Just Released: "Good Practice Toolkit: Strengthening Modern Slavery Responses"

 I am delighted to bring to the attention of readers the publication of the "Good Practice Toolkit: Strengthening Modern Slavery Responses." It is the 4th of a series of reports undertaken by academics from the Australian Human Rights Institute (UNSW Sydney), Business and Human Rights Centre (RMIT), the University of Melbourne, the University of Notre Dame Australia, the University of Western Australia and Willamette University, together with the Human Rights Law Centre, the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre and Baptist World Aid.

The Good Practice Toolkit draws on findings from the multi-year project showing how companies are responding to the MSA and conducting human rights due diligence. It identifies and addresses two areas of business practice that are notably weak: engagement with stakeholders; and engagement with suppliers.

“The Good Practice Toolkit provides guidance on how to approach these areas as part of a broader human rights due diligence process and highlights good practice examples from both reporting entities and other businesses,” said Professor Justine Nolan, director of the Australian Human Rights Institute and one of the Toolkit’s authors.

 Its re-imagining of the idea and practice of mandatory human rights due diligence as originally framed in the UNGPs to the specific context of Australia's Modern Slavary law is particularly interesting.

All reports can be read here. The Good Practice Toolkit may be downloaded HERE IN PDF FORMAT.

Introduction


This Good Practice Toolkit provides guidance for business on how to strengthen responses to the Australian Modern Slavery Act (MSA) and how to conduct human rights due diligence. The Toolkit focuses on two areas that have been found to be particularly weak in assessments of business practice:

Ɵ engagement with stakeholders; and
Ɵ engagement with suppliers

The evidence collected during this multi-year research project examining the effectiveness of the MSA and broader studies, shows that when done well, engagement with stakeholders and suppliers is key to combating modern slavery1 

[Disclaimer: The good practice examples provided in this Toolkit are
for illustrative purposes only and not as an endorsement of any given
practice or company.]

The United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) envisage that stakeholder and supplier engagement occur at various stages of human rights due diligence2 Business should conform to standards of human rights due diligence. When implemented, human rights due
diligence helps businesses identify, prevent, mitigate and account for how they address their adverse human rights impacts The process should include assessing actual and potential human rights impacts, integrating and acting upon the findings, tracking responses, and communicating how impacts are addressed.

In this Toolkit, we highlight examples of good practice that form part of an effective human rights due diligence approach to addressing modern slavery. These examples offer guidance for business, government and civil society who seek to ensure that the changes being implemented ultimately reach workers and change their lives for the better.

This Toolkit is the fourth publication in a multi-year collaborative research project between nine academic
and civil society organisations It builds on previous research outputs that include:

Ɵ Paper Promises: Evaluating the Early Impact of Australia’s Modern Slavery Act (February 2022) and Broken Promises: Two Years of Corporate Reporting under Australia’s Modern Slavery Act (November 2022). These reports examined corporate statements submitted to the Government’s Modern Slavery Register by approximately 100 companies sourcing from four sectors with known risks of modern slavery: garments from China, rubber gloves from Malaysia, seafood from Thailand and horticultural produce from Australia.

Ɵ Australia’s Modern Slavery Act: Is it Fit for Purpose? (April 2023) This report revealed the results of a detailed survey of nearly 90 business groups, supported by in-depth focus discussion groups, on the impact of Australia’s Modern Slavery Act as well as company approaches to remedying modern slavery in supply chains. 

As we noted in our Broken Promises report, ‘in order to be effective, the MSA must evolve from prompting a paper-driven response, to a people-driven response to tackling modern slavery’.3 A focus on improving stakeholder and supplier engagement will facilitate that change.

NOTES:

1. Amy Sinclair and Freya Dinshaw, Paper Promises: Evaluating the Early Impact of Australia’s Modern Slavery Act (Report, 6 February 2022), (‘Paper Promises report’); Freya Dinshaw, Justine Nolan, Christina Hill, Amy Sinclair, Shelley Marshall, Fiona McGaughey, Martijn Boersma, Vikram Bhakoo, Jasper Goss and Peter Keegan, Broken Promises: Two years of corporate reporting under Australia’s Modern Slavery Act (Report, 16 November 2022), (‘Broken Promises report’) 3; Shelley Marshall, Vikram Bhakoo, Andrew Kach, Fiona McGaughey, Martijn Boersma, Freya Dinshaw, Justine Nolan and Amy Sinclair, Australia's Modern Slavery Act: Is it Fit for Purpose? (Report, 3 April 2023). (‘Fit for Purpose report’).

2. United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: Implementing the United Nations “Protect, Respect and Remedy” Framework (UN Publication, 2011) (‘UNGPs’).