Home Office modern slavery statement 2020 to 2021 (accessible version)

Question 1

Home Secretary foreword

Accepted Answer

Slavery has not gone away. Modern slavery exists in almost every part of the global economy. It is unimaginably cruel and destroys the lives of victims. They are exploited by criminals for profit, often in seemingly legitimate businesses. This hidden workforce produces some of the goods and services we use every day.

These workers are not just in factories overseas. They are forced to work under terrible conditions, hidden in plain sight across the country. The public is increasingly aware of this exploitation and rightly expects businesses and public bodies to stop it.

I am proud that the UK is leading the way to eradicate modern slavery. The Home Office is the lead department responsible for co-ordinating the government’s strategic response to this vile crime. That includes overseeing the operational response to disrupting and bringing to justice the perpetrators who exploit vulnerable people, work upstream to prevent people being exploited, and the considerable support we provide to victims of modern slavery.

We were the first country to legislate to require large businesses to report on what they are doing to prevent modern slavery in their operations and supply chains. To enhance the impact of this legislation, we launched an online modern slavery statement registry in March 2021, bringing all modern slavery statements into one place and radically enhancing transparency in supply chains.

The public sector has a crucial role to play, accounting for £290 billion of expenditure on goods and services. We are harnessing this spending power to help prevent modern slavery and drive up labour standards. In March 2020, we published the world’s first government modern slavery statement, detailing the steps the UK government has taken to prevent modern slavery in its own supply chains. From 2021, ministerial government departments will publish individual statements to provide greater transparency on the steps they are taking. We will extend the Modern Slavery Act’s reporting requirement to large public bodies too.

We want to be the gold standard for how businesses and the public sector identifies and prevents modern slavery. There is no doubt that we have a long road ahead, but we will not stop until slavery is consigned to the dustbin of history.

Rt. Hon Priti Patel MP

Home Secretary

Question 2

Executive summary

Accepted Answer

The Home Office leads on the UK’s Transparency in Supply Chains (TISC) legislation, under the Modern Slavery Act 2015, which requires certain large businesses with a turnover of £36 million or more to publish annual modern slavery statements.

Following strong support from a broad coalition of stakeholders, the Home Office published its response to the Transparency in Supply Chains consultation in September 2020, which committed to taking forward an ambitious package of measures to strengthen the transparency legislation, including extending the reporting requirement to public bodies with a budget of £36 million or more, a global first. This will require legislative changes which will be introduced when parliamentary time allows.

Although the Home Office is not currently in scope of the transparency legislation, we have (along with other ministerial government departments) committed to voluntarily publish annual modern slavery statements. This statement is the first to describe in detail the steps that the Home Office has taken to tackle modern slavery risks in its supply chains. It also describes how we, as the lead department across government, are helping to build greater capability across the wider public sector to conduct modern slavery due diligence.

Each ministerial government department will outline the activities they have taken over the past year in their individual statements.

Over the last year the Home Office has:

1. worked with a wide range of businesses, civil society organisations and academics to inform our approach

2. created a network of director-level anti-slavery advocates to oversee how their ministerial government departments are tackling modern slavery and increase collaboration across government

3. risk assessed 286 contracts so that we can focus our modern slavery due diligence on higher risk supply chains and work in partnership with suppliers to make tangible improvements

4. reached over 1,000 public sector officials through workshops and events on the key steps they should take to tackle modern slavery and created a range of tools to support them

5. set new goals to ensure we make year-on-year progress and established key performance indicators to measure the effectiveness of our actions

Question 3

Section 1. Organisational structure, operations and supply chains

Accepted Answer

This section provides an overview of the Home Office, our supply chains and governance arrangements to tackle modern slavery in our supply chains. We highlight the size and diversity of our supply base and the range of partners we work with to inform our approach to preventing modern slavery in the Home Office and public sector supply chains.

About the Home Office

Since 1782, the Home Office has led work to keep the country safe from those who seek to do it harm. We work to keep people safe and secure so they can prosper wherever they may live. The government is committed to levelling up the country and cutting crime is central to this mission.

The Home Office is the lead government department for crime (including modern slavery), immigration and passports, drugs policy, fire, counter-terrorism, and police. We have 30 arm’s length bodies (ALBs), with which we work closely to tackle crime.^{[footnote 1]}

We have approximately 33,445 full-time, permanent employees and are headquartered in London with regional offices across the UK. In financial year (FY) 2020-21 we had a total net expenditure of £15 billion. This includes procurement of goods and services, grants, staff, and other administrative costs.

