Donate

National Lottery Community Fund makes engagement with hard to reach communities possible

Funding made possible by National Lottery players enables five year project to engage survivors of modern slavery in hard-to-reach communities across the UK.

Following a record number of calls and webform contacts in 2023, the Modern Slavery & Exploitation Helpline, run by anti-slavery charity Unseen, was awarded £1m over five years by the National Lottery Community Fund in August 2024. These funds will be used in campaigns aimed at engaging 15 hard to reach communities. 

This project will focus on increasing capacity of the Helpline, collaborating with lived experience consultants, and developing tools to engage overlooked survivors who need information and guidance.   

Reaching out to communities at risk

This project seeks to identify communities at heightened risk of modern slavery and exploitation that have historically had low engagement with the Helpline and other support services. Barriers to engagement can include misunderstandings of what exploitation looks like, fear that contacting the Helpline will result in being reported to authorities, and limited awareness of the Helpline and its role. 

Once communities at risk are identified, the Unseen team works to improve engagement through a variety of approaches tailored to each group. These typically include:   

  • Creating accessible materials such as flyers and posters, which are translated into specific languages based on community demographics. 
  • Running targeted social media campaigns and press activity. 
  • Delivering talks and workshops in community settings. 
  • Providing guidance and training for professionals who may come into contact with community members. 
  • Partnering with trusted organisations already active within these communities. 
Led by lived experience

A central aspect of this project is the involvement of Unseen’s survivor consultant group. The project is regularly working with, training, and empowering survivors of modern slavery to act as key advisers, contributing to research and co-designing culturally sensitive, accessible materials available in multiple languages. 

Backed by data

Each community we engage in this project is carefully researched and selected using multiple factors.

The team identifies areas where engagement and existing research are limited, but where Helpline and Home Office National Referral Mechanism data indicate a need for further investigation.

Relevant stakeholders are then engaged to build a deeper understanding of these communities. Materials and engagement approaches are co-developed with the survivor consultant group, stakeholders and key community members, and informed by best practice in community research and engagement. 

Expanding communities nationwide

During this project, communities are carefully selected by experts within the team to make sure they align with the project’s scope and the research team’s capacity. However, the risk of exploitation can affect members of these communities nationwide. 

If you’ve identified a similar situation in your area and think these materials could help but current language translations don’t reflect your community, please contact us at [email protected] to discuss options. 

Learn more about each community

The Modern Slavery & Exploitation Helpline is a free, independent, and confidential service staffed by trained advisers. 

If you or someone you know is experiencing exploitation, please call the Helpline on 08000 121 700 or use our webform. 

Related stories

Donate
Justine Currell

As I came to understand more about the issue, including through a visit to an Unseen safehouse, I knew I needed to do more to stop this abuse and exploitation.

For the last five years of my Civil Service career, I was the Modern Slavery Senior Policy Advisor in the Home Office and led on development of the Modern Slavery Act, including the transparency in supply chains provision and business guidance.

I joined Unseen to lead the development of the Modern Slavery & Exploitation Helpline, and Unseen’s work with businesses. I am regularly called upon to present at national and international conferences and use my experience of working with Ministers to influence other governments internationally to take action to address modern slavery and, in particular, business supply chain issues.

In my spare time I enjoy keeping fit, music, reading and travelling.

Andrew Wallis

What ultimately compelled me to act was a report on how people from Eastern Europe were being trafficked through Bristol airport to the USA. Kate Garbers, who went on to be an Unseen Director, and I wrote to all the city councillors, MPs and the Police Chief Constable challenging them on the issue. The challenge came back to us: this city needs safe housing for trafficked women. And so Unseen began.

But we never wanted Unseen to be just about safe housing. We wanted to end slavery once and for all, and that remains our driving focus.

I chaired the working group for the Centre for Social Justice’s landmark report “It Happens Here: Equipping the United Kingdom to Fight Modern Slavery”. This is now acknowledged as the catalyst behind the UK’s Modern Slavery Act of 2015. It was a great honour to be awarded an OBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours that year. On the other hand, I’ve also been described as “the loveliest disrupter you could ever hope to meet”.

This job has taken me from building flat-pack furniture for safehouses, to working with businesses to address slavery in supply chains, to delivering training, raising awareness and advising governments around the world.

When not at work, I enjoy travelling, spending time with my dog Harley, cooking, supporting Liverpool and Yorkshire CC, music (I’m a former DJ) and endurance events such as the Three Peaks Challenge and Tribe Freedom Runs – which I vow never to do again. Until the next time.