications/child_laundering_270407.pdf">documented concerns</a> are ignored and policies are rushed to please those with the loudest voices.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/36763/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Patricia Fronek does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>On Sunday, January 25, Prime Minister Tony Abbott released a little more detail about his plans for adoption in Australia. Although specifics are still pretty thin on the ground, the announcement makes…Patricia Fronek, Senior Lecturer, School of Human Services and Social Work, Griffith UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.