THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE - modern slavery

 

THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE

The truth about modern slavery, by Emily Kenway, published by Pluto Press (£14.99)

Unite Landworker magazine Winter 2023/24 

Slavery is a term associated with shackles, boats and cruelty. All right-thinking people are against it and so consequently when they hear the name of William Wilberforce and the term modern-slavery, which includes forced labour, human trafficking and slavery they will sit up, pay attention and help to eradicate it?

The problem is that the modern day slavery framework has been constructed by some of the very reactionary people, companies, media outlets and governments who have attacked the very forces – the trade unions – who can do the most to end today’s slavery.

In 2016 Prime Minster Theresa May, who a year earlier introduced the Modern Slavery Act (MSA), was lauded by the media for launching her ‘anti-slavery crusade’ when she said, “this government is determined to build a Great Britain that works for everyone and will not tolerate modern slavery, an evil trade that shatters victims’ lives and traps them in a cycle of abuse.”

Warm words, that Kenway notes in the real world translated into only 12 percent of those officially recognised as modern slavery victims being given a right to remain in the UK in 2016. May, of course, did not use the MSA to legally require companies to perform extensive investigations into their supply chains and to subsequently address any human rights impacts they identified.

Meanwhile, Labour inspectorates such as the Employment Agencies Standards Inspectorate, HSE, HMRC’ wage unit and the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority are all woefully underfunded and understaffed. In 2021, the anti-slavery charity Hope of Justice revealed that a year after the news first broke, workers in some Leicester textile factories were still being paid as little as £3.50 an hour.

And as Landworker highlighted last summer it also took the Tories over three years to report into the initial Seasonal Workers Scheme. (SWS) This is designed to make up for the shortage following Brexit of agricultural labour. Unsurprisingly, the report revealed gross exploitation of migrant workers, particularly those from Ukraine, who in the meantime were clearly still being terribly exploited as highlighted in an article on 19 April 2022 by The Guardian titled: ‘Ukrainian workers workers flee ‘modern slavery’ conditions on UK farms.’

The SWS, which has been massively expanded to allow up to 40,000 workers, including poultry workers and haulage drivers, to work in the UK for up to six months is, as highlighted by the Focus of Labour Exploitation (FLEX) and Fife Migrants Forum (FMF), a bonded labour scheme – forcing workers to remain with one employer – the likes of which was employed in Britain’s plantation colonies after the abolition of slavery.

Kenway contends that tougher immigration controls, embodied in Theresa May’s ‘hostile environment’, prevent migrant workers from seeking help when they experience exploitation, the result of which is a lowering of wages and conditions for all workers.

FLEX/FMF proposals to tackle these problems, including financial support to migrant community organisations and trade unions, who can then offer tailored support, have largely been ignored by the Scottish and UK Governments.

Kenway, does not, of course, condemn the many honest people seeking to end modern slavery. Her readers are asked to imagine doing things differently with each chapter providing possible alternatives to conventional thought on how to tackle modern slavery, which is a product and not some sort of extreme aberration of the political economy we live under in which so few people own so much wealth. Ultimately, modern slavery will exist and even grow until we find a way to organise workers everywhere to get what we rightly deserve.