Explanatory note

These Regulations specify Scottish public authorities which will be required to notify the chief constable of the Police Service of Scotland of victims of offences of human trafficking and slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour. They also specify those persons to whom the chief constable will in turn be required to provide information about victims of these offences.

Schedule 1 lists the information that is to be included in a notification given by a specified Scottish public authority to the chief constable where the public authority holds that information.

Schedule 2 lists the information that is to be included in a notification given by the chief constable to a specified person where the chief constable holds that information. It is envisaged that the chief constable may make these notifications to specified persons on a periodic basis, incorporating details relating to all victims over the period since the last notification.

Regulation 7 provides that a notification is not required to contain any information which would enable the identification of an individual victim. This is to be read alongside section 38(2) and (5) of the Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Scotland) Act 2015, which provides that notifications must not include such details where the victim is an adult and does not consent to their inclusion.

The National Referral Mechanism is the process for establishing whether there are reasonable grounds to believe that an individual is a victim of a human trafficking offence or an offence of slavery. servitude and forced or compulsory labour.