To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many audits of supply chains have been undertaken to ensure that public bodies and publicly-funded projects are not using forced labour through their supply chains.
Answered on
18 August 2014
We do not hold central information on the number of audits commissioned or auditing steps taken regarding publically funded projects, as these would be a matter for individual contracting authorities to commission.
All suppliers are required to comply with UK law, including relevant human rights and employment rights law. Social, environmental and ethical issues are taken into account in the procurement process, where relevant and proportionate.
In particular, EU procurement rules require contracting authorities to exclude suppliers that have been convicted of certain offences, and allow authorities to exclude suppliers for grave professional misconduct. The new EU procurement Directives, which are currently being transposed into UK law, update the mandatory exclusion offences to explicitly include offences of "trafficking in human beings".