To mark Anti-Slavery Day (October 18), Oxford city councillor Tom Hayes explains how to spot some of the warning signs of exploitation which could be happening right in front of you.

TODAY is Anti-Slavery Day.

Slavery is not something that happens in some faraway country, it is happening right here in Oxfordshire.

It doesn't belong to some distant past, it’s happening right now, and the people who are most common victims in the Thames Valley are not people from abroad, they are UK nationals.

Thankfully, we can all do something to stop slavery and exploitation.

Slavery isn’t something that is so secret that it cannot be detected: much of it can take place in plain sight – people obviously undernourished and working on building sites or farms; nail bars where people are working for excessively long shifts; car-wash operations that feel exploitative and wrong.

Modern-day slavery has many faces, and they can be seen in the referrals of 85 exploited people here in Oxfordshire to support services to escape slavery.

In the year from July 2017 to June 2018, these people – ranging in age from 14 to 55, mostly British, although some came from abroad – will have been the tip of a very large iceberg.

The most conservative estimate suggests that there were hundreds of victims of modern slavery in the Thames Valley area.

Here in Oxford, the city council and our partners have been taking measures to end the unacceptable exploitation and inhumane treatment of vulnerable people.

Oxford City Council helped to set up Hotel Watch, which trains hoteliers to spot the signs of exploitation, including child sexual exploitation and modern slavery, and what to do if they believe something suspicious is happening.

We introduced mandatory safeguarding training for all taxi drivers that it licences to operate in the city, and worked with neighbouring districts to roll this training out to all taxi drivers across Oxfordshire.

The council’s community safety team innovated the idea of the Independent Trauma Adviser (ITA) role – a role which delivers crisis intervention for new victims and offers ongoing support and advocacy for victims.

Elmore Community Services – an Oxford charity working with vulnerable people to stop them falling through the gaps of services – delivered this service to more than 50 victims over two years and intensively supported 31 to escape their situation.

For some, this support involved going into a safehouse in another part of the UK, while for others it meant staying in their own community with protection from their abusers.

Whether or not a victim went into a safe-house, escaping exploitation was the start of a journey to a safer, happier life where they have control.

We also seek to end the cruellest element of the drug market.

Crossovers between modern-day slavery and the calculated exploitation of vulnerable people are commonplace: young people and vulnerable adults are being exploited and coerced into moving money and drugs around the city.

Oxford City Council is committed to ending drugs slavery in our city by working with others through our new drugs task-force, launching this week, to ensure every vulnerable person can be found, stops being exploited, and gets the support they need to rebuild their lives.

Vulnerability is the dominant feature of modern-day slavery, whether that's a learning disability, drug addiction or mental health problem, and the exploitation of that vulnerability is the beating heart of this criminality.

Precisely because people are so vulnerable, they need to have enough support to put their lives together again, but sadly the Government aren’t doing enough in this area.

At a meeting of all councillors, I submitted a motion which asked the question ‘how long is long enough for victims to start putting their lives back together again?’

The Government protects people for a 45-day period then leaves them and their supporters to move on.

That isn’t right and I’m glad councillors called on Government to extend support from 45 days to a year.

The tragedy of slavery is that it’s a condition of human making, driven by greed and those that would make a profit from excessively cheap labour.

Together, we can spot it, stop it, and drive slavery from Oxfordshire.

Call 08000 121 700 to get help, support a suspicion or seek advice. Always call 999 in an emergency.