
A slave in Scotland - orf
http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2016/may/28/slavery-human-trafficking-hotel-workers-bangladesh-scotland
======
distances
He was jailed, but how come the missing wages, overtime, and compensation
weren't awarded at the same time? This should all have been dealt in a single
sentencing. It would have been both fair for the victims and efficient for the
justice system.

There was a similar case for a pizzeria employee in Finland. An Indian worker
was tricked into country and forced to work extra long days with no holidays,
for 16 months. The place owners got jail time and prohibition to run a
business. The employee got 90k€ in missing wages plus 12k€ in compensation for
the suffering.

~~~
blahedo
That was my persistent thought as I was reading the article. How is it even
remotely possible that the legal system did not see the trafficked men as
victims here? It was prosecuted as if Arefin's sole crime was against the
state, and the men he effectively enslaved were merely witnesses. (Which is
also more or less how it was treated by the first few authorities it was
reported to.)

------
teh_klev
As a Scot I'm deeply embarrassed about how these men were treated.
Unfortunately, although Scotland has a devolved parliament, immigration and
border control isn't a devolved power. I'd like to think that if these powers
were devolved, or in an independent Scotland, the Scottish equivalent of the
UK Borders Agency/Home Office would have treated these folks far more
sympathetically.

Whilst nowhere near as horrific as Azad and his colleagues experience, there's
currently a high profile story in the press about an Australian couple and
their son who've lived here since 2011. The UK government changed the visa
rules and now want to kick them out:

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-
islands-3638...](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-
islands-36387513)

One day I hope we can gain these powers and treat law abiding guests in our
country with much better respect.

------
bjornsing
I like the idea that "civilization is the process of setting man free from
men". Unfortunately immigration law based on sponsorship is rather obviously
pulling in the other direction...

------
Animats
We have trouble with this in the US.

One big problem is employers holding passports. That's illegal in the US, but
widespread. This would be easy to fix. Since the US takes biometrics on legal
immigrants entering the country, anyone legally in the US should be able to go
to any place with a TSA/ICE presence (any airport), get a
fingerprint/retina/photo scan, and get an immediate temporary ID.

~~~
nojvek
I would absolutely love to see this happen. I wish there was a govt user voice
where people would vote for their ideas and those with the most votes in a
department would have to be looked at.

We seem to have a democracy but the only decision we can make is which
man/woman leads the country.

------
Drdrdrq
Horrible. One aspect of this story is that these men are still slaves, though
their masters are now moneylenders and the whole thing seems kind of legal...
Modern day slavery.

