In July this year the UK Parliament’s Joint Committee on Human Rights (JCHR) published a report calling for the introduction of mandatory Human Rights and Environmental Due Diligence (mHREDD) legislation within a year to mandate due diligence across supply chains and to ban goods linked to forced labour from the UK market. This followed evidence collected by the Committee’s inquiry that goods which are produced or part-produced with forced labour are being sold to consumers in the UK.
In its response to the JCHR report, published last week, the UK Government stated its commitment to working to ensure that the UK market is not complicit in such practices, and is actively exploring options to strengthen protections. While campaigners have welcomed this commitment, they have expressed disappointment that it fell short of a commitment to introducing mHREDD legislation.
In a joint statement The Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI) (of which Banana Link is an active member), British Retail Consortium (BRC), Corporate Justice Coalition (CJC), and Trades Union Congress (TUC) state that “mHREDD legislation is essential to ensuring that all businesses meet their responsibility to respect all human and labour rights, and the environment. Enshrining mHREDD in law will drive consistent and meaningful action across the private and public sectors, protect workers and communities, and ensure a level playing field so that responsible companies are not undercut by those turning a blind eye to exploitation.“
“As other countries move ahead with regulating global supply chains, it is vital that the UK keeps pace. Strong mHREDD legislation with legal accountability mechanisms will strengthen supply chain resilience, enhance sustainable and inclusive growth, and help ensure that respect for people and the planet becomes a baseline for doing business, not an exception.“
Dominique Muller, Executive Director of the Corporate Justice Coalition, said “There is growing urgency to address corporate accountability and growing calls for mandatory due diligence legislation. The JCHR has laid out how the UK’s existing piecemeal and ad hoc domestic law framework for addressing forced labour is “inadequate”. The government response cites a patchwork of often ineffective sticking plaster regulations highlighting the urgent need for a holistic approach to addressing human rights abuses and environmental harms in supply chains. While we recognise the government is undertaking a review of responsible business conduct there is little transparency on the process. We hope the government can take bold steps towards a new law that will hold companies to account.”
A picture of persistent rights abuses linked to UK companies
Research from the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre and other groups around the world has exposed the extent of human rights abuse and environmental destruction linked to UK companies.
Many UK companies have a global presence and complex supply chains, while victims face numerous obstacles which often prevent them reporting abuse. Sometimes an abuse is directly perpetrated by a UK company, but more frequently it may occur via a subsidiary, supplier or contractor, often in response to UK companies demanding unreasonably low prices or fast delivery times. Various initiatives to increase corporate transparency when it comes to human rights have not succeeded in placing relevant information in the public domain. Despite these barriers, what evidence is available demonstrates the severity and range of human rights and environmental abuses linked to UK companies:
- 129 attacks on human rights defenders connected to UK business activity between 2015 and July 2022.
- Widespread reports of gender-based violence and harassment in Indian garment factories supplying UK brands.
- 65 complaints made to the UK National Contact Point related to potential violations by UK companies of the OECD Guidelines on Multinational Enterprises – the code of responsible business conduct which the UK Government has committed to promoting. This is nearly a fifth of the total complaints made globally, even though the UK is just one of 50 countries to have established such a National Contact Point.
Banana Link, which is also a member of the Corporate Justice Coalition, has played a role in advocating for binding legislation on the human rights and environmental impacts of global commodity chains over the last twenty years. International Coordinator, Alistair Smith, commented:
“This is a golden opportunity for the UK to show leadership in an area where the EU has led the way, but where pro-deregulation forces are trying to water down what has been agreed. The British government should understand that, with proposed legislation backed by civil society, retailers, trade unions and many other companies, the time is ripe to get to work and level the playing field for workers, consumers and all those who depend on the world’s complex economic chains. For banana workers, the single biggest priority issue is the freedom to organise independently of their employers so as to negotiate improvements in working and therefore living conditions.”
Image by PublicDomainPictures from Pixabay