Our supply chains in the 2020-21 financial year

last year, we spent approximately £3 billion with third party suppliers on goods and services (excluding grants)
we have 13 strategic suppliers, of which 5 are cross-government strategic suppliers^{[footnote 2]}
the majority of our direct suppliers (tier 1) are registered in the UK but some of their operations and supply chains are global

Categories of spend

Our highest categories of spend in 2020-21 FY were:

Data, Digital and Technology – £1.3 billion
Industrial Services – £580 million
Facilities Management – £570 million
Professional Services – £350 million
Office Solutions – £44 million

In March 2021, we had over 1,100 contracts categorised as Gold, Silver or Bronze:

43 Gold contracts – Strategically important contracts or other commercial arrangements that are business-critical (e.g. front-line service provision would be at risk without them). Annual expenditure for a Gold contract is typically over £40 million.

188 Silver contracts – Operationally important contracts or other commercial arrangements that may be business-critical but where annual expenditure is typically between £5 million and £40 million.

922 Bronze contracts – Remaining Home Office suppliers; this generally includes operational or transactional contracts or other commercial arrangements where annual expenditure is less than £5 million.

Governance of the Home Office’s modern slavery commercial policy

Matthew Rycroft CBE is our Permanent Secretary and Patricia Hayes CBE is our Second Permanent Secretary. They have a responsibility for the regularity and propriety of the Home Office’s spending decisions, including the steps we have taken to prevent modern slavery in our supply chains.

The Permanent Secretaries are supported by Sam Ulyatt, the Home Office’s Chief Commercial Officer and anti-slavery advocate. Sam plays a key role in overseeing how our commercial function addresses modern slavery risks in our procurements.

Home Office Commercial is supported in this work by the Home’s Office’s Modern Slavery Unit, a policy team that leads on implementation of the Modern Slavery Act 2015, including Transparency in Supply Chains policy. The Minister for Safeguarding, Rachel Maclean MP, is the Home Office minister responsible for modern slavery policy.

Accelerating cross-government collaboration on supply chains

The Home Office, Cabinet Office, and Crown Commercial Service (CCS) have jointly developed cross-government strategy and policies to tackle modern slavery in government supply chains. We work in consultation with the new cross-government director-level Anti-Slavery Advocates Network and the working level Modern Slavery and Procurement Implementation Group. The Home Office convenes both groups regularly to:

ensure policies and tools are fit for purpose (e.g. we co-developed a modern slavery risk prioritisation tool to support departments focus their activity on suppliers operating in medium-high risk supply chains)
build greater awareness of best practice modern slavery due diligence at senior levels (e.g. we have invited businesses and civil society experts to share insights and tips at anti-slavery advocate meetings)
co-ordinate activity and provide a forum for peer-to-peer learning (e.g. we have created a peer review process for departments to receive feedback on drafts of their modern slavery statement from other departments and external stakeholders, so they can identify areas for improvement)

Partnering with experts and the wider public sector

We have worked with a wide range of partners to develop our approach to tackling modern slavery in public sector supply chains, including the Business Against Slavery Forum^{[footnote 3]}, the Modern Slavery Strategy and Implementation Group^{[footnote 4]}, the Modern Slavery Policy and Evidence Centre, and the office of the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner.

In 2021, we established a working group consisting of wider public bodies and civil society organisations to champion good practice in the public sector and explore how public sector policy and systems can support more effective due diligence^{[footnote 5]}.

Governance and partnership goals for 2021-22 FY:

continue to chair the cross-government director-level Anti-Slavery Advocates Network and the working level Modern Slavery and Procurement Implementation Group to build on the cross-government momentum we have gained year-on-year
create actions groups and work plans for the public sector working group, to ensure the group delivers tangible outcomes
include modern slavery as a rolling agenda item for the Chief Commercial Officer’s meetings with the 13 Home Office strategic suppliers and hold a roundtable with these suppliers

Question 4

Section 2. Modern slavery policies

Accepted Answer

This section sets out the key policies the Home Office leads on or has adopted to prevent modern slavery in supply chains. Section 3 details the steps we have taken to implement these policies.

Government policies to tackle modern slavery in wider private and public sector supply chains

The Home Office is the lead department responsible for co-ordinating the government’s strategic response to modern slavery. The UK’s Annual Report on Modern Slavery describes the government’s wider work to tackle modern slavery, including how we support victims, our international advocacy, and the law enforcement response.

