Editor’s
note: Shamistha Selvaratnam is a LLM Candidate of the Advanced Masters of
European and International Human Rights Law at Leiden University in the
Netherlands and an intern with the Doing Business Right project. Prior to commencing the LLM, she worked as a business and human
rights solicitor in Australia where she specialised in promoting business
respect for human rights through engagement with policy, law and practice.
Introduction
This report compiles all relevant news,
events and materials on Doing Business Right based on the coverage provided on
our twitter feed @DoinBizRight and on various websites. You are invited to
contribute to this compilation via the comments section below, feel free to add
links to important cases, documents and articles we may have overlooked.
The
Headlines
CHRB
On 12 November 2018, the Corporate Human
Rights Benchmark released the results of its 2018 ranking of 101 companies
operating in the apparel, agricultural products and extractives industries. The
results show that implementation of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and
Human Rights in these sectors is still weak (following the 2017 results) with
the average overall score for 2018 being 27% (an increase of 9 percentage
points from last year), demonstrating a lack of respect for human rights. The
Report identifies that due diligence is a key weakness of the companies that
were reviewed, with 40% of companies scoring no points with respect to the due
diligence indicator. Other issues identified were the lack of a strong
commitment to ensuring that there are ‘living wages’ paid to those working in
company operations and supply chains and the failure to meet expectations with
respect to preventing child labour in supply chains. Read the 2018 Key Findings
Report here.
Australian
MSA passes both houses of Parliament
On 29 November 2018, the Modern Slavery Bill 2018 (Cth) passed
both houses of the Australian Parliament. Once enacted, the Act will require
Australian entities and entities carrying on a business in Australia that have
a consolidated revenue of at least $100 million to prepare a Modern Slavery
Statement covering mandatory criteria. Criteria that such entities will have to
report on include the risks of modern slavery practices in their operations and
supply chains and the actions they take to assess and address those risks,
including due diligence and remediation processes. It is likely that the Act
will come into effect on 1 January 2019 and accordingly the first Modern
Slavery Statements will be due by 1 January 2021. More...