Modern Slavery Bill

Debate between Anas Sarwar and Michael Connarty

Tuesday 17th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Anas Sarwar (Glasgow Central) (Lab)]

I do not intend to speak for very long at all, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I just want to touch on a few aspects, particularly around the supply chain amendments and how they relate to our commitment as a country and as a Government to our international development obligations. It is right that we seek to increase opportunity right across the world, but we have to accept that many of the systems we adopt domestically perpetuate poverty and the cycle of deprivation in some of the poorest and most vulnerable places around the world. One example of that is supply chains.

This debate comes between Fairtrade fortnight and the anniversary of the Rana plaza disaster, when 1,200 workers lost their lives putting together garments, many of which were going to be worn in Britain. That is why these amendments are so important, and I welcome many of the changes that have come from the Government, although I agree with the shadow Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr Hanson), that they could have gone a lot further.

The fact that 80 billion garments a year are produced globally, that there are 168 million child workers and that 85 million of them are working in hazardous conditions and that over 4 million aged between four and 14 are working in India alone shows the scale of the challenge. If we are to be serious about our international obligations, we must make sure our domestic legislation helps to shape and fight for the right things across the world. We must ensure that everyone has access to a decent job, fair pay and the right to join a trade union.

On that point, it is unacceptable in the midst of such a debate, in which I welcome many of the Government’s proposals, that we see the ideological scrapping of central budget support for the International Labour Organisation, which helps to promote workers’ rights around the globe. If we come into government on 7 May—as I hope we will—I am sure we will reverse that funding cut, and I hope a Government of any other colour would do so, too.

I want to say a bit about the sustainability of putting not only voluntary but mandatory entitlements on companies. Companies must meet their full obligations and there should be some kind of certification mechanism for well-behaved companies to be recognised, but bad practice must be exposed and outlawed. That will give the public the same confidence that they have about cocoa, chocolate and wine through Fairtrade fortnight. We should have the same confidence about all those things we acquire from across the globe.

I see that my three minutes have arrived, Madam Deputy Speaker. In closing, I welcome the Government amendments. They could have gone a lot further, but let us hope that this is the start of an opportunity to improve life chances of workers not just here, but across the globe.

[Michael Connarty]

I echo the positive and cautionary comments that my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) has made today. We have done much to progress this issue, but we still have a long way to go. I want to mark the fact that we did not take the advice of Lord Judge and Peter Carter and that we will not have a cascade of serious offences, so that people will know exactly what they are being judged on and so that judges will know what we want them to do, rather than having to interpret the previous collection of crimes. That, for me, is the most important thing.

I want to talk also about the Connarty-Mactaggart clause. We might even be able to call it the Connarty-Mactaggart-Bradley clause if the Minister were to attach herself to it. If I were to put that in alphabetical order, I would have to put the Minister’s name first, but I do not want to do that as the issue was initiated by my right hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) in her ten-minute rule Bill and by me in my private Member’s Bill.

I thank the Minister for putting into amendment 73 the six areas of information that an organisation’s slavery and human trafficking statement must include and disclose. The amendment also states that the board of a company must approve such a statement and that it will have to be signed by a director. That provision came from debates in the Bill Committee and in the Joint Committee. Those provisions give strength to what we have been trying to do.