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Seòmar agus comataidhean

Question reference: S6W-32511

  • Date lodged: 19 December 2024
  • Current status: Answered by Dorothy Bain on 15 January 2025

Question

To ask the Scottish Government how often the Lord Advocate’s instructions have been used to protect victims of human trafficking and exploitation since the commencement of the Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Scotland) Act 2015.


Answer

The Lord Advocate’s instructions for non-prosecution of victims of human trafficking | COPFS were first published in May 2016 and the manual collation of data commenced at that stage.

As of 6 January 2025, proceedings involving 188 individuals, who were reported to the National Lead Prosecutor for Human Trafficking in accordance with the instructions, were not raised or were discontinued on the basis that the two-part test in the Lord Advocate’s instructions was satisfied.

The information is provided under the caveats that:

?A decision to discontinue proceedings can be taken at any time during a proceeding. Therefore, although the National Lead Prosecutor has not discontinued proceedings against an accused person, that may not be the final decision. Should further information become available, such as a positive Conclusive Grounds Decision, the National Lead Prosecutor may decide to discontinue proceedings on receipt of that information.

  • The data is manually collated and so whilst the data is as accurate as it can be, full accuracy cannot be guaranteed.
  • The data changes constantly depending on when new information is received.