UK Supply Chains: Uyghur Forced Labour

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade if he will make a statement on the links between the UK’s supermarket supply chains and Uyghur forced labour.

The UK addresses forced labour in global supply chains under section 54 of the Modern Slavery Act 2015, which requires commercial businesses that operate in the UK and have a turnover of £36 million or more to report annually on the steps they have taken to prevent modern slavery in their operations and supply chains. The purpose is to provide transparency, whereby businesses monitor their supply chains with rigour, are open about their risks and mitigations, listen to their workers, and act when they do find issues.

In addition, the Department for Business and Trade takes a number of steps to address forced labour within UK supply chains. We negotiate and implement forced labour and modern slavery provisions within our free trade agreement programme, the developing countries trading scheme allows for the suspension of preferential trading arrangements on grounds of serious violation of labour rights, and UK Export Finance reviews environmental, social and human rights risk factors for transactions in the scope of its policy. We regularly engage with business and international partners in respect of both domestic and international tools to combat forced labour.

On Xinjiang specifically, we will continue to stand firm on human rights where China continues to persecute and arbitrarily detain Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim minorities. The UK Government also expect, encourage and support UK businesses to undertake due diligence so that human rights and environmental issues are considered in their operations and supply chain relationships, in line with the OECD guidelines on responsible business conduct.

I thank the Minister for his statement, but, with the greatest respect, what he has described is clearly not working.

Yesterday’s “Blood on the shelves” BBC investigation has rightly shocked the British public. Tomato products sold in UK supermarkets, with labels informing British customers that purées were “Italian made” or “produced in Italy”, were actually linked to slave labour in the Xinjiang Uyghur autonomous region. Our weak and confusing product label regulation has allowed linguistic sleight of hand to occur with, one can only assume, the aim of misleading consumers. I have to push the Minister: what more evidence is required to prove that we need stronger labelling standards that give consumers more information on the sourcing countries of pre-packed products?

In the Uyghur region, egregious human rights abuses are taking place every single day, all underpinned by a system of state-imposed forced labour. It is estimated that several hundred thousand people are involved in the production of tomatoes against their will. The United Nations has reported forced labour, torture and abuse. Survivors of the tomato fields cite having to meet impossible daily quotas, with physical torture such as electrocution used as punishment for failing to meet those targets, yet tomato products created using these barbaric practices line the shelves of our supermarkets and are sold as if they had been produced in a completely different country.

Sadly, this investigation is just the latest in a long line of reports showing that UK supply chains are awash with Uyghur forced labour products. Clothing, steel and solar have a serious dependency on Uyghur forced labour. The Modern Slavery Act is itself currently unfit for purpose. Current laws mean that companies are legally allowed to self-regulate, as human rights due diligence is optional for UK companies. We are now an outlier on legislation to prevent human rights abuses. The United States has enacted important legislation, as has the European Union, but the UK, once again, is a global outlier when it comes to slave-made goods.

Let me first pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) for the consistency and focus that she has brought to this issue. It is not a new worry for her. I assure her that I shared that concern yesterday morning when I heard the reports and the allegations that were levelled in relation to tomato paste, and I also assure her that the Government will approach the company in question to try to establish more clearly the exact facts that underlie those deeply worrying reports.

I think we are again in complete agreement about the egregious character of the human rights abuses taking place in Xinjiang province. I am glad to say that the Prime Minister in his most recent meeting with President Xi Jinping, and indeed the Foreign Secretary in his recent meeting with his counterpart, specifically raised the issue of human rights in China, notwithstanding our willingness to engage directly with the Government of that country.

As for the work that we are doing, the formal position of the Government remains that we expect all companies to conduct business responsibly, in line with the OECD guidelines for multinational businesses on responsible business conduct and the UN guiding principles on business and human rights.

My hon. Friend mentioned the legislation that has been passed in the United States. In the United States, the European Union, Canada and Mexico, legislation has been introduced or is in the process of being introduced specifically for import bans to prevent such goods from entering their markets in the first place, and I assure my hon. Friend that we are reviewing the impact of those measures to inform what should be the UK’s approach.

