Construction sector must do more to combat modern slavery in its supply chain, two leading industry bodies have warned.
The 2016 Global Slavery Index was released this week, which showed 45.8 million people are trapped in some form of slavery – many of them in construction.
“The findings of the Index are shocking and put the onus on all of us to take positive action against the evils of modern slavery,” said BRE’s head of responsible sourcing, Shamir Ghumra.
BRE is developing a new standard – the Ethical Labour Standard – which it says will provide organisations with a framework to verify their systems and processes in relation to the Modern Slavery Act and improve their ethical labour sourcing practices.
“We have 120+ organisations who are helping us shape the standard and trial its use,” said Ghumra. “These are organisations with complex international supply chains so the ability they have to affect real change on a global scale is significant.”
45.8 million people are trapped in some form of slavery, says the 2016 Global Slavery Index. Image: Dreamstime.com
Meanwhile, the CIOB is developing a toolkit for construction companies that use migrant labour, following its campaign document released last year, Modern Slavery: The Dark Side of Construction.
The toolkit will investigate the root causes of modern slavery and areas of good practice. It will look particularly at labour and materials supply, where slavery abuses often occur.
Chris Blythe, chief executive of the CIOB, said: “Slavery is present in most industries, whether through raw material production, manufacturing, contracted services or agency supplied labour. Global trends towards outsourcing and complex procurement processes are pushing risk further down supply chains, making it easy for human rights abuses to remain hidden.
“The CIOB’s core values are founded on the principles of ethical business behaviour. We are calling on our thousands of members to ask more searching questions of their colleagues, suppliers and clients.”
The CIOB toolkit will be published later this month.
