Financial Exploitation in Modern Salvery and Judicial Review in the High Court – Matthew Howarth

R (on the application of AOP) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2026] EWHC 971 (Admin)

Matthew Howarth, instructed by the Government Legal Department, appeared for the Secretary of State for the Home Department (“SSHD”) before Karen Ridge sitting as a
Deputy High Court Judge in the Administrative Court in Manchester. The judge refused the claimant’s renewed application for permission to judicially review the SSHD’s Reasonable Grounds decision under the Modern Slavery Act 2015 on all three grounds, upholding the SSHD’s conclusion that the claimant had not established the exploitation element of the statutory definition of trafficking.

Case Background

The claimant, an Indian national, was promised employment in the United Kingdom by Peter Chimanga, the director of a company called 24/7 Flex Care Limited. Before travelling to the UK on a work visa in April 2023, the claimant was induced to pay £10,000 purportedly to cover Home Office fees, agency fees and the company’s own charges. On arrival, he was given a single day’s training and then waited to be allocated work. No employment materialised, and after twelve months his sponsorship visa was cancelled.

When the claimant attended the company’s offices to raise the matter, Chimanga demanded a further £15,000 to find him a new sponsor, and threatened to report him to the immigration authorities if he involved solicitors. The claimant subsequently encountered a second individual, Jaydip Bhai, who took a further payment of £3,000, promising an 18-month work share code; that expired after three months and contact could not be maintained.

Following advice from the Salvation Army, the claimant was referred to the National Referral Mechanism (“NRM”). The SSHD’s Reasonable Grounds decision, issued on 29 July 2025 and maintained on reconsideration on 6 August 2025, accepted that two of the three trafficking components were present in relation to the events involving 24/7 Flex Care (a relevant action and a relevant means, namely recruitment by fraud and deception), but concluded that the third element — exploitation — was not established. Permission was refused on the papers by HHJ Bird, and the claimant renewed the application at an oral hearing on 5 March 2026.

The Legal Framework

The definition of trafficking requires three elements to be satisfied: a relevant action (recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt); a relevant means (force, coercion, fraud, deception or abuse of vulnerability); and the action by those means must be for the purpose of exploitation.

Section 3 of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 defines exploitation to include slavery, servitude and forced labour; securing services by force, threats or deception; and a number of other forms of serious abuse. The SSHD’s Modern Slavery Guidance (Version 4.0, 16 July 2025) lists examples at paragraph 2.22, including sexual exploitation, forced labour, slavery, servitude, forced criminality and organ harvesting, but does not use language that is exhaustive.

Critically, all three components must be established in an adult trafficking case, and it is the purpose of the trafficker — the intent to exploit — that underpins the entire process, not merely the fact that the victim suffered harm or financial loss.

The Grounds of Challenge and the Court’s Decision

Ground 1 — Breach of Guidance / Financial Exploitation

The claimant argued that the SSHD had unlawfully disregarded financial exploitation as a form of exploitation capable of satisfying section 3, and had thereby breached her own Guidance. The court rejected that argument.

The judge accepted the SSHD’s core submission, advanced by Matthew Howarth, that the intent of the alleged trafficker is central to the analysis: the claimant does not need to show that he was actually exploited, but must show that the prior deception was undertaken for the purpose of subsequent exploitation.

On the facts, the court held that it was reasonable to conclude that there was no evidence of any intention by 24/7 Flex Care to financially exploit the claimant once he had arrived in the UK. The company had simply ignored him for twelve months. The subsequent demand for £15,000 and the accompanying immigration threats were, as Matthew Howarth had characterised them, a separate and opportunistic attempt at financial extortion, made only after the claimant threatened to involve solicitors — not evidence of a pre-formed intent to exploit at the time of the original deception.

The judge confirmed the SSHD’s characterisation of the scheme: this was a case of advance fee fraud, designed to extract money through false promises of employment that was never going to materialise, rather than trafficking for the purpose of exploitation.

The court further held that references to “financial exploitation” in the Guidance must be read in context and consistently with the statutory definitions. The Guidance does not, and cannot, convert every fraud or extortion into trafficking where the statutory elements are absent.

Ground 2 — Irrationality

The irrationality challenge was also refused. The court was satisfied that the decision maker had applied the Guidance as a whole, considered the three components of trafficking separately and reached a rational conclusion on the facts. The claimant had identified no logical gap, omission or perversity in the reasoning.

The suggestion that the SSHD had operated a “secret policy” beyond the Guidance was rejected, as was the contention that the decision contained serious methodological
errors.

Ground 3 — Unlawful Fettering of Discretion

The claimant argued that the SSHD had unlawfully fettered her discretion by applying an unduly restricted definition of exploitation, pointing in particular to an email from the
SSHD’s Technical Specialist Team. The court rejected this. On a proper reading, the email explained the application of the Guidance to the claimant’s specific circumstances and was not inconsistent with the statutory definition or the Guidance. The decision maker had assessed the claimant’s account against the statutory test and Guidance in full; that assessment did not amount to fettering.

Why the Case Matters

This is a significant ruling on the correct approach to the exploitation element of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 definition of trafficking. The court’s judgment confirms several important points of principle:

Financial loss or fraud, without more, does not satisfy the exploitation element of section 3 MSA 2015. The statutory definition requires the deception or coercion to be directed towards securing services, labour, or benefits of the kind described in section 3; an advance fee fraud scheme that simply extracts money through false promises of employment is not, without more, trafficking for the purpose of exploitation.

The purpose of the trafficker at the time of the relevant action is central. Opportunistic and subsequent demands for money, made after a victim complains or threatens legal action, are not necessarily evidence of a pre-formed intent to exploit.

The Guidance must be read as a whole and consistently with the statute. References to “financial exploitation” in guidance documents do not expand the statutory definition so as to encompass all fraudulent schemes involving financial loss.

Practitioners acting for the SSHD and those advising potential trafficking victims in NRM cases should note the court’s clear endorsement of the distinction between advance fee fraud and trafficking for exploitation.

Practical Point

This case underlines the importance, in NRM decisions, of focusing clearly on the trafficker’s intent at the time of the relevant action. Where the evidence shows only a fraudulent scheme designed to extract money — with no evidence of an intention to force the victim into labour, services, criminality or similar — a Reasonable Grounds decision that finds the exploitation element unmet is likely to withstand challenge. Decision makers and legal advisers should take care to assess the entire sequence of events chronologically, distinguishing between the initial deception (and its purpose) and any subsequent opportunistic demands that may give rise to criminal liability of a different kind.

The full case can be read here: https://caselaw.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ewhc/admin/2026/971

For more information, or to instruct Matthew Howarth, please contact Criminal Clerk Ty Price