Human trafficking is happening on our doorstep, says head of Sheffield anti-slavery charity

Sharon endured the ultimate betrayal. She was enticed to the UK with false promises, then manipulated into a life of slavery – by a member of her own family. She came to the Yorkshire and Humber area from Ghana with dreams of becoming an accountant.

“My country is beautiful but there are no opportunities for anyone and there is corruption,” says Sharon, not her real name, who is now 27. “I wanted to be an accountant. I managed to study for an accountancy diploma. But there was no chance of getting any further. I was sat at home, helping my mum and feeling I’d just wasted three years of study.

“When my cousin, who was living in the UK, told me about her successful life, and promised to help me to get into college near her, I was really excited.

“She said I could stay with her and her family and offered to organise my visa and pay for my flight. People will say this sounded too good to be true but I had known her all my life; I trusted her totally.”

Sharon moved into her cousin’s home. She was given a mattress on the floor in the children’s bedroom, but she was told she would need to wait until September to start college, and asked to work in her cousin’s business in the meantime.

“I didn’t mind. I felt it was the least I could do to repay her for her kindness,” she says. “I worked six days a week until late each day, without receiving a penny. I felt very grateful to them. I didn’t want to make a fuss. But then I was asked to do the household chores on top of my job, and take the children to school. Without realising it, I had become the family’s unpaid servant and totally dependent on them. I would have liked to go out to make friends, but without money it was impossible. I think that was the plan – to isolate me. I became less and less confident.”

When the cousin’s business collapsed, there was no escape for Sharon. She was given false identity papers and a job was found for her.

“I didn’t have a say in it. They told me I needed to do it to pay for my college course, and living expenses while I studied. I could see their point so went along with it.” Around her household duties, she worked in a clothing warehouse. She has no idea how much she was earning, her wages went straight into her cousin’s bank account.

“She told me she was saving the money for me. But whenever I asked about applying for my college place, she would tell me I wasn’t ready. My English wasn’t good enough, I needed to be more settled here. There was always a reason. I had worked at the warehouse for over a year when I asked my cousin how much had been saved for me and where the money was. She got very angry and said I owed her money for the paperwork, my airfare and my room in her house. She always made me feel I should be grateful to her.”

Eventually Sharon confided in a friend at the factory, who helped her to get her payment details changed at the warehouse. That meant she would receive her next wage. It would give her the means to escape from her cousin.