I call the shadow Minister.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) on securing the urgent question. Let me also welcome the Minister back to Parliament, as well as to his place on the Front Bench.

As the hon. Lady said, the human rights abuses taking place against the Uyghurs in Xinjiang are egregious. In government we took robust action, leading international condemnations and sanctioning individuals and an entity involved to tackle the problem at source. We also took further measures to ensure that British companies were not involved, including the introduction of export controls and financial penalties for organisations that fail to meet their obligations under the Modern Slavery Act. Those measures must be retained, and indeed reviewed, to ensure that British companies and consumers do not indirectly support the human rights abuses.

The Minister said that the new Government were committed to the measures introduced by the last Conservative Government. He also mentioned that two weeks ago the Prime Minister held a bilateral meeting with President Xi. In the read-out from No. 10, however, there was no explicit mention of human rights abuses in Xinjiang, which is disappointing. Can the Minister elaborate on exactly what was said at that bilateral meeting? Were human rights abuses against the Uyghurs in Xinjiang explicitly raised? If the Minister decides to meet his Chinese counterpart, will he commit himself to explicitly raising those human rights abuses? Indeed, will all Ministers across the Government always raise this issue in all their bilateral meetings?

The Government made a manifesto commitment to carry out an audit of our relations with China. Can the Minister confirm that the audit will cover trade and the issue of goods in the UK supply chain that are produced in Xinjiang? Can he tell us whether the impact of the accelerated roll-out of electric vehicles and solar panels and the 2030 decarbonisation target will also be audited? Given the Government’s so far unsuccessful mission to grow the UK economy, will the Minister agree that that growth must not come at the price of restricting our condemnation of human rights abuses in China?

I thank the Opposition spokesperson for her characteristically kind and generous words in welcoming me back to Parliament and, indeed, the Dispatch Box.

There is a tension between the first two questions we have heard, with my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham observing that there is a need for radical transformation in the legislation and, on the other hand, the Opposition spokesperson asserting that it is adequate, although she drifted into demanding a review of her own legislation after only five months in opposition. We should try to find common ground, rather than score points.

I assure the hon. Lady that the Government stand firm on human rights, including in Xinjiang, where China continues to persecute and arbitrarily detain Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim minorities. That includes raising our concerns at the highest levels with the Chinese Government, and co-ordinating efforts in international fora to hold China to account for human rights violations.

The hon. Lady asks specifically about where the treatment of the Uyghurs has been raised as a human rights issue. During the recent session of the Human Rights Council in September, the UK signed a US-led joint statement on Xinjiang, called out China’s persecution of Uyghurs and restriction of civil society, and urged China to engage meaningfully with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and to implement the recommendations made in its assessment. Where possible, the Government also conduct independent visits to areas of major concern and support non-governmental organisations in exposing and reacting to human rights violations. On previous occasions when I have visited China as a Government Minister, I have of course raised the issue of human rights, and I will continue to endeavour to do so.

On the hon. Lady’s rather ungenerous observations about the growth mission, it is perfectly possible for a Government to set themselves a clear ambition to raise the UK economy’s trend rate of growth, and to continue to be a strong and powerful advocate for human rights in China and elsewhere.

Like many, I was very concerned to see the report to which my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) referred. Does the Minister agree that forced labour is a threat to supply chains and to the resilience of our economy not just in our food sector, but across our entire economy?

I am in full agreement with my hon. Friend. For businesses to be able to invest and thrive, they need confidence in their supply chains, which is why the Government are establishing a new supply chains taskforce. The taskforce will work to assess where supply chains that are critical to the UK’s economic security and resilience, including those in the growth sectors identified in the industrial strategy, could be vulnerable to disruption. The taskforce will ensure that the Government work with business to address the risks, including by exploring wide-ranging policy solutions and other mitigations.

