Slaves on our streets: How an Independent journalist witnessed an enslaved domestic worker's dash for freedom

It is 9.30 on a Monday evening, and Anne, 44, is sitting on the 28 bus in Kensington High Street. Her grey jumper is wet from her crying, and her whole body is shaking. This is the first bus she has ever been on.

Anne, who is too terrified to use her real name, has just escaped from a flat near Wandsworth Bridge, where she had been kept as a slave by a Saudi family visiting London for a summer holiday. “It never came into my head that I would escape. I guess destiny brought me here. I can do it. I can do anything.”

Last year, the UK granted 18,950 overseas domestic worker visas to people like Anne, so they could accompany wealthy families to the UK. These workers are mostly women, and the largest number are originally from the Philippines, followed by Indians and Indonesians. Anne did not plan for her life to turn out like this. When she left the Philippines to work for a family living in Saudi Arabia, her contact promised a well-paid job as a midwife.

But when she arrived in Riyadh in 2015, her employers confiscated her passport and forced her into domestic servitude. She was paid 1,400 dirhams (£300) a month, which she sent back to her family in the Philippines. She says she was not allowed to leave the house and had no day off.

“I was an animal to them,” she said. “I could only eat the children’s leftovers, so I was always hungry, and madam always shouted at me.

“Every time I tried to sleep, I had pain in my arms from working too much, so I would cry. And there were cameras all around the house watching me.”

When the family brought Anne with them to London, her situation got even worse. “My madam made me work 24-hour shifts sometimes, and my feet were so heavy because I never sat down,” she said. “In the daytime she would take us shopping with the family, as their slaves. I was a donkey, just following them, carrying bags.”

After she arrived in Britain, Anne’s father in the Philippines was diagnosed with a serious illness. “Even though they knew I needed money for my family, they wouldn’t pay me. I begged my madam, but while we were in London she just stopped giving me my salary.”

Anne became desperate. Then one day, her employers went out shopping, and dropped her in a Hyde Park playground to look after the children.

While the children were playing, a woman walked over and handed her a card. It had a phone number on it. A few days later, Anne’s father died, and she plucked up the courage to call it. On the other end of the line was Marissa Begonia, co-founder of Justice For Domestic Workers, the woman who had handed Anne the business card.

Set up in 2009, J4DW works to empower its members to stand up to discrimination, inequality, and slavery.As well as providing them with clothes, food and shelter once they have escaped abusive employers, J4DW campaigns for law changes to protect domestic workers from this abuse happening in the first place.

Marissa knows first-hand what it feels like to run away. Before she started J4DW she escaped from two abusive employers herself.

Sitting in a McDonald’s in south-west London while waiting for Anne to give the signal she was going to try to escape, Marissa and fellow J4DW member Mary Balqen told the Standard about the 1,500 domestic workers they have freed in the past eight years — and the ones who haven’t been so lucky.

“Another one was supposed to escape in Kensington last night,” Marissa said. “She was on the phone begging us to save her. I said, ‘Tell us the name of the street and we will be there.’ But she didn’t know it. Then I heard a male voice, which must have been her employer, so I hung up. We are waiting for her to call again.”

While Marissa was talking, Mary’s phone started vibrating on the table. Anne’s employers had gone out to a restaurant, and she now thinks the moment has come to run away.

​Marissa and Mary put on their coats, and walked silently across the road to a block of luxury flats. Waiting for the lights to change, Marissa points up to a window, and the silhouette of a woman waving. This was not Anne, but the other domestic worker she works with. She was desperate to escape too, but had decided to stay behind, to look after the employer’s baby. “We can rescue her next time,” Marissa said.

Eventually, Anne emerged from a glass door, carrying two plastic bags, eyes darting around nervously. Marissa and Mary took her hand, and hurried across the nearby bridge. Terrified of being seen, Anne wrapped Marissa’s scarf around her head.

They jumped on the first bus that appeared to secure their getaway. “Someone came to save me and I had a chance for help, so I grabbed it. I guess this is not a crime,” Anne said, tears running down her face. “I can’t wait to tell my family.”

Anne does not know whether her visa has expired, because her employers have her passport. She is being referred to the National Referral Mechanism, and will then find out whether she will be granted a two-year visa to keep working here, or be deported.

“I feel worried and nervous now,” she said, her lip trembling with excitement and relief. “But at the same time happy — because I am free.”

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