Policy paper

Response to the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration’s report on work to identify, investigate, disrupt and prosecute perpetrators of modern slavery and human trafficking

Published 4 March 2021

This was published under the 2019 to 2022 Johnson Conservative government

The Home Office thanks the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration (ICIBI) for his report.

The report examined the work being done by Border Force, Immigration Enforcement and UK Visas & Immigration to identify, investigate, disrupt and prosecute the perpetrators of modern slavery and human trafficking (MSHT). We are grateful for the ICIBI’s engagement with staff in the areas inspected, and for setting out the recommendations in his report.

We remain committed to protecting the vulnerable and are pleased the report identifies that there has been success in focusing frontline staff on the identification of victims and referring them to the National Referral Mechanism (NRM), with the Border, Immigration and Citizenship System (BICS) referring 43% of the 2019 total.

More broadly the UK has a strong reputation internationally in addressing modern slavery referrals; year on year there has been a rise in referrals from all frontline responders into the NRM, from 6,986 in 2018 to 10,627 in 2019, with 90% of decisions in 2019 receiving a positive reasonable grounds decision.

We acknowledge there is more to do in tackling the criminals who perpetrate, enable and exploit vulnerable victims of MSHT, and work is already underway to strengthen the BICS response to this, working in collaboration with the Serious & Organised Crime Group.

The Home Office accepts the ICIBI’s recommendations one and two, and partially accepts recommendations three and four, the latter also featuring within the published inspection report and government response to in-country clandestine arrivals (‘lorry drops’) and to irregular migrants arriving via ‘small boats’.

The Home Office will begin implementing a new structure which will affect the parts of the Department mentioned here in 2021/22. The accepted recommendations will be taken forward and implemented within this new structure, with clear owners established for each action.

Response to Recommendations

The Home Office should:

Recommendation 1

1.1 Review the roles and responsibilities of Border Force, Immigration Enforcement and UK Visas and Immigration business areas and functions in relation to each strand (the “4 Ps”) of ‘Modern Slavery Strategy’. The review should be led by the Director General Serious Organised Crime Group (SOCG) and the Modern Slavery Unit (MSU), and the results presented to the BICS Board for sign off and to the Home Office Executive Board for information, then published on Horizon and shared, as appropriate, with partner agencies.

1.2 Accepted.

1.3 The Serious and Organised Crime Group will revisit the roles and responsibilities of Border Force, Immigration Enforcement UK Visas & Immigration, and the National Crime Agency in relation to delivering the Government’s overall objectives on tackling modern slavery. BICS representatives will be involved in this review. Findings will be shared with the BICS Board and Home Office ExCo, before being shared with partner agencies and communicated as appropriate.

Recommendation 2

2.1 In support of the updated statement of ‘Modern Slavery Strategy’ roles and responsibilities across BICS;

a. produce BICS-specific guidance in relation to the identification, reporting and pursuit of perpetrators of modern slavery and human trafficking (MSHT) that complements ‘Modern Slavery Act 2015 – Statutory Guidance for England and Wales’, revising forms, work and information flows, points of contact, advice and expertise, etc. as necessary.

b. Conduct a skills gap analysis to identify where business areas and staff are not equipped to fulfil the MSHT ‘Pursue’ roles and responsibilities assigned to them and produce an improvement plan, incorporating a training plan, to bring them up to speed as quickly as possible.

2.2 Accepted.

2.3 The Home Office accepts there is more to do to in identifying, reporting and convicting perpetrators of MSHT and we are working closely with operational partners and the CPS to increase prosecutions. Underpinning this will be clear guidance, forms, information flows and training for staff to enhance capability.

2.4 We will develop BICS specific guidance in respect of identifying and referring perpetrators. A skills-gap analysis, and training plan will accompany this work. This guidance will draw on relevant material in the Modern Slavery Act 2015 statutory guidance which focuses on the identification and support of victims.

2.5 The Criminal & Financial Investigation (CFI) command within Immigration Enforcement leads the BICS operational response due to their prosecution capability in disrupting and prosecuting perpetrators of modern slavery and human trafficking. CFI and Immigration Intelligence Crime Development teams within Immigration Enforcement will work with Modern Slavery Unit Pursue teams, the Modern Slavery and Organised Immigration Crime Unit (MSOICU) and the National Crime Agency (NCA) to revise forms and information flows. CFI have already developed a network of modern slavery champions within each team to act as specialist lead investigators, points of contact and advice for staff and National Policing and other law enforcement agencies. Quarterly forums have now been established to identify areas of best practice.

