Dear Sylvia,
As well as fighting crime, protecting and safeguarding vulnerable people in our communities is something we do day in, day out.
Yesterday, we carried out visits to four properties across Peterborough in relation to modern slavery and the sex-work industry.
This work, under Operation Aidant which is a national focus on modern slavery and exploitation, focused on sexual exploitation, including looking into the methods used by perpetrators to recruit their victims.
As with any operation, the day started with a briefing before heading out to the locations where a total of eight women were spoken with, asking questions to make sure they are safe and not being forced into anything.
Questions we asked included whether they had access to the money they made, who had control of their online profiles and if they knew what to do if they needed help.
This information enables us to identify any concerns around exploitation but also allows us to ensure the women know what to do in case of an emergency.
We were also joined by someone from a sexual health charity and all women were offered access to free sexual health testing.
Our work doesn’t stop there though – we have specialist teams working on intelligence gathering, carrying out various enquiries and also working with partner agencies to put support in place for those working in the industry.
We were pleased to see all the addresses appeared to be well looked after and the women were living in reasonably good conditions, with no one showing signs of exploitation, however we know this is not always the case.
We would encourage you to visit our Modern slavery | Cambridgeshire Constabulary (cambs.police.uk) to find information about the signs of exploitation, as any one of us could be living next door to it. Here you will also find information on how to report concerns.