In March 2021, we announced a review of the 2014 Modern Slavery Strategy to ensure we build on the considerable progress we have made to date, adapt our approach to the evolving nature of these terrible crimes, and continue our international leadership in tackling modern slavery. We plan to publish a revised strategy in Spring 2022 following a period of stakeholder engagement.

The Home Office leads on the UK’s Transparency in Supply Chains (TISC) legislation, under the Modern Slavery Act 2015, which requires certain large businesses with a turnover of £36 million or more to publish annual modern slavery statements. Following strong support from a broad coalition of stakeholders, the Home Office published its response to the Transparency in Supply Chains consultation in September 2020, which committed to taking forward an ambitious package of measures to strengthen the transparency legislation, including:

extending the reporting requirement to public bodies with a budget of £36 million or more, a global first
mandating the specific reporting topics statements must cover
requiring organisations to publish their statement on the new government modern slavery statement registry
setting a single reporting deadline by which all modern slavery statements must be published

In 2021, the government also announced that the new Single Enforcement Body for employment rights will have powers to impose financial penalties on organisations who fail to meet their statutory obligations to publish annual modern slavery statements. All of these measures require legislative change and will be introduced when parliamentary time allows.

Launch of the modern slavery statement registry

In March 2021, the government launched an online modern slavery statement registry, which will help bring all modern slavery statements in one place and radically enhance transparency by enabling public buyers, investors, consumers, Non-Governmental Organisations (NGO) and others to scrutinise the action organisations are taking to prevent modern slavery.

The government is now encouraging all organisations in scope of the legislation to submit their statement to the registry. Since launch, over 6,000 statements have been submitted covering over 20,000 organisations on a voluntary basis.

Cross-government policies to address modern slavery in HMG supply chains

The Policy Procurement Note (PPN) 05/19 and modern slavery procurement guidance is the principal framework we use to inform how we identify and mitigate modern slavery risks in our supply chains. This guidance is based on the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.

The guidance sets out the steps we must take to identify and mitigate modern slavery risks throughout the commercial life cycle, from defining contract requirements and procuring goods, to managing supplier relationships and remediation where exploitation has been uncovered. The key steps the Home Office has taken to implement this guidance are set out in section 3.

To support other government departments to implement the PPN guidance, we have also developed:

a modern slavery risk prioritisation tool to help departments risk assess their contracts in accordance with the PPN guidance more easily
an induction pack for anti-slavery advocates to ensure senior commercial directors are better equipped to oversee how their department is tackling modern slavery
guidance on modern slavery statements to ensure departments have a clear understanding of key information they must include in their first statements
guidance on developing modern slavery KPIs to help departments measure the effectiveness of the measures they are taking to combat modern slavery

The Home Office also adheres to all of the cross-government policies set out in the UK government modern slavery statement.

Government is delivering greater social value through its commercial activities and incentivising businesses to become more responsible and sustainable. Following the launch of the Social Value Model, most new central government procurements need to take account of social value criteria in the award of contracts, and place a minimum weighting of 10% of the total score for social value to ensure that it carries a heavy enough score to be a differentiating factor in bid evaluation.

We supported the Cabinet Office in building modern slavery-related questions and evaluation criteria into the Social Value Model, so that departments are encouraged to take account of the robustness of a bidder’s modern slavery due diligence processes when awarding contracts. We also ran training sessions across central government to increase awareness of the modern slavery criteria in the model and place a strong focus on social value in most of our training (see the training session for more details).

Policy goals for 2021-22 FY:

1. actively encourage public bodies to submit modern slavery statements to the new registry, including through a direct letters campaign

2. engage with public bodies and businesses through user research to inform the continuous improvement of the new registry

3. create more practical tools to support the public sector and make these tools available via gov.uk

4. explore how we strengthen our processes so modern slavery criteria (from the Social Value model) is more routinely applied when awarding contracts and grants (where relevant)

Question 5

Section 3. Risk assessment and due diligence

Accepted Answer

This section details our understanding of the most significant modern slavery risks in Home Office supply chains and the modern slavery due diligence we have undertaken to identify and mitigate these risks. We also highlight our efforts to support other government departments in conducting modern slavery due diligence on COVID-related procurements.

