Modern-day Slavery

Darren Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 9th October 2018 Westminster Hall

[Gareth Snell]

My hon. Friend must be somewhat prescient, because he has read ahead in my speech before I have managed to get to that point. I shall touch on it later.

I welcome the announcement by the Government of the review of the Modern Slavery Act, which will be ably chaired by my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Frank Field) and the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller), as well as the noble Lady Butler-Sloss. That is a triumvirate of expertise if ever there were one. I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for being present this afternoon.

I want to talk about the processes in the Modern Slavery Act. It was a step forward in properly attacking and dealing with some of the horrible situations people find themselves in, but it also contained important preventive measures that helped to reduce modern slavery in all forms, whether sexual exploitation, domestic servitude, forced labour or criminal exploitation.

For me, one of the most important parts of the Act is section 54, which requires large companies with a turnover of £36 million or more to place on record transparency in their supply chains. Such modern slavery statements are a welcome process to deal with these problems but, if we are honest and up front, the implementation is simply not working properly. At a meeting of the Public Accounts Committee, on which I sit, the Home Office confirmed that it does not compile a list of companies that may be required to make a declaration, does not have a list of those that have done so and, importantly, does not maintain the database. Any further analysis of the information in the declarations is made by non-governmental organisations.

[Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)]

On that point, will my hon. Friend join me in congratulating TISCreport, which was developed and is based in Bristol? It has looked at the 18,000 companies with revenue of more than £36 million, and it is the only organisation that maintains a database of the companies that comply with section 54. The database is now searchable via a zoomable map. Will he encourage the Minister to engage with TISCreport and to allow it to help the Home Office in its endeavours?

[Gareth Snell]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. NGOs are doing some excellent work but, fundamentally, I believe that such work should be done by the Home Office and by Government—because we are talking about something set out in statute—rather than relying on the benevolence of third-party organisations.

Despite the work of the organisation in my hon. Friend’s constituency, and even though the matter has been progressed, I know that the Minister is aware of concerns about how section 54 is being implemented. Back in April I asked a question in the Chamber of a Department for International Development Minister, who confirmed that a hub was being set up. Will the Minister present today confirm what progress has been made on that hub?

What is really worrying, however, is that an investigation by The Guardian demonstrated that of the companies that had made a modern slavery statement, more than two thirds had failed to refer specifically to the risk of modern slavery. They had made a declaration, but it did not comply with the requirements of the Act. More worryingly, only 19% of all agricultural businesses that should be making a statement have done so, and that is an area in which exploitation could be rife.

Unfortunately, because everything is being done by third-party NGOs, the ability to compel necessary information simply does not exist. Until the Government introduce something on a formal statutory basis, more and more organisations will seek to put aside their responsibilities. The Co-operative Group, which I shall talk about later, has estimated that it is cheaper and easier for organisations simply to ignore the requirements than it is for them to produce the statements and submit them. There is no validation and so no penalty for failing to make a declaration.

The section 54 requirement also applies only to commercial organisations. The public sector, however, is a huge spender of money—billions and billions of pounds are spent in procurement—yet no public authority is required to make declarations to demonstrate their actions to reduce modern slavery. Were we to extend section 54 to cover public bodies and authorities, that might not stop certain aspects of modern slavery happening, but we would be able to have oversight of where the billions of pounds in public procurement are ultimately being spent, and Members could look for the impact on modern slavery.

--- Later in debate ---

[Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Gareth Snell) for securing this important debate and for introducing another six tests to remember. I support every single one of them.

I will make a very short speech—not least because I have only two minutes—about the unintended priority that this became as a consequence of being the new MP for Bristol North West. I grew up and have lived in my constituency for most of my life, but I never knew that modern slavery was taking place on my doorstep; it was not until I was elected that I came face to face with it, both through constituents in my surgeries and as a result of raids in Bristol thanks to the excellent work of Avon and Somerset police. I now understand about Bristol’s excellent history with Unseen, which provides the national modern slavery helpline, which was established and is based in Bristol.

TISCreport, which I have already mentioned, is looking at supply chains’ compliance with the Modern Slavery Act. I should add that even though I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central that the Home Office should have a statutory responsibility to ensure that data is used properly, that does not mean that it cannot work with non-governmental bodies to ensure it is done in the best possible way.

In my final minute, let me say that this is not just a domestic issue but an international one. We in the United Kingdom have something to be proud of in our work at home as well as abroad. I had the pleasure of being in Nairobi for 36 hours with the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association during the summer recess, where I saw at first hand the impact that British money is having on the ground in Kenya not only in aid but in security. British police officers were working with Kenyan police officers to massively increase the enforcement potential in investigation on the ground, although interestingly there was a lack of resourcing for victim support—something that was pledged to change as a consequence of the CPA organising meetings between non-governmental organisations and Kenyan politicians.

My one question for the Minister—I am sorry to be the one to introduce the Brexit word—is whether the projects on the ground in Kenya and other countries that are co-funded by the European Union and the United Kingdom will continue to be funded in a no-deal scenario.