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trafficking via Shutterstock

'Strongest response possible' needed to combat human trafficking in Ireland

The Immigrant Council of Ireland is calling for a range of measures to be introduced in Ireland’s next anti-trafficking plan.

IRELAND NEEDS TO adopt the “strongest possible response” to the issue of human trafficking, the Immigrant Council of Ireland (ICI) said.

The organisation is also recommending the appointment of a ‘Czar’ to ensure the implementation of the anti-trafficking policies.

Minister for Justice Alan Shatter confirmed earlier this week that a second National Action Plan on Human Trafficking is being planned.

“A second National Action Plan to Prevent and Combat Trafficking in Human Beings in Ireland is currently being drafted and will address further follow up action in this regard,” the Minister said in response to a parliamentary question from Labour TD Ciarán Lynch.

He added that since June 2008, 106 suspected victims of trafficking for forced labour have been recorded.

ICI Chief Executive Denise Charlton said this will be “a welcome opportunity to address shortfalls which have left Ireland vulnerable to a crime which puts €25 billion into the pockets of organised crime across the EU each year”.

She also recommended that part of this plan should be mandatory training for airline and airport crew and staff to spot victims of human trafficking.

Voluntary training in this area has already been developed by the Department of Justice.

Read: Are enough airline staff being trained to identify trafficking victims? >

Column: Sex buyers are the last link in chain of trafficking, abuse and rape >

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23 Comments
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    Mute Paul Roche
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    Apr 12th 2014, 1:47 PM

    Denis [sic] Charleton is paid how much?

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    Mute Lex Luther
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:07 PM

    Though she’s paid by Chuck Feeney rather than the state, it would be interesting to know. They certainly seem to have a free pass where the press is concerned. No one seems to question them in any way. Media outlets seem to happily reproduce their press releases.

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    Mute Gaye Dalton
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:16 PM

    Apparently nowhere near as much as she intends to be as “trafficking Czar” (the use of word “Czar” is SUCH a red flag for pathological control issues it is unreal.).

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    Mute feck'n voters
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    Apr 14th 2014, 9:53 AM

    It is no longer Chuck (he built refuges for assaulted women). It is Catherine Downton that controls the strings and pushes the post IEC 2012 agenda.

    http://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/philanthropist-chuck-feeney-lost-control-of-his-own-charity-in-dispute-over-spending-1.1504106

    http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/person.asp?personId=6339858&privcapId=4666331&previousCapId=4666331&previousTitle=The%20Atlantic%20Philanthropies%20(USA),%20Inc.

    Charity regulation is desperately needed to stop proxy political parties usurping democracy with €40M + in foreign funding to reposition & reframe the catholic church in Irish media

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    Mute Niall Griffin
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:01 PM

    Let’s start with heavy sentencing for the people who are doing the trafficking, and not giving suspended sentences like the Romanian (female) pimp in Limerick received a while back.

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    Mute susanna smyth
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:47 PM

    Irish Immigrant Council looking for more funding ?

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    Mute susanna smyth
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:49 PM

    What about our own citizens sold into slavery by the government to fund keep the banks afloat?

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    Mute Gaye Dalton
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    Apr 12th 2014, 3:02 PM

    Bit like asking if fish are swimming that. ;o)

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    Mute Etienne de Montfort
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    Apr 12th 2014, 3:41 PM

    Susanna, you aren’t a slave. For starters, you get paid for working or even not working as the case may be. You can also leave any time you want. Stop appropriating other people’s suffering you shameless drama queen

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    Mute al shamen
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    Apr 12th 2014, 1:56 PM

    The EU open borders madness is a gift to human traffickers.Mafioso who engage in this type of criminality are free to move across Europe with little or no background checks.
    Enhance immigration controls and human trafficking will decrease as a result.But you will never see an Internationalist like Denise Charlton advocating these type of policies.She is in favour of open borders and mass third world immigration to the detriment of the native population.

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    Mute Paul Roche
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:08 PM

    We share a common border policy with the UK, we’re not in Schengen…

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    Mute al shamen
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:11 PM

    That’s true.But once you have an EU passport you are still free to move here with no background checks.

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    Mute Kevin Higgins
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:14 PM

    I might take this debate seriously if it wasn’t for a profile with no picture or full name debating the need for background checks.

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    Mute al shamen
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:29 PM

    @Kevin Look at any media website were commenting is available.People use synonyms all the time for various reasons.The only media website I have seen this being made an issue of is this one.Learn to live with it.

