Government urged to tackle 'prevalent' human trafficking in Ireland by charity organisations

Most homeless charities believe they are encountering victims of human trafficking through their work but have insufficient knowledge to help them, new research suggests.

On Monday, homelessness charity Depaul, in conjunction with UK-based charity The Passage, published a report entitled An Overview of Homelessness and Human Trafficking in Dublin', in which the charities explore potential links between homelessness and human trafficking in Ireland.

According to the report, mapping, evaluation and research findings show there are and have been victims of human trafficking living in homeless accommodation services across Dublin, echoing the current situation in London and other major cities.

The findings of the report show that most homelessness organisations believe they are coming into contact with victims of trafficking, but recognise that they have insufficient knowledge and awareness to identify victims.

The research conducted has identified that there are many missed opportunities to identify victims and provide them with the support they are entitled to as a human right and as included in the EU Directive for Human Trafficking.

The Depaul report called on politicians and decision makers to involve homelessness organisations in the introduction of the National Action Plan to Prevent and Combat Human Trafficking.

David Carroll, Chief Executive of Depaul, who were the lead Irish homelessness organisation involved in the research said that  we need an "ecosystem that is robust enough to support victims of trafficking which we don’t have at present." He added that human trafficking "is becoming more prevalent in Ireland and the aim of this research is to shine a light on this issue in the context of trafficking and homelessness."

"The report highlights the need to not only to identify victims but to be able to link these victims into crucial support services which are only at the beginning of development. This report signals an initial response to links between human trafficking and homelessness in Ireland and highlights that we can do more to support these individuals. Every gender and every nationality can be a victim of this destructive crime. No community is immune to it.”

The report outlined that it is not clear whether the potential victims of trafficking encountered by homelessness organisations were homeless before or after being trafficked and were targetted because of their vulnerability.

Overall, there seems to be an absence of training, policies and procedures within organisations which means that staff aren’t equipped to look out for the signs that someone may have been trafficked, the report found.

“Pre-assessment is necessary and post support is urgently needed. Much of the discussions to date focused on trafficking in the context of foreign nationals, and it is therefore not clear whether homelessness organisations are coming into contact with Irish nationals or people with residence in Ireland who have been trafficked,” Mr.Carroll added.

Six recommendations are proposed to improve the multi-agency response to human trafficking and improve the intelligence picture. These include; developing additional trauma informed specialist accommodation services for victims of trafficking, devloping a multi-agency approach, improved information recording by homeless organisations, training and awareness raising for the homeless sector, an online toolkit, and further research.