Yorkshire 'focus for trafficked victims of sex trade'

It is estimated that Yorkshire has the third highest number of Eastern European prostitutes working in brothels in the UK, after London and the West Midlands, and the third highest number from Asia.

Some of them have been subject to kidnap, rape and imprisonment, while others are debt-bonded and "strictly controlled through threats of violence to family members", says the report, with follows an investigation named Project Acumen.

It is estimated that more than 5,000 of those who come to the UK do so in the knowledge that they would become prostitutes.

The report reveals that Yorkshire has the highest number of women involved in prostitution outside London but that the vast majority in this region – around 68 per cent – are actually British, with 19 per cent from Eastern Europe and 10 per cent from Asia.

The report by the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) found that around 17,000 of the estimated 30,000 women involved in off-street prostitution (brothels, massage parlours) were migrants. Around half come from Eastern Europe and a third from Asia.

Of the 17,000, around 2,600 are believed to have been trafficked and a further 9,200 are deemed to be vulnerable to further exploitation.

Most of those trafficked (2,200) are from Asia, mainly China.

The report, Setting the Record, provides a shocking assessment of the levels of trafficking for sexual exploitation.

ACPO's expect on migration, Deputy Chief Constable of Nottinghamshire Police Chris Eyre, said: "Human trafficking for sexual exploitation involves the most extreme abuse of individuals in our communities.

"We recognise that Project Acumen focuses on only one area of trafficking, but it clearly sets out the scale of the problems that those in law enforcement, victim support, social care and border protection, collectively face.

"It provides us with a more sophisticated and nuanced understanding of how migrant women are involved in prostitution – how they are influenced, controlled, coerced, exploited and trafficked.

"We now have a better picture of the extent of trafficking and will look to support from Government to ensure we work effectively with all agencies to make the UK a more hostile environment for traffickers, to shut down trafficking routes into the UK and to prosecute those who are exploiting women for their own gains."

Immigration Minister Damian Green said: "Human trafficking is a brutal form of organised crime where people are traded as commodities and exploited for profit by criminal gangs. Combating trafficking and looking after its victims is a priority for the new Government.

"In order to combat trafficking more effectively we need to understand it better, and Project Acumen marks significant progress. Having any number of people trafficked into the UK is unacceptable, therefore it is vital that we use Acumen to re-focus our efforts both at targeting the criminal gangs that trade in this human misery and in helping victims escape and recover."

A spokesman for West Yorkshire Police said trafficking was a "brutal" type of organised crime which the force was committed to tackling.

The breakdown of figures reveals there are an estimated 534 business in Yorkshire selling "off-street sexual services" – the highest number outside London, which has 2,103. The estimated number of women involved in prostitution in Yorkshire is put at 4,382, the second highest outside London (with 5,299)

There are an estimated 651 Eastern European off-street prostitutes in Yorkshire (the third highest of the regions) and 375 from Asia, also the third highest.

Overall, the highest numbers of British prostitutes, 3,356, can be found in Yorkshire.

BRUTAL REALITY OF VICE IN REGION

The brutal reality of the sex trade in Yorkshire was revealed in a 2005 court case.

Two teenage girls from Lithuania came to Britain for a short holiday but were transported like cattle to Sheffield and imprisoned..

One of the girls, a 19-year-old student, was taken away within hours to London for a life of enforced prostitution while the other, aged 18, was kept in Sheffield.

She was violently and repeatedly raped by one man before she too was forced into prostitution.

Their abusers got a total of 48 years in custody.