A CIPS survey of procurement and supply chain professionals revealed that one fifth of large UK businesses are not aware of their obligations under the Modern Slavery Act, which came into force in October 2015. The Act requires companies with more than £36 million turnover to publish a statement online detailing what they are doing to tackle slavery and human trafficking in their supply chain. Of those surveyed, only 27% said they could be certain of no slavery in their supply chain; 52% of buyers said they wouldn’t know what to do if they did identify forced labour abuse.
Supply Management’s campaign reports on government findings that that there are between 10 - 13,000 slaves in the UK, with 130 related labour abuse convictions in 2014 and 233 in 2015.
Andrew Wallis, CEO of anti-slavery non-governmental organisation Unseen, whose work paved the way for the Modern Slavery Act 2015 (and earned him an OBE, says every company should presume they have a problem, try to identify it and devise a plan to address it. “Bollocks to PR,” he says, “just hold your hands up, accept you’ve got a problem and focus on what you’re going to do about it.”
Rebecca Ellinor Tyler, Supply Management Editor, said: "Every single consumer could be complicit in encouraging modern slavery. Then, it's no stretch to imagine most companies are unwittingly supporting this menace somewhere in their supply chain.
"It's a hideously complicated problem that is difficult to uncover, and immensely challenging to tackle once discovered. That's why, with this re-vamped, re-launched issue of Supply Management, we are backing CIPS' campaign to raise awareness and help the procurement and supply profession play a pivotal part in eliminating this evil."
The re-launched Supply Management includes a new look for the magazine, website, email bulletins, jobs board, and an insights platform - all channels which will be used to promote the anti-slavery campaign.
David Noble, Group CEO CIPS, said: “Modern Slavery is a real time issue for the world at large to address and the procurement and supply chain profession has a fundamental role to play. We need to raise awareness of the issues and take action now. Clearly there is still a lot of confusion out there about what steps business needs to take to meet the requirements of the Modern Slavery Act – that’s where CIPS can help. Supply Management will be an essential vehicle to help spread the word and we are really pleased to be re-launching with this critical campaign with many more insightful and thought provoking topics and features to follow in the months ahead.”
In November, CIPS contracted Haymarket Media Group as its supplier of media and events, globally. CIPS, the leading professional body for procurement and supply chain management, has a global community of over 118,000 in the UK, Asia, China, Australasia, Africa and the Middle East and around the world.
Haymarket now produces all CIPS media for its Supply Management brand: member magazine, website content, email bulletins, social media and jobs board plus all associated commercial activity. In addition, it manages CIPS international portfolio of conferences and awards events. The relationship is managed by Haymarket Network, Haymarket's content marketing agency, and draws on the specialist commercial expertise of Haymarket Business Media, along with the Group's international office infrastructure.
