Wednesday 1 February 18:30 - 20:30

Doughty Street Chambers
53-54 Doughty Street
London
WC1N 2LS

Registration
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Public Procurement Due Diligence | Business and Human Rights Roundtable

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A joint Doughty Street Chambers and UNISON Business and Human Rights Roundtable.

DOUGHTY STREET CHAMBERS BUSINESS AND HUMAN RIGHTS ROUNDTABLE

Public Procurement and Due Diligence

6:30pm - 8:30pm, with refreshments provided. 

The UK spends £290 billion on public procurement every year. However, the discharge of NHS patients into private care homes where they died from covid, and the purchase of PPE from factories in Malaysia where there is evidence of forced labour, shows that the UK is failing to comply with both the law and its own stated policy commitments. And those whose rights are violated have no justice. But it doesn’t have to be this way in the future. People could get justice and commercial organisations could be held accountable.

The European Parliament is currently debating a directive on corporate sustainability and due diligence, which will require corporations to ensure that their supply chains don’t breach human rights and environmental norms by using their commercial leverage. And in the UK there is a campaign for a new UK law to hold companies and the public sector to account when they fail to prevent human rights abuses and environmental harms in their global value chains. Should the UK public sector be amendable to such a law? If so, what form could it take and what would be the obstacles to make it effective?

These are some of the questions that will be discussed at the joint Doughty Street Chambers and UNISON Business and Human Rights Roundtable.

The conference will be hybrid, allowing for in-person and remote attendance.

Speakers:

Gemma Freedman, International Officer, UNISON

Neil McInnes, Pinsent Masons

Dr Claire Methven O’Brien, University of Dundee

Chair:

Krishnendu Mukherjee, Doughty Street Chambers

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