Assessing risk to ensure a targeted approach

Modern slavery can affect any industry and any country. To have the greatest impact on the lives of vulnerable workers, we are taking targeted action where the risks of exploitation are the most severe, salient and strategic – in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.

The Home Office conducted a risk assessment of 286 contracts (including all Gold and Silver contracts) using a new modern slavery risk prioritisation tool^{[footnote 6]}. We assessed against the risk factors below.

Strategic risk

For example, the government’s level of expenditure and associated leverage.

Country risk

For example, manufacturing in South East Asian countries.

Industry type

For example, construction and manufacturing.

Nature of the workforce

For example, low-skilled temporary work.

Business and supply chain models

For example, sub-contracting and reliance on outsourced recruitment.

Context of the supply chain

For example, weak labour laws and high levels of poverty.

50 contracts (worth approximately £8.7 billion in total value) met 4 or more of these risk indicators. Suppliers of these contracts were then invited to complete the Modern Slavery Assessment Tool (MSAT) so that we could develop a greater understanding of the risks and require mitigation action where appropriate.^{[footnote 7]}

MSAT is a free modern slavery risk management tool developed by the Home Office for public bodies to use with their suppliers. The tool was developed in consultation with over 60 organisations (including businesses, civil society organisations and academics) and provides suppliers with tailored good practice recommendations to improve their anti-slavery activity, from how they conduct risk assessments to ensuring their due diligence helps prevent debt bondage.

Key findings from MSAT on our priority risk contracts^{[footnote 8]}

Theme and why it’s important	Findings
Supply chain mapping Some suppliers have complex global supply chains with multiple tiers of sub-contracting. It’s important that we and our suppliers develop our understanding of the lower tiers of our supply chains, as this is where risks of exploitation can be higher.	73% of our suppliers are large businesses headquartered in the UK. 78% of our suppliers have taken steps to map their supply chains and of those, 45% have mapped at least down to their second tier (our third tier).
Engaging partners and workers Modern slavery is a complex problem that requires long-term industry collaboration to meaningfully address the issue. NGOs and trade unions can also help organisations take a more worker-centred approach to modern slavery due diligence and achieve better outcomes for workers.	55% of our suppliers actively work with businesses and NGOs to prevent and mitigate modern slavery. 30% of our suppliers have undertaken activities to support workers in their supply chains have access to trades unions or other forms of worker representation.
Promoting responsible recruitment practices The charging of recruitment fees to workers is a common factor underpinning many aspects of modern slavery in the private economy. The International Labour Organisation estimates that 50% of all victims of forced labour in the private economy are in debt bondage, and over 70% for adults in agriculture, domestic work, and manufacturing.^{[footnote 9]}	63% of our suppliers prohibit the use of worker-paid recruitment fees. 48% of our suppliers monitor key recruitment agencies/labour providers for ethical recruitment.
Improving purchasing practices Organisations can have a profound impact on worker conditions in their supply chains through their purchasing practices. Certain purchasing practices can unintentionally put pressure on suppliers, leading to poor recruitment practices, working conditions and low pay for some workers.	70% of our suppliers have assessed whether their purchasing practices may create pressures on their suppliers that could lead to modern slavery. Of these, 68% have assessed whether they have (i) aggressive pricing that does not consider sustainable production costs, (ii) short lead times, and (iii) late or extended payments.
Priority sector We buy goods and services from a wide range of sectors, but the majority of medium/high risk contracts identified through the risk assessment were in the Information Communication Technology (ICT) (e.g. laptops, printers and servers), accounting for £3.6 billion in total contract value.	Many of our ICT suppliers have identified higher risks in supply chains relying on low-skilled labour in China, India and Malaysia. Migrant workers, women and children were found to be more at risk of exploitation. We have increased our engagement with the ICT sector to develop and promote industry-wide solutions, particularly with: (i) the Responsible Business Alliance (a industry coalition dedicated to corporate social responsibility in global supply chains), (ii) Electronics Watch, an independent monitoring organisation, and (iii) the Crown Representatives who help the government act as a single customer by managing cross-cutting supplier related issues for each strategic supplier.

Next steps

We are building capacity of our contract managers to conduct effective follow-up conversations with suppliers and monitor progress of how suppliers are implementing tailored action plans generated by the MSAT. We have recently begun conducting follow-up sessions with suppliers and we will provide case studies of how this engagement leads to tangible improvements in our next modern slavery statement.

