The Silent Chains: How can we eradicate Modern Slavery within our supply chains?

By Johanna Ramaer

Just a week ago a fire erupted in a denim factory located in Ahmedabad, India, leading to seven deaths. Reportedly the factory had one door for entry and for exit, making it difficult for people to exit the building when the fire erupted. Imagine the horror and the fear those working to make our jeans experienced trying to run away from a fatal fire through just one door. It is heartbreaking and begs the question: at what price cheap denim? Poor safety in the factories making our clothes is unfortunately all too common. The entire manufacturing industry is riddled by its poor labour conditions, and numerous Modern Slavery practices have been identified within the industry.

The end of slavery throughout Britain’s Empire is usually connected to The Slavery Abolition Act in 1833. However, to what extent in real terms has this Act abolished slavery? The Act in 1833 may have abolished the old forms of slavery, but what we now refer to as ‘modern slavery’, is rampant. This is defined as ‘the recruitment, movement, harbouring or receiving of children, women or men through the use of force, coercion, abuse of vulnerability, deception or other means for the purpose of exploitation’. According to the Global Slavery Index no country in the world is exempt. In 2016 the ILO estimated that 40.3 million people were victims of modern slavery, which in turn generates annual profits of $US 150 billion. Such numbers are deeply troubling. Modern slavery permeates our daily lives in plain sight. In every product you buy there are traces of modern slavery and the recent fire brings these practices to light. This asks for effective measurements to eradicate modern slavery from our everyday supply chains.

In 2015 the UK implemented the Modern Slavery Act to prevent and prosecute modern slavery and protect victims. This Act was considered as world-leading and internationally praised for its breakthrough in corporate transparency. But four years later the Business & Human Right Resource centre, which had been monitoring the quality of Modern Slavery Act manual statements since its inception, finds that the act has failed to deliver the transformational change that many of us hoped for. Unfortunately, the Act has several shortcomings of which one is the lack of corporate liability. Under the Act, businesses with an annual turnover of £36 million or more and supplies goods or services in the UK are required to produce and publish an annual slavery and trafficking statement in a “prominent” place on its website every year. There are no immediate financial penalties for companies that fail to publish such a statement. As a result, few companies publish a statement and the statements that do get published do not necessarily spur impactful change in a company’s supply chain.

The UK Modern Slavery Act is yet another example of how voluntary codes of conduct do not work to tackle the numerous human rights abuses within the fashion industry. And the recent fire in India demonstrates once again the urgency and need for effective measures. The fierce competition and the race to the bottom that characterises the fashion industry have turned those who make our clothes into commodities and latter day slaves. No one surely wants to be a part of a slave trade, we all abhor the stories of the slave trade of the 18th Century and need to apply that same moral judgement to the consequences of our consumer choices today. Rather than creating measures that only affect those companies that are willing to be more transparent about the potential human rights abuses within their supply chain, we need to create a level playing field for all companies. We need consumers to ask the question “Who Made My Clothes”, ask governments to work together to eradicate supply chain slavery across the globe and in the UK look to the amendment to Section 54 of the Modern Day Slavery Act to eradicate this within larger businesses here. Implementing extra-territorial liability for modern slavery within supply chains is the only measure to effectively eradicate the evil of modern slavery. Only then will we be able to prevent such horrible incidents, like the recent fire in India, from happening.

If you want to know more about the shortcomings of the UK Modern Slavery Act and how more corporate liability can be added to the act members can read our policy paper here.

The Price of Free, a documentary about Nobel Prize winner Kailash Satyarthi and winner of the Sundance Grand Jury Prize 2018 is a must watch highlighting the horrors of endemic child labour by a director who has managed to save more than 88,000 children from latter day slavery. The next time you source a bargain, which seems too good to be true, in all likelihood, it is.