Human Trafficking in [UK] [other countries]Street Children in [UK] [other countries]Child Prostitution in [UK |
Child Prostitution The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of
Children In the
first ten years of the 21st Century -
2000 to 2009
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CAUTION: The following links and accompanying text have been culled
from the web to illuminate the situation in the ***
FEATURED ARTICLE *** UK A Hub For European Child Prostitution Britain has become a hub of a growing trade in children. They come mainly from west Africa but increasingly from eastern and central Europe too. Their final destinations are anywhere there is a demand for child prostitutes. ***
ARCHIVES *** Runaways - Where To Turn For Help Before You Are Homeless - 0800 1111 Here are the best phone numbers to
call …They are Confidential - which means they won't tell anyone about your
call unless you want them to talk to somebody for you, or you are in
danger. They are open 24 Hours - it
doesn't matter what time you call In
the UK, call 0800 1111 NSPCC
opens first UK advice line to help combat child trafficking - 0800 107 7057 The NSPCC today (8 October 2007)
launches the first advice and information line to protect children trafficked
to the UK for sexual exploitation, forced labour,
drugs transport, benefit fraud, and other crimes. The NSPCC Child Trafficking Advice and
Information Line (CTAIL) on 0800 107 7057 will help people working with
children, such as immigration officers, the police, social workers, teachers,
and health workers, to better identify and protect child victims. It will
also shed light on the scale of child trafficking in the UK. “Identifying trafficked children
can be very difficult, even for a professional working in social services or
immigration. These children are incredibly vulnerable – they might be
regularly beaten, raped, denied food and basic comforts, and have no access to
healthcare or an education. Trafficked
children have often lost their trust in adults because of the abuse they have
suffered. They are afraid to ask for help for fear of retaliation from their
trafficker or being treated as criminals by the UK authorities. They may also
be confused about what has happened to them, or may not speak any
English. The NSPCC’s
new trafficking advice line will help break down these barriers. Its success
will depend on adults working with children being vigilant, calling us when
they need to know what to do, and intervening to help protect the victims of
child trafficking.” www.ecpat.net/A4A_2005/PDF/Europe/Global_Monitoring_Report-UK.pdf Much of the available information
on the prostitution of children comes from smallscale
studies, which suggest that it has increased in recent years. It has been
estimated that up to 5,000 young people may be involved at a time, with four
times more girls than boys. Research commissioned by the Department of Health
in 2002 showed that children are known to suffer from this form of abuse in
111 of the 146 Area Child Protection Committee (ACPC) districts - an average
of 19 girls and 3 boys in each area (this refers to the ACPCs
in England and Wales only). A recent study by the NGO Barnardo’s
showed that many young people are first drawn into ‘informal exploitation’,
where sex is exchanged for drugs or a place to stay, and that many young
women become involved in relationships with an older man, who grooms them for
more formal prostitution. Bur of Democracy,
Human Rights & Labor - Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices - 2005 CHILDREN - Some children were subjected to forced
labor or trafficked into the country for sexual exploitation (see section 5,
Trafficking). In July the children's charity, Bernardo's, estimated that at
least one thousand children were sexually exploited in TRAFFICKING
IN PERSONS – The law
prohibits trafficking in persons for the purposes of prostitution, sexual
exploitation, or forced labor. The law criminalizes trafficking offenses by
citizens and residents, whether committed domestically or abroad, and carries
a maximum sentence of 14 years' imprisonment. The law also prohibits such
related acts as keeping a brothel and causing, inciting, or controlling
prostitution for gain. There were severe penalties for such offenses as
causing, inciting, controlling, arranging, or facilitating the prostitution
of a child. The law also criminalizes paying for sexual services of a child. Concluding
Observations of the Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) - 2000 [53] The Committee notes with
concern the lack of information concerning the situation of commercial sexual
exploitation of children, including prostitution and pornography. The
Committee also notes that lack of programs for the physical and psychological
recovery and social reintegration of children victims of such abuse and
exploitation, particularly in Bermuda and some of the Schoolgirl
earned £14,000 as a prostitute www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/schoolgirl-earned-pound14000-as-a-prostitute-1632818.html
A schoolgirl earned about £14,000
in two months by working as a prostitute.