Improving our own purchasing practices

Organisations can have a profound impact on the conditions of workers in supply chains through their own purchasing practices. Aggressive pricing, short lead times and late payments are just a few examples of purchasing practices that can unintentionally create modern slavery risks.

We want to make sure we pay our suppliers promptly and our suppliers do the same in their supply chains. In financial year 2020-21, we paid 91% of compliant supplier invoices within 5 days and 97% of compliant supplier invoices within 30 days.

Bidders for contracts valued above £5 million per annum (and in scope of the Public Procurement Regulations 2015) must provide evidence that they pay at least 85% of their invoices to their supply chain within 60 days.^{[footnote 10]} All new procurements in the period January – March 2021 that were in scope of this policy were compliant.

In the context of COVID-19, government commercial teams were required to conduct urgent procurements and reallocate staff to secure goods and services that were critical to the UK’s response to the pandemic. As well as undertaking urgent procurements with new suppliers, we asked existing suppliers to respond quickly to unprecedented demand.

Personal protective equipment (PPE)

The Home Office, with support from Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and NHS Supply Chain, commissioned the ethical trade consultancy, Impactt, to develop tailored guidance for buyers and suppliers of PPE on best practice approaches to preventing modern slavery in supply chains. To support suppliers in implementing the guidance, Impactt delivered training workshops to 23 PPE manufacturers and resellers to support them implement the guidance.

We have also engaged with a range of other domestic and international public sector partners to increase our collective understanding of the risks of modern slavery in PPE supply chains and develop policy and practical solutions. We have:

1. worked with 5 Eyes partners (US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand) through a dedicated working group on modern slavery in health supply chains to identify best practice and lessons learned from the pandemic (along with DHSC, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and Department for International Trade (DIT)

2. worked with the Modern Slavery and Human Rights Policy and Evidence Centre (Modern Slavery PEC) to facilitate 2 workshops between Newcastle University, the University of Sussex, the University of Nottingham, Impactt, UK government departments and 5 Eyes partners to increase understanding of modern slavery risks in Malaysia’s rubber glove sector during the pandemic. The workshops were based on research by Newcastle University, which was supported by the Modern Slavery PEC, a centre funded by the government specifically to transform the evidence base underpinning our policy and operational response to modern slavery

3. supported NHS Supply Chain to hold a roundtable with PPE suppliers on monitoring labour standards in supply chains during lockdowns

4. worked with external partners, such as the Ethical Trading Initiative, to support vulnerable migrant workers in Malaysia and deliver long-term improvements. Through the Home Office’s Modern Slavery Innovation Fund, we have set up a project that seeks to support vulnerable migrant workers, including workers in the rubber glove industry, to be able to negotiate collectively for better terms and conditions of work, access support, raise grievances and obtain remedy where they have suffered abuses. This also includes development and pilot of a worker-owned application called JustGoodWork App Malaysia providing workers with accessible information on their rights and help in deciding what advice and support they need, as well as who to approach for help

Risk assessment and due diligence goals and KPIs for 2021-22 FY:

1. conduct modern slavery risk assessment on all new Gold and Silver contracts^{[footnote 11]}

2. improve MSAT results for our priority themes so that more of our suppliers are taking steps to map their supply chains, working in partnership with businesses and workers, and implementing responsible recruitment and purchasing practices

3. ensure 90% of suppliers of priority contracts complete the MSAT^{[footnote 12]}

4. ensure 100% of suppliers who complete MSAT for the Home Office have a follow up conversation to discuss their results and agree plans for improvement

5. work more closely with the academic community to increase the evidence base on modern slavery risks in global public sector supply chains and best practice solutions

Question 6

Section 4. Training and awareness raising

Accepted Answer

This section describes the training we have delivered to our staff on modern slavery and social value, as well as our work to build greater expertise and awareness across the public sector.

Home Office training

Increasing the skills and capability of commercial staff and contract managers is fundamental to our ability to conduct effective modern slavery due diligence on our supply chains. However, a significant proportion of our commercial staff have not had any modern slavery training. Most of those that have completed training have completed basic introductory training.

We surveyed 39 commercial staff at different grades and found only 54% had “little” or “some” knowledge of mitigating modern slavery risks in public sector supply chains prior to attending Home Office introductory training sessions or completing the CIPS ethical procurement e-learning. 26% had not yet undertaken any training.

