The number of people affected by modern slavery is on the rise. Research from the University of Liverpool highlights how important it is for survivors to receive long-term emotional support.

The authors analyzed the LifeLine program developed by the modern slavery charity Causeway, which aims to provide such long-term support to survivors of modern slavery.

Long-term support

The study was conducted by interviewing individuals who have firsthand experience with modern slavery, and it was also co-designed with a group of survivors to evaluate the effectiveness of the service on the ground and to make recommendations for improvement.

The National Referral Mechanism (NRM), a government-funded program for survivors of modern slavery, originally focused on providing short-term support for foreign nationals to encourage them to work with police and return to their home countries.

However, an increasing number of modern slavery survivors in the UK are now British nationals, many of whom are children who have been exploited criminally. Once the NRM support ends, after 45 days or when a decision is made on whether an individual is a survivor of modern slavery, LifeLine (established in 2012) offers services such as helping survivors find employment and housing and connecting them to other agencies for specialized support on issues such as immigration and mental health.

Valuable support

The analysis of the LifeLine service revealed that 78% of survivors were satisfied with the support they received. However, during the study, survivors expressed concern about the reduction in support when transitioning from the National Referral Mechanism (NRM) to LifeLine, suggesting that government-provided support should be expanded.

The report from the University of Liverpool provides specific recommendations to Causeway on how to provide effective support to survivors that focuses on preventing harm, promoting empowerment through proactive measures, and connecting survivors to resources within their local community.

“Our study has found that Causeway’s LifeLine is an essential service that prevents survivors of modern slavery from falling through the cracks once government support through the NRM has ended,” the researchers explain. “This support is crucial given that there are increasing numbers of people who have been identified as having experienced modern slavery.”