UK Company Supply Chains

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Tuesday 16th December 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery) on leading the debate and I commend him and my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Jim Sheridan) on their initiative in North Carolina and the meetings that they have held here since. I was struck that my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck made the trip to North Carolina having been in Columbia the previous week with me and others on a Justice for Colombia trip.

When we were in Colombia, among the things we witnessed was a major project driven by the EU-Colombia free trade agreement that is leading to the degradation of land rights and further abuse of labour rights. However, in a poignant way that project is not just throwing up issues about new dimensions of modern slavery; it saw us meet Afro-Colombian families who are the descendents of the original escaped slaves—the people who were given and found this land by the shores in Colombia—who are now being driven off that land and forced to live in concrete batteries up mountains, well away from their previous experiences. That is happening not just to them, but to indigenous peoples as well.

That mega project of a super port at Buenaventura is driven not just by the Colombian Government and big business, but by myriad vicious paramilitaries who are completely indulged by the police. That is one of the reasons why, as a member of the Modern Slavery Bill Committee, in Committee and on Report I tabled amendments that would have broadened the issues around ethical trading and supply-chain proofing. That was to make sure not just that customers were taking responsibility for what happened in the workshops from which they bought goods, but that people were taking responsibility for wider aid and trade policies that were driving wholesale, pernicious human rights abuses, affecting not only people’s labour and land rights, but their basic living conditions and even where they had the right to live.

In the Bill Committee, we did see progress on supply chains. Initially, the Bill was completely deficient in that area, but there was strong lobbying, which, I must acknowledge, came from Members on both sides of the House—from the Government Benches and the Opposition Benches, and from parties big and small—and that was reflected in the Committee. Obviously, there was also a big lobby, involving groups ranging from Anti-Slavery International to the Catholic Fund for Overseas Development, Oxfam, UNICEF and many others, and they all highlighted, among other issues, the Bill’s deficiency in that respect.

Even though all those groups and coalitions inside and outside Parliament must be commended on the strong case they made to the Government, the business voices responding to the ethical trading initiative were decisive in persuading Ministers. Although I commend the businesses involved for being ethically alert and active and for working in partnership with others, it is a poor comment on the Bill that the issue would have been missed altogether had it not been for the intensity of those business voices.

[Huw Irranca-Davies]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. Some of the more progressive, ethically aware companies see the competitive advantage in driving higher standards, which will, hopefully, drive the rogues out of the marketplace in different sectors. There is therefore an advantage in driving higher standards.

[Mark Durkan]

Exactly. That is exactly the point those businesses made, and it was clearly taken on board by Members on both sides of the House. It was also stressed by the trade union movement, which has been an active driver of the ethical trading initiative.

Whenever the Government resisted widening the Bill’s scope, they would tell us that ethical auditing was already taking place. However, ethical auditing, as talked about and supposedly practised over a number of years, is really a badge for big business, rather than a shield for vulnerable, exploited workers. My hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Huw Irranca-Davies) and others have quoted examples of scandals that have been identified, including the case of the Thai fishing industry, which was revealed in The Guardian. We were previously told that those things were the subject of ethical auditing—that companies were aware of the issues and would respond to any problems—but it is up to somebody else to show them the problems, and then they respond.

In the example of the Thai fishing industry, there has been some positive response subsequently. After The Guardian exposed the story, with the assistance of Anti-Slavery International, that organisation, along with Thai NGOs, retailers and seafood suppliers, embarked on a project called Issara—the Thai word for “freedom”. The inspections the project team has been able to carry out are already delivering positive results and driving change. That shows that there needs to be effective intervention, as hon. Members have said.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North said, effective intervention should be about making sure not only that companies are liable and held to account for what happens in their supply chain, but that the state has the power to ban goods. What is the point of passing legislation saying that companies will have responsibilities and liabilities in terms of knowing what is going on in their supply chains, saying that we encourage consumers to be responsible, conscientious and aware—for example, that the goods they buy may come from southern India, where young Dalit women and girls are exploited, or from Uzbekistan, where the exploitation involves not just companies, but the Government—and saying that there is a responsibility on consumers, suppliers and retailers, if there is no responsibility on the state? If it is evident that the sourcing or manufacture of a product involves slavery and human rights abuses, there should be the power to ban that product.

Such a power has existed in American law since 1930—since the Tariff Act—and it was in the scope of one of the amendments I tabled to the Bill to say that there should be the power to ban or prohibit something where there was clear evidence of abuse. That amendment would not have imposed a duty on the state to police trading practices in all parts of the world, but it would have been based on the state’s right to respond when someone else brought evidence to it. In the American system, the Department of Homeland Security can be petitioned with evidence, and it would then have the power to issue a ban. If we are serious about dealing with these issues, we should follow through.

[Chris Williamson]

My hon. Friend is right. I am closely following his point about the importance of the state being meticulous in enforcing greater protections. As my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North said, these multinational companies are quick to resort to litigation, and they will spend a lot of money on lawyers. Chevron, for example, had a case brought against it for causing terrible pollution in the Ecuadorian rain forest, but it said it would fight the case

“until hell freezes over and then fight it out on the ice.”

When international companies have that attitude, states need to be strong and to stand up for their citizens; otherwise, these powerful companies will ride roughshod over them.

[Mark Durkan]

I fully accept my hon. Friend’s point. That is why, rather than leaving these issues to all sorts of litigation, there should be the power to ban a product where it can be specifically identified.

I have closely followed all that my hon. Friend has said today and previously about Qatar. Several Members in the Bill Committee mentioned the system of employer-tied visas for domestic workers in the UK, where the visa, which rests with the employer and is almost their property, can be abused in a way that makes the employee their chattel. The style and logic of the visa system used to exploit workers in Qatar are exactly the same, and that should give us all pause for thought.