As a result, over the last year we have increased the amount of training delivered to commercial staff, including providing:

Building greater expertise in the Home Office and the wider public sector

We have appointed 26 Social Value Ambassadors to promote social value policy within the Home Office Commercial, scrutinise commercial approval submissions and evaluate bid responses for strategic procurements.

We have launched a new modern slavery e-learning course for public sector commercial staff (at all grades) to train them on the practical steps they can take throughout the commercial lifecycle to identify and mitigate modern slavery risks.^{[footnote 13]} This 2.5 hour course helps learners:

recognise how modern slavery can manifest in supply chains
spot modern slavery risks in procurement and critically interrogate the assurances suppliers provide (such as social audits)
drive improvements in modern slavery due diligence to create better outcomes for workers

At the end of the course, users will complete a case study quiz to test their knowledge. Upon completion of the course, users will receive a certificate. We will be monitoring the uptake of this e-learning and will have a better understanding of learning outcomes as a result of a built-in survey.

Raising awareness in the public sector

We have worked to raise the profile of modern slavery risks in public sector supply chains by hosting or participating in events and training workshops:

in September 2020, the Home Office’s anti-slavery advocate hosted a virtual event along with experts from business and civil society. The session, which was attended by over 150 commercial staff across central government, aimed to increase awareness and discuss the key steps commercial staff should take ahead of publishing their first modern slavery statements
delivered 2 virtual government commercial social value masterclasses to around 350 civil servants. We have also delivered social value training to 5 suppliers on how to develop social value implementation plans (a contractual commitment for those suppliers)
reached over 1,000 public sector officials on the key steps they should take to tackle modern slavery in supply chains, by presenting at events organised by government departments, police forces, the Local Government Association, NHS England and Electronics Watch

Training goals and KPIs for 2021-22 FY:

1. 100% of our senior Commercial Specialists to complete the new modern slavery e-learning and the social value e-learning. We will encourage all commercial staff to complete both e-learning courses

2. identify a baseline of the number of commercial staff that report an improved understanding of how to address modern slavery risks as a result of the modern slavery e-learning course

3. host and participate in awareness raising events aimed at senior public procurement leaders

4. support engagement events with cross-government strategic suppliers

Question 7

Section 5. Goals and KPIs

Accepted Answer

This section lists all of the goals and KPIs listed in this statement.

We have set these goals to ensure we make year-on-year progress and established key performance indicators to measure the effectiveness of our efforts to protect workers from exploitation.

Goals and KPIs for 2021-22 FY

Governance and partnership:

1. continue to chair the cross-government director-level Anti-Slavery Advocates Network and the working level Modern Slavery and Procurement Implementation Group to build on the cross-government momentum we have gained year-on-year

2. create actions groups and work plans for the public sector working group, to ensure the group delivers tangible outcomes

3. include modern slavery as a rolling agenda item for the Chief Commercial Officer’s meetings with the 13 Home Office strategic suppliers and hold a roundtable with these suppliers

Policy:

4. actively encourage public bodies to submit modern slavery statements to the new registry, including through a direct letters campaign

5. engage with public bodies and businesses through user research to inform the continuous improvement of the new registry

6. create more practical tools to support the public sector and make these tools available via gov.uk

7. explore how we strengthen our processes so modern slavery criteria (from the Social Value model) is more routinely applied when awarding contracts and grants (where relevant)

Risk assessment and due diligence:

8. conduct modern slavery risk assessment on all new Gold and Silver contracts

9. improve MSAT results for our priority themes so that more of our suppliers are taking steps to map their supply chains, working in partnership with businesses and workers, and implementing responsible recruitment and purchasing practices

10. ensure 90% of suppliers of priority contracts complete the MSAT

11. ensure 100% of suppliers who complete MSAT for the Home Office have a follow up conversation to discuss their results and agree plans for improvement

12. work more closely with the academic community to increase the evidence base on modern slavery risks in global public sector supply chains and best practice solutions

Training:

13. 100% of our senior Commercial Specialists to complete the new modern slavery e-learning and the social value e-learning. We will encourage all commercial staff to complete both e-learning courses

14. identify a baseline of the number of commercial staff that report an improved understanding of how to address modern slavery risks as a result of the modern slavery e-learning course

15. host and participate in awareness raising events aimed at senior public procurement leaders

16. support engagement events with cross-government strategic suppliers

Signed by:

Matthew Rycroft CBE, Permanent Secretary

Date: 12 October 2021

Rt. Hon Priti Patel MP, Home Secretary