Modern slavery is a violation of human rights. It can be found throughout all economies and includes all situations where human freedom is exploited using coercion, threats, or deception. Anti-slavery laws and government organisations provide guidelines on how to identify and prevent this practice or behaviour.
Despite its persistence, many businesses still fail to recognise this problem in their workplace or supply chain. To raise awareness about modern slavery and its social and economic effects, all organisations are required to provide their workforce with relevant training. This article provides all the necessary information that organisations require to know about modern slavery awareness training.
What is modern slavery training?
Modern slavery training educates learners to understand what modern slavery is, the types of conduct that lead to and are modern slavery, the risks involved in your operations and supply chain, and the actions that can be taken to mitigate these risks. This training can be targeted towards employees, contractors, and volunteers involved directly or indirectly in your operations and supply chain.
Why is modern slavery training a must for your organisation?
Some of the outcomes of providing effective modern slavery awareness training in your organisation include:
Prevent it in your organisation and supply chain
The purpose behind deploying a modern slavery awareness training program in your organisation is its prevention. Every human life matters, and everyone is entitled to fair and respectable employment. Any occurrence of modern slavery such as child labour, forced labour, debt bondage, etc. in your organisation or supply chain must be prevented.
Ensure timely reporting of modern slavery risks
All organisations across Australia are required to submit annual reports on the risks of modern slavery in their workplaces or supply chains. When employees are made aware of the repercussions and severity of modern slavery along with how it can be reported, employees can identify and report risks of modern slavery in a timely manner.
Encourage contribution from employees
Awareness of the risks of modern slavery also encourages contribution from employees in terms of identifying and reporting such behaviour or malpractice. If organisations also extend this training to their contractors and volunteers, it can help foster contribution from people in their supply chain as well.
Meet compliance obligations
Non-compliance with any law including anti-slavery laws can cause a business to incur high losses. They can either be reputational, financial or operational. No organisation wants to lose their market presence because of non-compliance. Anti-slavery laws require organisations to provide this training to their workforce and safeguard themselves from human exploitation while staying compliant.
Promote a safe workplace
A safe and respectable workplace is a human right and violating this is not desirable for employees or the organisation. Promoting a workplace that mandates fair and equal treatment of all employees can make a positive impact on employees, society, and your organisation as well.
