Sign the Petition Keep Bristol Parks Safe and Accessible for Professional Dog Walkers

Own a dog? Live in Bristol? Sign this! c.org/2FgZtXkZFm

The same leadership is needed now.

Silence has a cost. It's measured in human lives.

@thelancet.com

#modernslavery #humantrafficking #epstein

The Epstein files are a moment. The question is whether institutions treat it as one.

Medical organisations and public health agencies have done this before — tobacco, HIV/AIDS. They used their collective voice when politics looked away.

The public health response to the Epstein files In 2019, revelations that American financier Jeffrey Epstein had orchestrated a powerful international network for human trafficking and sexual exploitation shocked the conscience of global society. A...

A Lancet @thelancet.com correspondence just landed that deserves attention.

Human trafficking isn't just a crime. It's a structural determinant of health. 6.3 million people trafficked for sexual exploitation. PTSD, chronic pain, & developmental harm in children.
www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...

THE NEW WORLD (front cover) ISSUE 476, MARCH 26, 2026 | UK: Photos of part of Reeves’s face and part of Starmer’s - side by side with text superimposed on their faces… BREXIT WAS It's only taken them 10 years... A DISASTER .. but FINALLY the government agrees with us OFFICIAL

10 years of cost, red tape, business closures, lost opportunities, emboldened prejudice, national insecurity and social division.
A total waste of our time, resources and patience.
But refusing to face up to that has been the most dismal part. Political cowardice and dishonesty on an epic scale.

Anger as EU gets a ‘better trade deal’ with Australia than Brexit Britain British farmers are still furious that the U.K. didn’t take a harder line in its talks with Canberra.

Brexit - the gift that keeps on giving sh*te @nfudc.bsky.social
www.politico.eu/article/ange...

Al Fayed survivors say government has been 'sceptical' over public inquiry Survivors say the Met and government need to expand their investigation to include human trafficking.

This is not a good look for the government and further adds to the perception that victims of trafficking are not to be believed. Appalling that they have been told ‘the usefulness of a trafficking investigation where the conviction rate is very low’ www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
#modernslavery

@sarahchampionmp.bsky.social @edmilibandmp.bsky.social

#modernslavery #forcedlabour #greatbritishenergy #china #xinjiang #uyghurs | Andrew Wallis OBE The Foreign Office funded carbon capture development in Xinjiang between 2016 and 2018. At least four payments from the UK aid budget went to the Xinjiang regional government. At the time, the governm...

The Foreign Office funded Xinjiang carbon capture during the Uyghur detentions. Now GB Energy has a legal obligation to ensure its supply chains are free from forced labour. The government wrote that clause itself. Full argument on LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/posts/andrew...
@aliciakearns.bsky.social

#modernslavery #msoicu | Andrew Wallis OBE Criminal gangs are making billions from modern slavery in the UK. They are paying almost nothing back. In 2024, £854,000 was recovered from modern slavery cases under the Proceeds of Crime Act. Total...

We close the national modern slavery investigations unit this April. Mid-investigation. Because immigration polls better. The full argument, including the Al Fayed angle, is on my LinkedIn. www.linkedin.com/posts/andrew...

Outcry as modern slavery unit is closed | The Observer Funding is being cut from the task force, despite an ongoing investigation into a trafficking ring allegedly run by the late Harrod’s owner Al Fayed

The UK has 130,000 #modernslavery victims and a £60bn annual cost. From April, the government is closing the national unit that coordinates police investigations into it. The reason, per insiders: immigration wins more votes. That is a policy decision with a body count observer.co.uk/news/nationa...

If you can, but you’ll have to be quick, do go and see this production at the Bristol Old Vic bristololdvic.org.uk/whats-on/a-m...

Modern slavery is thriving: the media just isn’t telling you Podcast Episode · Media Storm · 12 March · 1h 1m

Listen to this from @mediastormpod.bsky.social #modernslavery

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/m...

Woman kept in ‘Dickensian’ servitude for 25 years speaks out as abuser jailed Amanda Wixon, 56, sentenced to 13 years for keeping victim imprisoned at home in Gloucestershire since 1990s

The instinct is to frame this as a monstrous outlier. But outliers do not survive 25 years of captivity in a residential neighbourhood. That requires systemic permission. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...
#modernslavery

A landmark anti-slavery case adds suppliers to British firms’ risks The dust settles in a Dyson dispute

I spoke to The Economist @theeconomistnews.bsky.social for this piece. My concern is simple: without stronger law, Britain becomes the world’s dumping ground for tainted goods.

www.economist.com/britain/2026...