The 15-year-old, who cannot be named, is understood to have earned
more than £1,700 every weekend by working for an escort agency in
Newcastle. The teenager's lucrative
career ended after a teacher found her bag at school and found condoms,
lubricant and details of the agency she worked for. The school, in South Shields, contacted
police who took the teenager home and the property was searched. Michele Elliott, from Kidscape, said: "Child prostitution is a hidden
problem that nobody wants to talk about.
"The reality is that there is a lot of
children out there doing what this child did." Hero's
portrait goes under hammer www.portsmouth.co.uk/people/Hero39s-portrait-goes-under-hammer.4975188.jp In 1885, while editor of the Pall
Mall Gazette, Stead published a series of articles against child
prostitution, entitled The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon. To prove child prostitution was rife, he
bought 13 year-old Eliza Armstrong from her family for £5. As a result, he was jailed for three
months but not before the government introduced the Criminal Law Amendment
Act of 1885, which raised the age of consent to 16
and which Stead's expose was credited with inspiring. Schoolgirls
lured into prostitution, warns MP www.24dash.com/news/Communities/2009-01-20-Schoolgirls-lured-into-prostitution-warns-MP
The grooming of schoolgirls as
young as 12 into prostitution by gangs of men is a growing national problem,
a senior MP warned today. He warned the problem was being
made worse by the use of the "sophisticated techniques" and new
technology. He said young men were
initially targeting girls at school and acting as their boyfriends before
passing them on to older men who would become their pimps. The MP said he knew of cases in
his Baby
P relative implicated in child sex ring www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article5337785.ece
According to the report the child
was involved with three pimps suspected of being involved in child abuse.
These men telephoned or called at the children’s homes and persuaded him with
money, drugs and threats to bring other children to them. The disclosure raises further questions
about the failure of Haringey council to take Baby
P into care. Care experts say routine background checks on the family would
have uncovered the history of abuse in the family and should have raised
serious and immediate concerns. Liz
Davies, the former Islington social worker who blew the whistle on the 1990s
scandal, said the child was like a “Pied Piper” who led other children into
abuse. “But he was also a victim himself, who begged for help,” she said. 'Sex
slavery' gang jailed in child prostitution case www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/nov/04/sex-slavery-gang
A gang of human traffickers,
brothel keepers and pimps received substantial jail terms yesterday over the
ordeal of a teenage virgin tricked into travelling
to the UK for a life of sexual "slavery". Their Slovakian victim had cried
in the dock as she described spending nearly a year-and-a-half working as a
prostitute after being lured to Britain at the age of 16 with the promise of
a job in a pub. She told of being sold on from owner to owner, raped by one
who was never identified, beaten and threatened. - htcp Racial
Tension, and Sexual Exploitation However, according to the BBC’s
investigative reporting program Panorama many British girls (some as young as
12) are “groomed” for prostitution by criminal gangs with networks that
extend across the country. Such girls are typically not the out-of-control
youths lacking parental guidance, such as we might assume. They are merely
teenagers, easily manipulated and easily controlled by ruthless, older men.
“Grooming” consists of an emotionally and mentally paralyzing mix of flattery
and gifts from boys only slightly older than their victims, introductions to
older men, drink, drugs, sexual abuse, and rape. According to Jane, who
talked on Panorama about being forced into prostitution at the age of 13 Helping
children turn life around It follows research by Barnardo’s in 2005 which revealed that 28 children and
young people were being sexually exploited through prostitution in Newcastle,
with another 136 being at significant risk of being involved. The Children’s
Society also found that, on average, 436 under-16s in Newcastle run away
every year. Scarpa opened its doors in October and
hopes to have made contact with 40 young runaways and 15 young people who
have been sexually exploited in its first six months. National
police campaign to target sex trafficking The government estimates that up
to 4,000 women and girls are forced into prostitution after being trafficked
from abroad. Last year Pentameter
rescued 88 women and girls, including some as young as 14, who had been
forced into the sex industry. The
Child Sex Scandal On The Streets Of Scotland A child prostitution ring which is
sexually exploiting immigrant Roma children as young as nine is operating in
Glasgow, the Sunday Herald can reveal. Police have been running undercover
surveillance operations in empty homes and unmarked cars in the Govanhill area in the southside
of Glasgow for months in the hope of catching those behind the ring and the
