UK Parliament / Open data

Modern Slavery Bill

Proceeding contribution from Baroness Young of Hornsey (Crossbench) in the House of Lords on Wednesday, 25 February 2015. It occurred during Debate on bills on Modern Slavery Bill.

I thank the Minister for his comprehensive response to the amendments we have just been considering. I will make three quick points.

I think that we will return to the issue of enforcement. We expect businesses to comply with money-laundering laws, bribery laws and a whole heap of other potentially criminal activities. To me, this is another criminal activity in which a company might be complicit and therefore the statements that they make need to be meaningful, and there will eventually need to be some sort of sanction, I am sure, in the future. But we will see what happens once we come to post-legislative scrutiny and we see how well the Bill actually works.

With regard to turnover and thresholds, it will be interesting to see what comes out of the consultation with business. As to whether or not there will be any consensus, that will be something we will see when that is published. That will be an interesting point because obviously different organisations will have different views on that.

With regard to government procurement, which is probably the thing I feel most strongly about in the two amendments to which I have been speaking, I will have a look at the Modern Slavery Strategy, as the Minister suggests. But statements of intent that are in that kind of paper are not the same as having something in a Bill that makes a very clear statement about what government agencies and the Government themselves should be doing in relation to that.

I will have a think about that, along with others—and I hope the Minister will as well—and in that context, I withdraw the amendment.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
759 c1750 
Session
2014-15
Chamber / Committee
House of Lords chamber
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