@unseenuk.bsky.social

But courts are a poor substitute for Parliament. The Modern Slavery Act lets firms report that “no steps” were taken to prevent forced labour, with zero penalty. The EU mandates due diligence with fines up to 5% of turnover. America bars Xinjiang goods outright. Britain has neither.

The Dyson/ATA Malaysia settlement is a landmark. British courts can now hear forced labour claims against UK firms for what happens in overseas supply chains, not just subsidiaries. Outsourcing no longer equals legal protection.

Overseas domestic workers visa: independent review James Ewins’s review on the overseas domestic workers visa.

The exploitation isn't despite the system. It's because of it.
Restore the visa.

It has been recommended for over a decade. GOV.UK publication page:
www.gov.uk/government/p...

The hidden scandal of modern slavery in London Unpaid wages, 20-hour days, screaming abuse — Hannah Wallace investigates the grim reality for migrant domestic workers, helpless inside the city’s grandest addresses

Behind the stuccoed façades of Chelsea.
18-hour days.
No bedroom.
Passport gone.
Sent across London for "massages."

The Overseas Domestic Worker ODW visa was changed in 2012. Workers lost the right to change employers or renew, a legal exit route, gone. www.standard.co.uk/news/london/...

How does Bristol's public transport compare to European cities? Less than half of residents can get to the city centre in 30 minutes by public transport

I love this city. It doesn't need London's permission for anything. Except apparently a tram, or a metro or a bus that turns up. 23 smaller French cities have metro networks. #Bristol has a document explaining why it might commission a rprt about exploring options www.bristol247.com/news-and-fea...

Same victims. Same network. Same evidence — except the #humantrafficking lens means investigators look at the enablers, the logistics, the pattern. Not just one person's word against another.
The former head of the Met's anti-trafficking unit can't understand why it hasn't changed.

Neither can I.

Al Fayed abuse should be investigated as human trafficking, says former senior Met officer Investigation into claims of sex abuse by the late Harrods owner should include trafficking, says former head of Met's Anti-Trafficking Unit.

The French are investigating Al Fayed as #sextrafficking.
The Met is investigating him for sexual abuse.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

The Guardian view on adult services websites: ministers must act on evidence of harm | Editorial Editorial: Ofcom, the government and the police are all to blame for allowing online sex advertising to run out of control

Tougher regulation of adult services websites? Yes. But is the response designed to reduce harm, or just reduce visibility? Those aren't the same thing. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

The Guardian view on adult services websites: ministers must act on evidence of harm | Editorial Editorial: Ofcom, the government and the police are all to blame for allowing online sex advertising to run out of control

Our @unseenuk.bsky.social Modern Slavery and Exploitation Helpline indicated 804 potential victims of sexual exploitation in 2024. Child sexual exploitation cases more than doubled.

Supreme Court says forced labor lawsuit against firm operating ICE facilities can move forward | Colorado Newsline The U.S. Supreme Court denied the GEO Group's request to dismiss a lawsuit challenging work requirements at its Aurora ICE detention center.

coloradonewsline.com/briefs/supre...

This is what #forcedlabour looks like when it is built into a government contract rather than a supply chain.

The legal question is whether GEO is liable. The prior question is who designed a detention model where this was economically rational.

@unseenuk.bsky.social

The detail that rarely gets named: GEO Group manages 77,000 beds across 98 facilities. The $1 a day figure is not an accident of underfunding. It is the margin. The externalised cost of running detention infrastructure is passed to the people detained within it, under threat of punishment.

The GEO Group operates immigration detention on behalf of the US government. It argued it was immune from lawsuit because it was carrying out federal instructions. The Supreme Court unanimously disagreed this week. The case now goes to trial.

Work without pay. Or face 72 hours in solitary confinement.

That is not a labour dispute. That is a coercion mechanism. Under any serious forced labour framework, that is the definition. 🧵

Thanks, Hannah. No surprises that #middleeastforum is scaremongering.