Ban all products tainted by forced labour

Modern slavery and forced labour can be behind all sorts of products we take for granted, from the clothes we wear to the food we eat, to the gadgets we use every day. We know that the Government can do much more to ensure that goods tainted by modern slavery are not sold in the UK. Help call on the Government to change the law right now by adding your name to the petition.

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I want the Government to ban the import of all products tainted by forced labour and modern slavery.

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More details about the petition

Did you know there are an estimated 50 million people in slavery around the world, including millions in forced labour, many of whom are children?

Many are forced to work in squalid, dangerous conditions, for little or no money and often under the threat of brutal violence and not free to leave.

There are victims of forced labour all over the world, working on farms and in mines, in factories and in workshops, making the things we use in our daily lives – from the clothes we wear, to the food we eat to the phone you might be using to read this.

Where does forced labour happen?

Forced labour could be happening anywhere in the process of making and distributing a product – this is known as the “supply chain”.

It could be on a farm where cocoa beans are harvested to make our chocolate, in a factory making T-shirts that will be sold in our high streets, or in a warehouse packing all manner of products to be distributed around the UK.

Strengthening supply chains laws

We are calling on the UK Government to use the planned new modern slavery bill to ban the import of modern slavery-tainted products into the UK.

We need companies to get better at rooting out exploitation in their supply chains, or even their own businesses. Current laws only ask firms to report what they are doing to stop slavery – even if that is nothing at all. And many give little information or ignore the rules completely. We want reporting rules to be stronger with proper penalties if companies don’t comply, but we need more.

Import bans need to be introduced as part of a package of measures to address forced labour in supply chains. The measures should include support for victims too. Import bans can encourage companies to take greater steps to find or prevent forced labour in their supply chains and to compensate workers if exploitation is uncovered.

The Government has already acted on some supply chains. In summer 2022 it banned the NHS from buying any products tainted by modern slavery, after news emerged that the NHS could have been using PPE made by forced labour in Malaysia and China.

So let’s persuade the Government to go further and ban all import of products tainted by forced labour. Can you help? Sign the petition now.