Speaking at the October launch of a new national police crackdown on sex traffickers, home secretary Jacqui Smith described sex trafficking as a 'modern-day form of slavery.
Yet in the next breath, when asked if those rescued from enforced prostitution would be allowed to stay in Britain, she admitted they could face deportation as illegal immigrants.
Human traficking to Britain destroys hundreds of lives every year, especially those of young women and girls. Unscrupulous traffickers seize their documents and use them as sex workers, controlling them with threats that if they try to escape they will be detained by police as "illegals' and deported. Now, according to the home secretary, it is clear that that is exactly what may happen to them.
How do the police with their Operation Pentameter 2 expect to 'rescue' women and encourage them to break free from their captors? And what is the point of the government funding the Poppy project to provide extra places in women's refuges to deal with increased referrals generated by the police crackdown?
The cynicism and inhumanity of New Labour know no bounds.