men paying to have sex with children. Street
children given a new life ANTOINE’S STORY - Hardcore hoodie
Antoine is 19 and has spent most of his life on the streets. He has sold
drugs and worked as a male prostitute to survive. When you read what the
young Londoner – now studying to be a barrister – has endured, you may
understand why. … CHELSEA’S STORY - Chelsea, 17, started selling
crack when she was 11 but with the help of tuition from Kids Co is now due to
take her GCSEs. … Woman Who Pimped Underage Girls Jailed www.lifestyleextra.com/ShowStory.asp?story=DB937173V&news_headline=woman_who_pimped_underage_girls_jailed A female Fagin, who lured girls as
young as 12 into prostitution by getting them hooked on crack, was jailed for
ten years today (Wed). Fiona Walsh -
known as Foxy - plied the girls with highly addictive drug and then forced
them to have sex with 'punters' in alleyways and hotel rooms to fund their
addiction. Mother-of-two Walsh met the
victims through a mutual friend and gained their trust by taking them on
shopping trips and buying them designer clothes and handbags. Sex traffic:
Danielle was 15 when she was sold into slavery in the UK Danielle was excited at the
prospect of leaving her home in Lithuania for a summer job in Britain at the
age of 15. The work had been arranged through a friend who was unable to join
Danielle until later and so put her in touch with a man who would take her to
London. Danielle suspected nothing until
the stranger took her passport once they passed through customs and left her
with two Albanians and a Lithuanian woman. It turned out that she had been
sold for £3,500. The "holiday job" was working in a brothel in
Birmingham. Child prostitution: the horrors of selling sex www.channel4.com/health/microsites/F/family/problems/childprostitution.html www.childexploitation.org/prostitution13.html One month before her 14th birthday
Aliyah Ismail was found dead
in a grubby flat in Camden Town, London, in her 17-year-old ex-boyfriend's
bed. She had taken twice the amount of methadone needed to kill her and had
been working as a prostitute in nearby King's Cross. HOW DOES IT HAPPEN? - Children end up as prostitutes
as the result of a complex process involving manipulation, violence, sexual
abuse, drugs, alcohol and poverty. Barnardo's gives
an example of how it could happen: A girl, who has run away from home or is
being abused at home, meets a young man, probably aged between 18 and 25. He
gives her the love and affection she is missing. He pretends to be her
boyfriend, impressing her with his maturity and lifestyle, his money and car.
She falls in love with him and they start to have sex. Then he becomes possessive and demands
proof of the girl's love. Often this includes breaking off with friends and
family. If she is still living with her parents he may help her put herself
into care. Soon he controls her life – what she wears, what she eats, where
she goes. He becomes violent and she becomes frightened, but she still hopes
that one more proof of her love will restore their relationship. Once the man
totally dominates her he demands she has sex with one of his 'friends', and
then with other men. He uses violence and threats to control her. He has now
become not her boyfriend but her pimp. news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/1462628.stm www.childexploitation.org/prostitution15.html According to both the police and
child care agencies, hundreds of children around Britain are being lured into
the world of paid-sex. They admit they are unable to keep track of the number
of children involved, but both warn that sophisticated networks involving
children of both sexes are being set up by ruthless criminals. In Rotherham alone for example, 80 girls are said to be
working as prostitutes. And experts say prostitution is rife in every major
town and city. Foreign prostitutes, 12, for sale in Scotland McCormack said: "We can see
the trend is changing. We have intelligence that Chinese and Slovakian girls
from the age of 12 are being prostituted in the south side of Glasgow. "We have heard of a 12-year-old girl
being prostituted for £10. Others cost £20-£30. They are good looking. Half
of the local prostitutes are junkies charging £60. The punters are anyone -
people coming out of pubs are offered girls. There is a huge child
prostitution issue." McCormack said they had
intelligence Glasgow was being used as a dumping ground for trafficked girls.
Most were sold in London airports and put into London brothels, he said. But
they were moved on when the police started investigating. "The Albanians
have contacts in Scotland through the Albanian community. Glasgow is just a
place they come to," he said.
McCormack added: "There is evidence that children from Slovakia
are coming through the country with no problems, because there's no visa
needed. The traffickers can make millions from girls in brothels.” The situation is chilling - police
and council officials openly admit they are not yet in a position to be sure
of the scale of the problem in Scotland - but they have seen enough to know
that foreign girls as young as 12 are being prostituted north of the Border.
