By Rebecca Camber for the Daily Mail
Slavery victims in the UK are now more likely to be British than any other nationality.
National Crime Agency statistics on potential slavery and human trafficking victims show Britons now top the league.
They have overtaken the number of Albanian, Vietnamese, Romanian or Chinese victims for the first time since records began.
Figures released last week also show that one in eight slaves reported to police is a British child aged 17 or under.
There were 432 British children reported to the authorities in the first nine months of last year who were suspected of being sexually exploited or forced to peddle drugs, weapons, stolen goods or deliver cash for gangs.
Figures for July to September 2017, show a record 179 British children were referred to police and local authorities.
That is seven times as many as the number of suspected British adult slaves reported in that time.
A total of 205 British nationals were recorded, a sixth of the 1,322 potential victims from 73 countries referred in the three months. Seventy-six children were at risk of labour exploitation and there were 94 cases of sexual exploitation.
In contrast, for the same quarter in 2016, there were only 57 children referred to police, 46 of whom were suspected of being forced into prostitution. The sharp rise comes as investigators say they are increasingly seeing criminal gangs grooming vulnerable young British girls for sex before transporting them around the country.