In the Dock

their locality, have tailored training, protocols and specialised units of personnel devoted to traffickinginvestigations. This led to more cases identified, more arrests and more investigations resulting intwice as many charged at federal level than non-participating law enforcement agencies. 212The other view claims that trafficking investigations should become part of core police business. In theUK, the latter view has been pursued, stating that trafficking investigations should be mainstreamed tobecome day-to-day policing. To assist this process, a network of single points of contact (SPOC)occupying senior ranks, have been appointed in 34 out of 43 police forces to direct information, and tocoordinate and encourage activity within their respective organisations. 213 A prior network of SPOCs,developed by the UKHTC when it was first established, subsequently lapsed due to staff changes. Toavert this loss in the future, staff change should be persistently monitored. Though the SPOC networkis a step in the right direction, it appears that it needs to be rolled out across all forces. It was alsostated that an agency handbook would assist in identifying SPOCs in other areas. The SPOC modelshould also be actively promoted among regional police forces as one participant stated that anumber of cases of trafficked persons identified at a port had not been forwarded to the regionalSPOC. It is also important to point out that while SPOCs are developing specialists, a team ofinvestigating officers is required to investigate trafficking.Though the ability and capacity to identify all types of trafficking needs to be conventional to all UKpolice personnel, participants stated that not all police are suited to investigating trafficking given thatsome investigations are complex and involve considerable challenges that are outlined in this report.One officer stated, “[i]t’s a round peg in a square hole, kind of thing. I think you’ve got to be the righttype of person to deal with it and have some empathy with who you deal with.” Officers need to showaptitude in many different areas, the ability to think outside of normal constraints and possess bothsoft and hard police skills to liaise with vulnerable victims while dealing with hardened and organisedcriminals. The need for specialism is acknowledged in other complex areas of policing such as drugtrafficking and fraud, which are managed in force by specialist squads; though it was recognised thatpolice forces were moving away from specialism to cope with resource cuts.There are some specialised units which have formed in the UK, such as the MPS SCO9 in London.Also in Scotland, Strathclyde Police established a Vice and Anti Trafficking Unit in 2009 and sinceMarch 2013 this has been operational for Police Scotland and renamed the National HumanTrafficking Unit (see Chapter 10). Though it is acknowledged that there is a larger demographic inLondon, this unit is disproportionately responsible for more prosecutions 214 than other built up regions,thus suggesting that being given a mandate and resources to examine trafficking inherently developspolicing in this area. Indeed, SCO9 are often called upon by police as well as NGOs in cases wherethe local police force is unwilling to investigate or take a statement from a potential trafficked person.The ATMG is also aware of small specialised units developing in some police forces who sit with theircolleagues whose work, for example on forced marriage, traverses with trafficking.Specialist units also have the potential to be cost-effective. If given a clear mandate and channels ofcommunication from the frontline, they would reduce the number of low quality and lengthyinvestigations, particularly in relation to forced labour. Furthermore, their investigations would beplanned and managed with financial investigators from the outset in order to ascertain traffickers’assets that could potentially finance the unit’s future activities.212Farrell et al., Understanding and Improving Law Enforcement Responses to Human Trafficking: Executive Summary. (2008)[online] Available at: www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/222752.pdf [last accessed March 2013].213Mark Harper, HC Deb 17 Dec 2012, c498W.214See numerous Hansard entries and NRM referral information.62