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

May I, too, congratulate the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) on securing the urgent question, and welcome the Minister back to Parliament and to his place?

Food labelling and food safety are among the most important issues for our diet and for our health. They allow consumers to make informed choices, and to ensure that food is safe and consistent with consumers’ ethical and moral beliefs. I am very pleased to hear the Minister say that the Government will look at the impact of legislation in the US, the EU and other countries, particularly where it may involve import bans on products that have been produced using forced labour. May I press him to tell us the timetable for doing that review?

I thank the hon. Lady for her observation, and for the characteristically calm wisdom with which she spoke about issues on which I think there is a high degree of consensus across the House. Given that we have been in government for five months, it is appropriate that we review the effectiveness of the Modern Slavery Act, which, in its day, was clearly a pioneering piece of legislation that commanded support across the House. In that sense, the review and the desire to understand the impact of the Act are informed by more recent innovations, such as those in the United States, the EU and Canada. I can assure the hon. Lady that alongside the trade strategy that we are publishing and the industrial strategy that we aim to publish in the spring, we are already carefully considering the critical elements of other legislation and seeing whether there is scope for strengthening the approach taken by the UK.

Does my right hon. Friend agree that self-regulation, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) referred, is often a euphemism for minimal or, indeed, no regulation? Is he confident that current legislation is sufficient to compel businesses operating in the UK to address the risks of modern slavery and, most importantly, the risks to the human rights of the people being exploited?

Notwithstanding the concerns that have been expressed in the Chamber about the existing statutory framework, we need to send a clear and unequivocal signal that no company in the United Kingdom that operates under the existing statutory framework should have any forced labour whatsoever in its supply chain. There are already rules in place to compel companies to publish statements demonstrating that they have met their very clear legal obligations, not least in relation to the exploitation of which my hon. Friend speaks.

I welcome the right hon. Gentleman to his place, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion)—she is my hon. Friend in this case—on raising a really important issue. I also welcome another person on the Government Front Bench, who will remain nameless—I am sure that Hansard will pick them out.

The problem with all this is that it does not seem to matter who is in government; the Foreign Office and other Departments try to block everything to do with slavery. I was one of the people who drove through the Modern Slavery Act 2015, which we know is long past its sell-by date with regard to modern slavery. I tried to co-operate with the Government when they were in opposition, and we need to change the law, because we have real problems with net zero. Right now, we have polysilicon arrays coming in from Xinjiang in massive quantities, and nothing is being done about it. This is not just about Xinjiang; there are a quarter of a million people from Tibet in forced labour.

The only way to address the issue is to do what we did with the Health and Care Act 2022, which we amended to ensure that the Department of Health and Social Care had a duty to eradicate slavery. In America, supply chains are checked using forensic science provided by Oritain, but we do not do any of that. Will we move towards checking all supply chains, and put legislation in place to make it a criminal offence to have anything to do with slave labour?

Let me pay tribute to the right hon. Gentleman for his sustained effort on, and interest in, these issues. It has come at some personal cost; he has received criticism from foreign Governments. He is an example to us all in this Chamber in his willingness to speak up for human rights without fear or favour.

On his point, first, I see the answer as involving enforcement of the current legislation. It is important to reaffirm that legislation is clear about companies’ mandatory obligations, regardless of whether they import from Xinjiang or elsewhere. Secondly, as I have said, we intend to look carefully at whether lessons can be drawn from other jurisdictions, notwithstanding the good efforts of the right hon. Gentleman and many others in this Chamber at the time of the initiation of the Modern Slavery Act.

Earlier this year, the Global Legal Action Network and the World Uyghur Congress filed a legal case against the National Crime Agency’s decision not to investigate suspected forced-labour goods from Xinjiang. That led to a landmark ruling, which established that any goods suspected of being linked to Uyghur forced labour can be considered criminal property when offered for sale in the UK. What measures have the Government taken in the light of that landmark decision? What protection is there, and what accountability measures are in place, in instances where UK businesses are still involved with goods produced from forced labour?