Why Ask The Workers?

Labour rights due diligence processes have evolved little over the last 30 years. The processes that most businesses use are “business to business”.

Even worker surveys are usually conducted on site and under supplier management supervision.

We draw conclusions about how suppliers treat their workers by asking the suppliers – and then we broadly take their word for it. There is no other "due diligence" process that we can think of which works like this.

Taking someone’s word for it is not due diligence.

As one major UK retailer put it in their published supplier due diligence process:

“SAQ completed, transparency delivered”.

We draw conclusions about how suppliers treat their workers by asking the suppliers – and then we broadly take their word for it. There is no other "due diligence" process that we can think of which works like this.

Why Ask The Workers? .... because they can tell you the answer.

Business to business due diligence

Most businesses use two main tools to check that workers are being treated in line with relevant laws and policies:

• Self-assessment questionnaires (or SAQs)

• Periodic social audits

  
  

The principle behind the SAQ is that the supplier is required to sign up to certain policies and procedures, confirming that these are in place and being observed.

It is a “self-assessment” process and it is important. We should not stop doing this. The SAQ provides a way for suppliers to take responsibility for the treatment of workers involved in their enterprise - and that means we can hold them to the standards involved.

A periodic audit (“social audit”) can also be used. This is a short visit, often one day, by a trained auditor with a long checklist of questions to be answered and evidence to gather.

Many SAQs and certainly audits also request documented proof from suppliers. For example, policies, payroll records, time sheets and so on. But it is very hard to establish that these actually relate to the reality of the workplace and typically there is no proof obtained that they actually do.

In combination, the SAQ and the social audit are meant to establish that workers are being treated in line with the law and in line with policies and procedures. Typically these processes only check whether policies exist, and not whether and how they are implemented in practice.

Both audit and SAQ are “business-to-business”.

We are largely asking the supplier’s management team to confirm it is behaving properly and then we take their word for it.

Unsurprisingly, suppliers nearly always provide evidence of compliance regardless of what is actually happening.

But social audits involve worker interviews and evidence is collected?

That’s right – they do.

But most of the time an auditor is on-site to conduct an audit, perhaps once a year at most, and often only for a day. In fact, some due diligence policies for major retailers specify that audits are only required every 5 years if the site is only "medium-risk".

A few workers might be interviewed but these interviews are not voluntary, workers can be coached, and are usually unable to speak the truth because the process is not anonymous. The supplier management is well aware of which workers are being interviewed and sometimes will even select them. Sample sizes are too small to provide anonymity and under these conditions, workers can be fearful of the consequences of revealing exploitative practices or other failings.

And timesheets and payroll records are not validated by asking workers and so these records are quite easy to manipulate to paint a false picture.

Social audits are widely recognised as insufficient because they are generally poor at identifying policy implementation, management behaviour, especiallly when it comes to disadvantaged cohorts of workers.

Here are two of many links to studies and articles on this topic:

• Human Rights Watch: https://www.hrw.org/report/2022/11/15/obsessed-audit-tools-missing-goal/why-social-audits-cant-fix-labor-rights-abuses

• The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2023/oct/10/corporate-auditing-foreign-workers-abuse-Before nowclaims

How effective are SAQs and social audits?

How did we get here?

Today we ask suppliers if they are employing their workers legally, we believe the answer that they give, and we call it due diligence.

Until now, there has not really been a better approach that is reasonable, economic and practical.

With new technology emerging, this has now changed.

And that means expectations of what counts as reasonable due diligence for business are changing too.

It is now practical to Ask The Workers?

It is.

New low-cost technologies are emerging that can link workers at scale to rating agencies, certification bodies, and to business.

This changes what we expect business reasonably to do

There is now widespread use of smart phones, even in emerging markets.

Workers have the tools in their hands to provide their feedback.

With the right approach, workers can do this efficiently, authentically, anonymously and continually.

Ask The Workers - the way forward.

True transparency can only be delivered when workers are engaged anonymously and continuously in labour rights due diligence processes.

It is reasonable to expect that business should Ask The Workers.

Continue the discussion

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