ghandi

Our Services

Here's how the expertise in can help you, your business and your community.

Services offered

Modern Slavery Risk Assessment Service

Leading social audit experts and modern slavery academics at the Wilberforce Institute are helping businesses to identify and avoid slavery practices in their supply chain, complying with the 2015 Modern Slavery Act.

Under the new rules, businesses with a turnover of more than £36 million are legally required to publish a slavery and human trafficking statement each year. The statement sets out what steps they have taken to ensure that slavery is not occurring in their business or supply chains.

Failure to comply results in a court injunction. There are fines for continued non-compliance, as well as significant damage to a company’s reputation.

While companies have a legal obligation to follow the new rules, more forward-thinking businesses are welcoming this review of responsibilities. Showing progress year on year is a powerful way of underscoring their ethical credentials and protecting their reputation.

It is also a opportunities for businesses to strengthen their relationships with suppliers, producers and customers. Consumers are increasingly shopping with their consciences. The online publication of annual anti-slavery statements will enable them to see which companies are actually addressing the issues.

To help companies uphold the new law and capitalise on the opportunities it opens up, the Wilberforce Institute has established the Modern Slavery Risk Assessment Service. The team now providing this service to several major UK retailers: identifying risk in their supply chains and putting preventative measures in place.

Providing a unique combination of business experience and academic rigour, the service is able to dig deep into supply chains and uncover potential problems such as organised crime, human trafficking and forced labour.

 The assessment includes

  • a review of the client company’s existing ethical sourcing management systems and policies, and its risk management tools

  • research into the challenges faced by suppliers at an industry and/or national level

  • recommendations on how best to address modern slavery hot-spots with suppliers

For further details, please contact

Phone: +44 (0) 1482 305176
Mobile: +44 77428 91929
Email: c.talens@hull.ac.uk 

 

Training relevant practitioners

Alicia Kidd, a PhD student at the Wilberforce Institute and Vice-Chair of the Humber Modern Slavery Partnership, jointly delivers a modern slavery training package for frontline professionals from across the Humber region. Attendees included representatives from councils, local NGOs, the police, the NHS and the Department for Work and Pensions.

The training incorporates information on

  • the definition of modern slavery

  • the different types of exploitation

  • the indicators of modern slavery

  • what to do in the instance of identifying a potential victim

  • the legal requirements and responsibilities of the attendees

  • what happens once a person has been identified as a potential victim

  • a summary of the local picture

For further details, please contact Alica at A.Kidd@2015.hull.ac.uk

 

Advising governments to bring about change

The Wilberforce Institute helps to inform policy. It recently played an integral role in the development of a landmark bill to help eradicate modern slavery in the UK.

The team advised the Government when the Modern Day Slavery Bill was drawn up, and the accompanying Act (the first of its kind in Europe) was passed in March 2015.

We also act as an advisor to the UK’s Anti-Slavery Commissioner, Kevin Hyland, OBE.

Top