Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate she has made of the number of children brought into the UK by people traffickers in each of the last five years; and if she will make a statement.

Modern Slavery remains a largely hidden crime and it is challenging to accurately assess its prevalence. The Government holds data on potential victims of trafficking referred to the National Referral Mechanism (NRM). The link below provides NRM statistics which include data on the number of non-UK national children aged 17 years and under (at the time of referral) referred to the NRM because of a human trafficking claim.

http://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/publications/national-referral-mechanism-statistics

Data for the first three quarters of 2016 is available within the link. The final quarter and annual summary is due to be published in March 2017.