Modern Slavery Charter

• Lead Member Birmingham City Council
• Categories Social Outcomes, Strategy

Implementation of the Co-operative Party Charter Against Modern Slavery

In July 2021, Birmingham City Council signed the Co-operative Party’s Charter Against Modern Slavery. The charter takes a 10-step approach, ensuring that local authorities work proactively to ensure there are no instances of modern slavery taking place within their supply chains. It commits us to:

1. Training our procurement team to understand modern slavery through the Chartered Institute of Procurement and Supply’s online course on Ethical Procurement and Supply.
2. Requiring contractors to comply fully with the Modern Slavery Act 2015, wherever it applies, with contract termination as a potential sanction for non-compliance.
3. Challenge any abnormally low-cost tenders to ensure they do not rely upon the potential contractor practising modern slavery.
4. Highlight to suppliers that contracted workers are free to join a trade union and are not to be treated unfairly for belonging to one.
5. Publicise our whistle-blowing system for staff to blow the whistle on any suspected examples of modern slavery.
6. Require our tendered contractors to adopt a whistle-blowing policy which enables their staff to blow the whistle on any suspected examples of modern slavery.
7. Review our contractual spending regularly to identify any potential issues with modern slavery.
8. Highlight for our suppliers any risks identified concerning modern slavery and refer them to the relevant agencies to be addressed.
9. Refer for investigation via the National Crime Agency’s national referral mechanism any of our contractors identified as a cause for concern regarding modern slavery.
10. Report publicly on the implementation of the charter annually through our Modern Slavery Transparency Statement.

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