2.6 Work is underway to bridge the specialist skills gap within CFI. All CFI modern slavery champions will have received enhanced police training from the Metropolitan Police Service by the end of 2021. All operational CFI officers receive MSHT awareness training within the Professional Investigative Pathway.

Recommendation 3

3.1 Create a cross-BICS/SOCG governance board to oversee the Home Office input to the ‘Pursue’ strand of the ‘Modern Slavery Strategy’. Membership should be at Director/Deputy Director level and the board should be accountable to Director General SOCG. Its responsibilities should include

a. agreeing a performance/delivery plan that takes full account of the priorities and taskings of the National Crime Agency Modern Slavery Threat Group (MSTG)

b. holding BICS/SOCG business areas to account for their performance

c. producing monthly performance reports for the BICS Board and “headlines” for the Home Office Executive Committee.

3.2 Partially accepted.

3.3 The Director General of the Serious and Organised Crime Group chairs the National Security Implementation Group (NSIG). In addition to this, the National Crime Agency’s (NCA) Modern Slavery Threat Group brings together law enforcement agencies on the operational response to tackle modern slavery and feeds into the NSIG, which is a route of escalation of all modern slavery issues, including reporting on modern slavery performance metrics. SOCG and BICS attend this group at Director Level. To complement this existing governance structure, a cross-BICS Modern Slavery Steering Group was established in May 2020, with operational leads from Border Force, UK Visas & Immigration, Immigration Enforcement, Modern Slavery Unit and the Single Competent Authority in attendance.

3.4 This Steering Group oversees the BICS contribution to the National Crime Agency Modern Slavery Threat Group. The Department is content that the Steering Group’s membership of Assistant Director/Deputy Directors (Grade 7 and 6) is the correct level for decision making. The BICS group have established a delivery plan that reflects the priorities and taskings of the Threat Group with actions owned by the relevant business area.

3.5 We agree more can be done to develop indicators of performance and the Steering Group will work with performance leads to develop these to become part of routinely available performance data for BICS.

Recommendation 4

4.1 ‘An inspection of the Home Office’s response to in-country clandestine arrivals (‘lorry drops’) and to irregular migrants arriving via ‘small boats’ (May 2019 – March 2020) was sent to the Home Secretary on 13 March 2020, but at the time of writing has not been published. Recommendation 1 from that report applies also to this inspection:

[The Home Office should] Carry out a fundamental review of the Borders, Immigration and Citizenship System’s criminal investigation and prosecution capabilities and capacity, looking at clandestine entry (incorporating people smuggling, trafficking and modern slavery) and other immigration-related crimes, and revisiting with the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) and the National Crime Agency, and others if appropriate, where the underlaps are at National Intelligence Model (NIM) Levels 1, 2 and 3.

4.2 Partially accepted.

4.3 The ICIBI’s report on ‘An inspection of the Home Office’s response to in-country clandestine arrivals (‘lorry drops’) and to irregular migrants arriving via ‘small boats’’ was laid before parliament and published on Gov.UK on 11 November 2020. The Department partially accepted this recommendation and published its response on GOV.UK. The Department responded:

The Home Office accepts that there is more to do to better co-ordinate the approach to organised immigration crime. Since this inspection started, there has been an independent review of Serious and Organised Crime (SOC). It was led by Sir Craig Mackey QPM, former deputy commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, with support from stakeholders and advisors from law enforcement and national security. We are considering the review’s recommendations and will provide details of the key findings in due course. Alongside this, there has been work done within the Home Office to clarify roles and responsibilities and streamline governance on organised immigration crime.

Rather than conduct an additional review at this stage, the Home Office will, therefore, take the findings of this ICIBI inspection fully into account alongside the findings of the SOC review when working with partners, including the National Crime Agency. The newly formed Illegal Migration Strategy Board and the Clandestine Threat Board are both considering the response across the borders and immigration system to the criminality behind the clandestine threat and Home Office teams will be reviewing roles and responsibilities with other partners over the course of 2020.

Longer term the Home Office’s Immigration Enforcement Directorate is undertaking an exercise to develop its future footprint and will look at any investment needed to improve capacity and capability in relation to criminal and financial investigations. We expect our response to the existing reviews to fully address the issues that led to the ICBI’s findings.