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    Mute Gaye Dalton
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    Apr 12th 2014, 3:00 PM

    Before you dismiss what Patricia has to say above let me say that I have gone through her whole post and so many of the things she sees and say are exactly what I have seen for myself.

    Anyone looking at that degree of corruption is entitled to come across as a bit rattled. I often do myself.

    Think it is far fetched to suggest political party members are involved inhuman trafficking?

    Think again.

    Lord Morrow (heavily supported and advised by Denise Charlton and friends) openly brought a giuy called Dr Dan Boucher in to the NI Justice Committee, where he proceeded to advocate for “sheltered accommodation” and “supported living” facilities to be provided for “victims of human trafficking” and sex workers (which he insists are the same) who (sic) “probably know nothing of the real world”, which would, allegedly, only require a “seed capital” of £200,000.

    Sounds impossible?

    Not when you look at companies Dan Boucher actively promotes like “Allia” http://allia.org.uk/programmes/overview/ who literally trade disadvantaged people like bonds in the open market – quite legal BTW.

    Which, in turn are part of larger groups with the potential to (quite legally, at least in Switzerland) use debt and deficit to manipulate far larger market sectors.

    There is already a new “trafficking victim support” Charity launched that is owned and operated by an ailing securities company (with all the links to other, similar companies that are part and parcel of such).

    If you think Patricia is saying anything far fetched, wipe the glass clean and you will see she is probably even sanitising the worst of it.

    “Supported living” and “Sheltered Accommodation” state funded at anything between €50k and €120k per head,for situations that often resemble either glorified B&Bs, or glorified open prisons, and strive to foster dependency in their residents (why would they want to throw such a lucrative cash crop away)? is the new “licence to print your own money” (all perfectly legal) even when they incorporate “supported employment” owned by the management (not laundries, you can’t make those pay since the advent of the washing machine, but the principle is the same).

    As fully functional adults, a herd of “rescued” sex workers in “supported living” would be like a herd of pedigree Jersey cows…except sex workers are human beings who ought to have the same human rights as anyone, not cattle…but that doesn’t seem to be discouraging anyone from trying to herd them for gain anyway.

    THAT is the real “modern day slavery”…an update on the old Laundries and industrial schools.

    I would say we need a tribunal of enquiry into the whole “anti trafficking” movement, except, if I do, it might sound as if that was the only thing we need a tribunal of enquiry into.

    Better to waste some public money on endless tribunals of enquiry than waste far more on crushing real human lives in the name of “help”, “support” and “rescue”.

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    Mute Gaye Dalton
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:23 PM

    I do not think we should be pouring any more of the taxpayers money into things members of a smug, self appointed elite make up as they go along to suit their personal careers planc.

    As long as we do, money is being wasted on crushing, approximately, the people it is (nominally) intended to aid.

    We need proper, neutral research into the sex industry, shouldn’t be too hard as I understand much of the team commissioned to do such research for the Department of Justice NI are based in the South, instead of unsubstantiated assertation by whoever has the most friends in high places this week..

    BUT THEN…

    We need proper, neutral research into *all* possible aspects of human trafficking…incliuding those parts that are internal, still perfectly legal and state funded, before they suffer further expansion at the behest of the same people who apply for funds to “fight trafficking”.

    This travesty has gone on far too long without anyone ever checking a single “fact”.

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    Mute Lex Luther
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:31 PM

    I’m just gonna sit here and wait for Seamus Larkin to turn up and indiscriminately call people racists all over the shop/.

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    Mute Wanaka
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:37 PM

    That’s a terrible waste of a Saturday unless your sitting waiting on a high stool pint in hand ;)

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    Mute Lex Luther
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:48 PM

    I’m hungover. I can wait.

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    Mute Kevin Higgins
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    Apr 12th 2014, 1:44 PM

    Legalisation of cannabis would result in the largest decrease in Human Trafficking we have ever seen.

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    Mute Kevin Higgins
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    Apr 12th 2014, 2:00 PM

    Summary –Trafficking for
    Forced Labour in Cannabis
    Production: The Case of Ireland – http://www.mrci.ie/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Summary-of-Trafficking-for-Forced-Labour-in-Cannabis-Production.pdf

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    Mute Cpm
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    Apr 12th 2014, 6:19 PM

    “He added that since June 2008, 106 suspected victims of trafficking for forced labour have been recorded.”

    Suspected. How many have been confirmed?

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    Mute Taxi Bill
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    Apr 13th 2014, 4:10 AM

    Well !I just assumed that all the “refugees /asylum seekers” were “trafficked” into Ireland. and then “trafficked” from Dublin to the cities and towns of Ireland (at taxpayers expense.by government policy)

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