Germany: Party congress of conservative CDU calls for human rights due diligence regulation
[unofficial web-based summary translation of German original]
"Other decisions of the 32nd Party Congress of the CDU Germany", 22-23 Nov 2019
...CDU Germany demands dedicated commitment by the German government to the observance and enforcement of human rights as well as social and
environmental standards along the entire supply chain of products. The National Action Plan "Implementation of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights" (2016-2020) is an important component. It must now be implemented consistently...
Companies are another important key for the enforcement of standards... Companies also bear a great deal of responsibility. The same applies to public procurement.
Voluntary commitments often do not achieve the broad impact and degree of commitment necessary to achieve sustainable change. We therefore call on the Federal Government to develop legal regulations for the value chain based on the experience and findings from the [NAP] monitoring. The group of companies to be included must encompass all relevant actors and sanctions...
...We welcome the fact that the Federal Government, within the framework of its EU Council Presidency 2020 also wants to address social and environmental standards with the aim of establishing common European guidelines. These should then also be applied in treaties and trade agreements...