Modern slavery at record levels in UK and expected to worsen, report warns

Slavery in the UK is at record levels and is expected to worsen over the next decade, the government’s independent anti-slavery commissioner has warned.

According to the number of referrals to the national referral mechanism, which assesses potential victims of slavery and provides support to victims, numbers have almost doubled in the last five years from 12,691 referrals in 2021 to 23,411 in 2025, the highest ever number.

In her report, published on Tuesday, Eleanor Lyons said this increase was not only due to better detection of slavery but also to worsening conditions in the UK and across the world.

“Poverty, global instability, conflict, global displacement of people and the breakdown of safe migration routes are creating a growing pipeline of vulnerability that traffickers are quick to exploit,” said the report, Anticipating Exploitation: A Futures-Based Analysis.

It pulled together research compiled by more than 50 different experts across law enforcement, government, civil society and the charity sector and is the first comprehensive forward-looking analysis of how modern slavery and human trafficking are likely to evolve in the UK over the next decade.

Lyons said that unless the UK took action, the situation could become even worse with AI being used to scale up and professionalise exploitation; the increased use of digital labour in “scam compounds” – such as entrapping people into investor and romance fraud; and the integration of cryptocurrencies into trafficking models.

The report also raised concerns about the continued growth of gig economy platforms, coercive labour in areas such as agriculture, construction and mining, and an increase in reproductive slavery such as enforced egg harvesting and surrogacy.

Lyons called on ministers to increase funding for specialist police units so they can disrupt exploitation, prosecute more businesses exploiting or enslaving workers, and to launch a national campaign to help the public recognise and report exploitation. She is also called on the government to improve victim care.

Her report warned that without urgent action criminal networks would become more cunning, less visible and harder to disrupt. “Slavery and the most harrowing forms of exploitation are becoming more widespread in this country and evolving faster than we can respond,” Lyons said.

“As exploitation becomes more complex and more hidden, driven by technology and global instability, it will spread further and become harder to stop unless we act now.”

A separate evaluation report, also published on Tuesday by the Council of Europe’s influential group of experts on trafficking in human beings, , highlighted a steep rise in potential trafficking victims.