They warn that Glasgow could soon have a human trafficking problem to rival
that of London and Birmingham. The first signs of Scotland's
trafficking problem emerged earlier this year when a 14-year-old African girl
in Dumfries was one of six young females rescued from brothels as part of
Operation Pentameter, a nationwide crackdown. The African teenager is thought
to have been thrown out of the brothel and left homeless. What sickens those trying to
tackle the problem most is the age of the girls involved. Teenagers under the
age of 16 are, police are now certain, being held captive in private flats,
and their pimps are seeking punters from the local population. This is
something which sickens those trying to tackle the problem. Child
sex tourists exploit legal loopholes in Europe Ministers are preparing tough new
measures against sex tourism to close legal loopholes which British paedophiles are exploiting in order to abuse children
abroad. The crackdown is intended to
combat the growing trend of sexual predators travelling
to parts of Europe to prey on young people, rather than established centres of child prostitution such as south east Asia,
because they stand less chance of getting caught in Europe. Vulnerable children are to be
given greater protection from predatory men thanks to a new initiative set up
in the wake of the Lancashire Telegraph's Keep Them Safe campaign. The new Lancashire Safeguarding
Children Board (LSCB) aims to ensure that agencies and children's services
work closely together to safeguard any child from falling victim to child
prostitution. She was a teenage orphan living on
the streets of Nairobi when a man approached her and promised her work in the
United Kingdom. He told her she would be working as a house girl. True to his word, her
"savior" brought her into the U.K. -- but instead of placing her
with a family the man took her to a brothel, where she was systematically
raped, beaten, and forced to work as a prostitute. Three months later, when the
16-year-old Kenyan girl became pregnant, she was forced to continue sleeping
with a succession of men until she was almost due to give birth. The heavily
pregnant teenager was then removed from the brothel, driven out of the town
where she had been held, and dumped many miles away on the streets of
Sheffield. A support group for the parents of
sexually exploited children is to be launched by a mother whose daughter was
groomed into child prostitution. Jean (not her real name) said more
and more parents needed help and advice as the number of girls aged between
12 and 16 being lured into sexual exploitation by groups of predominantly
Asian men had risen to around 100 in East Lancashire. Help
plea over child prostitution Children's charity Barnardo's has called for a network of services to help
children who have been sexually exploited or groomed for prostitution. It identified several risk factors
associated with sexual exploitation, including poor relationships with
parents or carers, going missing, disengagement
from education and a lack of awareness of rights. Six jailed for
sex acts with girl Six men have been jailed for a
total of more than 17 years for sexual offences involving a girl aged
13. They took part in sex acts with
the girl on beaches, in a car and in a flat after they were introduced to
her. Men
who pay for sex are 'as bad as child abusers' Men who pay for sex are as bad as
child abusers, a senior government minister warned today, as she unveiled
radical plans to protect prostitutes by targeting their clients. Under the
proposals, schoolgirls will be taught about the dangers of selling sex, amid
evidence that more than half of streetwalkers start out as teenagers. Children's Society: Prostitution proposals welcome www.politics.co.uk/issueoftheday/childrens-society-prostitution-proposals-welcome-$368791$367058.htm At one time this article had been
archived and may possibly still be accessible [here]
The Children's Society has welcomed the government's proposals outlined in today's prostitution strategy. "A clear focus on tackling and preventing the abuse of teenagers caught up in prostitution is important not only for protecting children today, but also for reducing the scale of the problem in years to come," said policy director Kathy Evans. Sex-trade
children flown to region Global crime syndicates have begun
to use ECPAT: Fifth Report on implementation of the Agenda for
Action [DOC] www.ecpat.net/eng/Ecpat_inter/publication/other/english/Doc_page/ecpat_5th_a4a_2001_full.doc At one time this article had been
archived and may possibly still be accessible [here]
[B]
COUNTRY UPDATES – UNITED KINGDOM – The Committee on the Rights of the Child has expressed
its concern at the lack of information on the situation of CSEC in the UK,
and on the lack of programs for the physical and psychological recovery and
social reintegration of CSEC victims. Report
by Special Rapporteur [DOC] [75] The United Kingdom is
carrying out a review of legislation concerning sexual offences with specific
proposals to tackle the involvement of children in prostitution and
pornography. There is currently no specific law criminalizing the
trafficking of human beings, but the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Bill
