Modern Slavery Bill should include food supply chain
Both have called on the government to step up safeguards, after reports in The Guardian newspaper claimed prawns sold by leading supermarkets Tesco, Walmart, Costco and Carrefour were produced by CP Foods, a firm based in Thailand, which allegedly relied on slave labour.
The newspaper claimed on Tuesday June 10: “A six month investigation has established that large numbers of men bought and sold like animals and held against their will on fishing boats off Thailand are integral to the production of prawns … sold in leading supermarkets around the world …”
‘An abhorrent crime’
Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper called the allegations “shocking” and urged the government to stop supermarkets selling food produced by slaves. “Trafficking people into slavery is an abhorrent crime and the international community should work together to stamp it out entirely,” said Cooper.
“We have called for greater transparency in supply chains to ensure products that have been produced through forced labour do not end up on our shelves. The government’s Modern Slavery Bill doesn’t go far enough to address this and we will be pushing for changes to ensure companies are more accountable for the actions of those in their supply chain.”
Another critic of the proposed legislation is the Association of Labour Providers (ALP). The association highlighted concerns that the bill would not ask companies to report how they were tackling forced labour in their supply chains because it could be too burdensome.
‘Made the wrong call here’
ALP director David Camp said: “The government has made the wrong call here. If the UK is serious about being a world leader in combatting modern day slavery then parliament should do its best to rectify this omission.
“Those companies that are striving to effectively counter slavery in their supply chains should not be undercut by those that turn a blind eye.”
The ALP planned to make its views known in a meeting with the home secretary Teresa May and the minister for modern slavery Karen Bradley MP at a meeting at the Home Office yesterday (June 12).
Meanwhile, Jim Murphy MP, Labour’s shadow international development secretary, said: “The brutal abuse of migrant labour in the name of profit and cheaper food has to stop.
“These revelations prove once again that fighting the exploitation of migrant workers is vital to modern day development. Everyone should be entitled to decent jobs, under decent conditions for decent pay wherever they are.”
A Tesco spokesman said: “We regard slavery as completely unacceptable. We are working with CP Foods to ensure the supply chain is slavery-free, and are also working in partnership with the International Labour Organisation and Ethical Trading Initiative to achieve broader change across the Thai fishing industry.”
The British Retail Consortium told FoodManufacture.co.uk that cooperation was the best way to end worker exploitation. A product boycott would penalise workers who needed help, it argued.
