Corporate Responses to Tackling Modern Slavery

A Comparative Analysis of Australia, France and the United Kingdom

Bibliographic Data

ID13019369
AuthorsFiona McGaughey (0000-0001-5992-9939, The University of Western Australia, corresponding author), Hella Vo (0000-0002-0691-4706, HEC Montréal), Holly Cullen (0000-0002-2846-1621, The University of Western Australia), Matthew C Davis (0000-0003-1577-7544, University of Leeds)
Year2021
Volume7
Issue2
Pages249-270
Publication date2021-11-15
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueBusiness and Human Rights Journal (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2057-0198 • E-ISSN: 2057-0201
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/bhj.2021.47
OpenAlexW3214701261
LanguageEN
Citations received9
References cited12

The business and human rights agenda is gaining momentum internationally, perhaps best evidenced through recent legislative responses to tackling modern slavery. Using a reflexive law lens, we analyse three recent laws – the UK Modern Slavery Act 2015, the French ‘duty of vigilance’ law of 2017, and the Australian Modern Slavery Act 2018 (Cth). The three laws, or their accompanying guidance, share characteristics in terms of reporting requirements: the supply chain; risk mapping/assessment and management; analysis of subsidiary and supply chain risk; and effectiveness. The French Act has a broader scope as it is a due diligence, rather than a reporting law and includes obligations with regard to human rights and fundamental freedoms, health and safety, and the environment. It is the only Act of the three with substantive penalty provisions. All reporting requirements in the French and Australian Acts are mandatory, but the UK Act has limited mandatory reporting requirements. We find that only 22 companies globally will be required to report under all three laws. Using a subset of this dataset, we analysed 59 French vigilance plans and UK modern slavery statements published by nine manufacturing companies. This provided some preliminary analysis of how businesses have reported under the French Droit de Vigilance and the UK Modern Slavery Act (reports under the Australian Modern Slavery Act for these companies were not published at time of writing). Overall, businesses are using less demanding measures such as introducing policies and delivering training more commonly than the somewhat more resource-intensive activities such as audits. The more onerous requirements of the French law were reflected in the content and level of detail in the vigilance plans, compared with the UK modern slavery statements. However, for some companies, there were strong similarities between the UK and French publications, indicating ‘creep’ from the French Act into UK reports or a ‘race to the top’

Audit · Business · Common law · Companies Act · Corporate governance · Corporate law · Due diligence · Duty · Human rights · Multinational corporation · Political science · Subsidiary · Supply chain · Corporate Law and Human Rights · Global trade, sustainability, and social impact · Law · Regulation and Compliance Studies · Accounting · Finance

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