Anti-Al Capone Tactics Could Help Combat Human Trafficking
New legislation aims to disrupt human trafficking networks using sanctions
Human Trafficking, Sanctions, UK, Legislation, David Lammy, Dublin
Dublin: I found the foreign secretary’s recent opinion piece pretty intriguing. It talks about new laws aimed at tackling irregular migration and organized immigration crime. As someone who works in human rights and anti-corruption, I’m really curious about how this will all play out.
The idea is that sanctions could really help in stopping these criminal networks. By freezing their assets in the UK, we might be able to hit them where it hurts. Just like how US prosecutors took down Al Capone back in the day, it might be easier to go after human traffickers for sanctions violations rather than the trafficking itself.
But here’s the thing: the UK already has some sanctions in place for human trafficking. If needed, they can quickly expand these rules through secondary legislation. The real challenge is making sure there’s enough enforcement behind these sanctions. We’ve seen that just throwing sanctions out there without proper enforcement doesn’t really do much.
I totally back David Lammy’s goal to tackle the exploitation of migrants by going after trafficking gangs. But I hope this effort comes with a smoother asylum process too. The government wants to change laws to make it harder for people-smuggling gangs to operate, which sounds good. They’re looking to restrict their access to finance and social media, which could really help.
However, it’s worth noting that there are already serious crime prevention orders that can be used before a conviction, but not many have been applied for. Between 2011 and 2021, only two applications were made for these orders without a conviction. That’s a pretty low number compared to over a thousand obtained after a conviction.
It’ll be interesting to see how the new legislation sets the rules for these orders. We need to make sure it encourages more investigators to use them without getting stuck in legal red tape. Also, while these orders can impact individual criminals, they won’t change the bigger picture. As long as there’s demand for smuggling, there will always be people looking to exploit that.