Liu
Liu Bao Ren owned a successful brick factory in Fujian province in Southern China when he was arrested in 1997, at the age of 33, for his membership of a banned Buddhist cult, the Quan Yin method. Liu was tortured: his face was held millimetres away from a bucket of urine and excrement and sometimes a towel soaked in that bucket was used to wipe his face; he was beaten and shaken in a way that left no marks. He got word out to his brother to bribe the governor and prison warders to allow him to escape...
Home
As a young child from a poor, rural and large family in Fujian province in Southern China, Liu Bao Ren, dreamt about “the iron bowl”, as a guaranteed job in government is known in China. He feels that his ambitions as a youngster have not been fulfilled as an adult. Physics used to be his favourite subject in school and he had dreamt of becoming like Newton. He had wanted to go to Australia to study and do scientific research. Instead he did his apprenticeship in China’s construction industry before going on to own a successful brick factory. However, he was arrested in 1997, at the age of 33, for his membership of a banned Buddhist cult, the Quan Yin method. Liu believes that he has not been successful in life because he keeps changing his dream. Today he wants to set up a painting and decorating business and buy his own house although he still does not get regular work. He feels his English is still not good enough to allow him to work outside the Chinese community. He would like to earn enough to send money home to build a school or road and do ‘good works’.
Journey
After he was imprisoned for membership of a banned cult, he escaped by bribing the officials and took a train to Beijing. He knew he would not get an identity card to work in China. A snakehead (a people smuggler) agreed to take him to Europe on a fake passport at a cost of 100,000 RMB (approximately £7000). He took a flight to Moscow and from there to Budapest. After two weeks, a group of 18 migrants was packed into three cars and driven to some woods. When it was dark, they began their climb up a slippery and steep mountain path. At the top of the mountain they saw searchlights and were told that this was the border between Hungary and Slovakia. They had to climb another taller mountain which was reached by walking on a steep path on all fours for a gruelling three hours. If people were too tired to continue their journey, they would be left to die.
From Slovakia they were driven to a garage in Austria. In the basement, there was a warren of rooms with about 200 people headed to different destinations in Europe. From here they were driven to Prague in a container where they waited a month before crossing the heavily policed German border. They had to walk for nearly 24 hours without food in knee-deep snow. Liu ended up crawling into Germany because he was too tired to walk. Then they were taken to Amsterdam where they stayed for 3-4 weeks before crossing into the UK in a dark and mouldy container, stinking of urine, without any toilet stops during a 20 hour journey. Liu had been on the road for four months. They had lived in overcrowded conditions along the way, facing violence and extortion from their escorts, starvation and constant friction with other travellers over resources.
Arrival
When Liu was granted asylum in 2003, he finally escaped a life of hunger and destitution. He was then able to take on better paid jobs in better health and safety conditions. His wife and family joined him a year later. Although work is still irregular, he is paid the going rate for the job. His family are slowly settling down in Britain. Liu hopes to return to China one day. He believes that he will be happier there.
Entrapment
As Liu had no friends or family in London to help him find his way around, he ended up working for the Triad doing odd jobs, such as porterage, but it was not enough to meet his basic needs and the money he had brought with him was fast running out.
Liu escaped their clutches by paying £200 to a lorry driver to find him another job. As Liu had experience of construction work, he found one low-paid job after another in the building industry with such poor health and safety conditions that he suffers from health problems to this day. On one occasion, he fell through two floors before getting stuck with his legs dangling through the floor; on another, he fell part of the way while installing a chimney stack. Some places they did not get paid and were threatened with violence if they asked for payment. He suffered starvation and a life of destitution for five years.
Fear
Following Liu’s public condemnation of the snakeheads, he received death threats. His mother was visited by police in China and members of his family were thrown into prison. Liu had also offended the Big Boss (head of a Triad gang) here and had to go into hiding for a year, living in garden sheds and working for a pittance in small towns and villages the length and breadth of England. Liu lives in fear of the Triads to this day. He believes they will track him down and hurt him even though he has taken care to change many vital details of his story in order to escape identification.
Resistance
Liu found it very difficult to challenge the bosses who exploited him because his lack of papers made him vulnerable to the worst exploitation. In the first couple of years, he would get work for only a few months of the year so he could not afford to insist on even the most basic conditions. On some construction sites, his fellow workers would be beaten up simply for asking for their wages. When he asked one employer for a mask because he was experiencing breathing problems from the dust caused by the demolition work, he was told to bring a towel.
Escape
When Liu was granted asylum in 2003, he finally escaped a life of hunger and destitution. He was then able to take on better paid jobs in better health and safety conditions. His wife and family joined him a year later. Although work is still irregular, he is paid the going rate for the job. His family are slowly settling down in Britain. Liu hopes to return to China one day. He believes that he will be happier there.
Voices from Contemporary Human Trafficking and Forced Labour
