Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Gillian Keegan and Robert Buckland

Thursday 10th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[James Cleverly (Braintree) (Con)]

9. What steps the CPS is taking to increase its effectiveness in prosecuting crimes involving the exploitation of vulnerable people by gangs.

[The Solicitor General (Robert Buckland)]

The exploitation of vulnerable people to traffic drugs across the country through county lines activity is abhorrent, and the CPS does consider modern slavery legislation when it comes to relevant charging decisions.

[Gillian Keegan]

In Chichester, drug dealers are regularly taking over the homes of vulnerable people who suffer from mental health problems or from drug dependency themselves in a process known as cuckooing. Sussex police tell me that they struggle to identify the gang leaders who control the cuckoos as they are based outside the county. What steps is the CPS taking to prosecute those gang leaders effectively, so that others are deterred from exploiting the most vulnerable in society?

[The Solicitor General]

My hon. Friend is right to raise the issue of cuckooing and the need for local police forces such as Sussex to collaborate with other forces. A good example was a case last month in which two London-based gang members were convicted in Swansea Crown court of trafficking a teenage girl to the city to deal heroin and crack cocaine.