The History
The UK Modern Slavery Act (Act) was enacted in 2015. A landmark piece of legislation, the transparency in supply chains provision (TISC) requires commercial organisations that operate in the UK and have an annual turnover above £36m to produce a statement setting out the steps they are taking to address and prevent the risk of modern slavery in their operations and supply chains. Thousands of companies are required to report under the TISC provision every year but there was no government-run registry established under the Act where stakeholders could efficiently access statements by all entities that are required to report.
The Modern Slavery Registry, operated by Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, was created to fill this gap. The Registry has provided an invaluable resource that has helped promote transparency and increase accountability by enabling thousands of users worldwide the access to scrutinise over 16,000 modern slavery statements side by side. In doing so, we have played a central role in monitoring compliance with the UK Modern Slavery Act. We also have collected over 1,700 statements published under the California Transparency in Supply Chain Act, which is considered the predecessor to the UK Act.
In 2021, the UK Government launched its own central public registry of modern slavery statements. We fully support this step forward and hope that the new government-run registry will result in improved monitoring and enforcement against companies that fail to comply with their obligations under the Act. You can browse the new registry and submit your statement here.
We thank our partners for their support to the Modern Slavery Registry over the last five years: Humanity United, Freedom Fund, Freedom United, CORE Coalition, Anti-Slavery International, Unicef UK, Focus on Labour Exploitation (FLEX), Ethical Trade Initiative, Oxfam GB, UN Principles of Responsible Investment (PRI), and Trades Union Congress.
By The Numbers
> 16,000
Statements
collected between 2015 and Jan 2021.
18,242
Companies
named on recorded statements.
30%
Compliance
with minimum requirements, as of Jan 2021.
Exploring the Archive
With the UK Government modern slavery registry in place, Business & Human Rights Resource Centre has now closed the Modern Slavery Registry. This portal holds an archive of the Registry's complete dataset. You can search by company name and access a historical record of its reporting under the UK Modern Slavery Act, the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act and the Australia Modern Slavery Act (Cth). This portal also contains research briefings of our analysis of modern slavery reporting, guidance for companies, legislative developments, our latest publications including blogs and analysis.
Further Reading
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Latest Publications
Is the UK Modern Slavery Act the best way to tackle modern slavery?
The UK Government must regain its leadership role and follow the inevitable trend toward human rights due diligence laws to provide dignity for all workers
The word needs new laws to end modern slavery in supply chains
Tesco disclosed labour abuses in its supply chain, which is what is expected under the UK Modern Slavery Act. But this type of disclosure remains a rarity.
The Modern Slavery Act turns four today. Is it working? And how can it be improved?
Today marks four years since the UK’s Modern Slavery Act made history, but ahead of an Independent Review, new research finds that the Act is still failing to live up to its promise.
Why investor engagement is crucial to the fight against modern slavery
Investors must use their considerable leverage to drive positive change in the fight against modern slavery.
How the UK Modern Slavery Act can find its bite
The UK Modern Slavery Act can transform business action to eradicate slavery, but only if investors, civil society, consumers and companies use their leverage to ensure it.