introduces a new offence of trafficking for the purposes of controlling
someone in prostitution. Concerning prostitution, the pimp,
client, or person benefiting from the prostitution is criminally liable, and
it is a criminal offence to solicit for the purpose of
prostitution. Since May 2000, the Government has instructed that
although children soliciting for prostitution are criminally liable, in
practice they are to be treated as victims of exploitation and
abuse. All steps are taken to divert them away from prostitution
without recourse to the criminal justice system. Alarming figures reveal there are 26
children and young people currently being exploited through prostitution in
the city. And a further 121 are at
significant risk of becoming involved in the seedy underworld. Fears are growing that the problem could be
much wider, with many youngsters who are being abused, or have been victims
in the past, too frightened to come forward. NI children 'used as prostitutes' Children as young as 13 are being
used as prostitutes in Northern Ireland, childcare specialists have told the
BBC. According to experts, while
paramilitaries are involved, families have also been selling their own
children for sex. A BBC Newsline investigation has unearthed a chilling picture
of what is going on in towns, cities and country areas across Northern
Ireland. Migration and Development: How to make migration work for poverty reduction [PDF] [14] The UK Government and governments of other
developed countries, need to address the issue of sex tourism which fuels the
exploitation of women and child in south-east Asia particularly, and ensure
that existing legislation protecting the rights of migrant workers is vigorously
enforced. (Paragraph 53) The UK Government is committed to
eradicating the sexual exploitation of children, including where British
citizens go abroad to abuse children. The Government has put in place
comprehensive legislation to deal with this problem. Life
Sentence Part Of New Child Prostitution Laws Any adult caught paying for sex
from a child under the age of 18 will face prosecution and a severe penalty -
up to life imprisonment, under a tightening of the prostitution laws.
In addition,
people who sexually exploit children for their own gain - irrespective of
whether they participate in any sexual activity with the child - are to be
held responsible for that abuse. Shock
Posters Break Taboo To Fight Child Prostitution One poster shows a little girl
sitting on a sofa, her face grotesquely old and worn. Behind her a man runs his fingers through her hair. On another poster, a young boy is shown
standing in a public toilet in front of an undressing man. The controversial images are part of a
campaign by Barnardo's to highlight the alarming
rise in the number of children being lured into prostitution. Child
Prostitution Plea From Charity Young boys and girls involved in
prostitution should be recognized as victims of child abuse, rather than
criminals, according to Barnardo's UK
A Hub For European Child Prostitution DRUG ABUSE - It has been described as a
revolving door situation - the police hand them over to social services, but
within hours they are often back on the street. Many are addicted to crack cocaine and they
will do anything to feed their habit. Children groomed for sex trafficking Children in Wales are being
enslaved into a sordid life of sexual exploitation and prostitution, experts
warned today. Adults are grooming and trafficking vulnerable children
as young as 12 from Welsh care homes to work in massage parlours
throughout South Wales. The shocking trade is being fuelled by the
internet, putting adults intent on fulfilling their
depraved sexual desires and fantasies in physical contact with these
exploited young children. www.onebigvillage.com.au/onebigvillage/content.asp?topicID=81&obv1=msnhomepage CHILD SEX TOURISM - Campaign
To End Child Prostitution Samantha was just 14 when she
started working as a prostitute. Her
story is typical of many of the children who are forced to work in this
world. Sara Swann, who runs a Barnardo's project working with young prostitutes in Preying
On Children - The Number Of Kids Trafficked Into Virtual Slavery In Europe Is
On The Rise Over pasta in a Bloomsbury
pizzeria, "Maria" could pass for any urbane 21-year-old Londoner.
She's not. The Macedonia-born Maria was orphaned at 9, then
sent to stay with a family whose 19-year-old son, "Nuri,"
began sleeping with her. He bought her a new dress and a doll, and then trafficked her through southern Europe
to what was billed simply as "a better life" in Factbook
on Global Sexual Exploitation - UK One hundred Brazilian women, aged
between 18 and 25, were promised work in All material used herein
reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107 for noncommercial,
nonprofit, and educational use. PLEASE
RESPECT COPYRIGHTS OF COMPONENT ARTICLES.
Cite this webpage as: Patt, Prof. Martin,
"Child Prostitution – United Kingdom (UK)",
http://gvnet.com/childprostitution/UK.htm, [accessed <date>] |
More than
250,000 sex tourists visit Asia each year, with 25 percent coming from
the Human Trafficking in [UK] [other countries]Street Children in [UK] [other countries]Child Prostitution in [UK