1.0 Introduction
Signet Resources prides itself on having an awareness of the contemporary issues and challenges that are met in the world today. One of these issues being Modern Slavery. Modern Slavery can be demonstrated in various forms including human trafficking, forced work, restriction of free-movement and slavery. The focus of this policy is to ensure the elimination of any type of slavery and or human trafficking within its business and supply chains.
1.1 Definitions
Signet Resources considers that modern slavery encompasses:
- Human trafficking
- Forced work, through mental or physical threat
- Being owned or controlled by an employer through mental or physical abuse of the threat of
abuse
- Being dehumanised, treated as a commodity or being bought or sold as property
Being physically constrained or to have restriction placed on freedom of movement.
2.0 Organisational Structure
Signet Resources is a private limited company that operates as an employment agency and an employment business within the United Kingdom. Signet Resources is a member of the industry trade body – Recruitment and Employment Confederation. Signet Resources is classified as an SME.
- Public Sector & Not For Profit
- Human Resources
- Finance
- Sales & Marketing
- Procurement, Logistics & Supply Chain
- Construction & Property
- Information technology
- Temp & Interim
- Executive Search
Further to recruitment – Signet Resources provides Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO), and Retention strategies to businesses. RPO is aimed at businesses that require their internal recruitment processes to be outsourced to a third party. Retention is a separate function, focussing on the development at the top of an organisation with the aim to retain its employees.
3.0 Our Commitment
We acknowledge our responsibility in relation to tackling modern slavery and commit to complying with the provisions in the Modern Slavery Act 2015. Signet Resources understands that this requires an ongoing review of both its internal practices in relation to its labour force and its supply chains.
Signet Resources does not enter into business with any other organisation, in the United Kingdom or abroad, which knowingly supports or is found to involve itself in slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour.
No labour provided to Signet Resources in the pursuance of the provision of its own services is obtained by means of slavery or human trafficking. Signet Resources strictly adheres to the minimum standards required in relation to its responsibilities under relevant employment legislation in the United Kingdom.
4.0 Supply Chains
In order to fulfil our activities, the main supply chains of Signet Resources include those related to the sourcing of candidates for clients, providing outsourced recruitment services and provision of retention strategy services.
Signet Resources requires and expects all current and future suppliers to demonstrate proactive actions towards the reduction of Modern Slavery.
5.0 Potential exposure
Signet Resources has evaluated its main exposure of risk to modern slavery and human trafficking to be focussed in in our core business, with the provision of recruitment services. The provision of recruitment services we offer is aligned to professionals, specialists and office/administrative workers. We do not consider that we operate within a high-risk sector; however, we carry out necessary checks with our supply chains although we expect them to operate in an ethical manner in adherence to legislation in compliance to our Supplier Code of Conduct.
6.0 Due Diligence
Signet Resources carries out due diligence processes in relation to ensuring slavery and/or human trafficking does not take place in its organisation or supply chains.
In accordance with section 54(4) of the Modern Slavery Act 2015, Signet Resources has taken the following steps to ensure that modern slavery is not taking place:
Supply Chains
- We review our supplier contracts to include termination powers, where in the event of a fundamental breach of the terms including being involved in any form of slavery, the agreement can be immediately terminated.
- We ensure that we have measures in place to identify and assess the potential risks in our supply chains.
Our Employees and our Temporary Workers
We conduct our due diligence checks at the beginning of the onboarding process before we appoint workers into their respective positions.
- We ensure that all documentation provided by our employees and temporary workers are in their own name and not in any other name (incl. banking information, unless it is a joint account). It is ensured that we do not accept any documents that are not in an employee or temporary staff’s name.
- We do not issue any payments to our employees and temporary workers via cheques.
- The worker’s UK right to work documentation must be in their name to demonstrate they are compliant. If for any reason any right to work documentation has a different name – we require a proof of a name change, for their right to work document to be marked as compliant.
- We do not issue contracts in any other name, but the worker who has been appointed for a role.
- We provide and ensure that our employees have knowledge of Modern Slavery & Human trafficking, and the risks it imposes onto themselves and our business. We do this by providing training for all staff.
7.0 Policies
We ensure that we have implemented the following policies to further define its stance on modern slavery and equal treatment for our stakeholders.
Supplier Code of Conduct
Our Supplier Code of Conduct (SCOC) outlines the expectations and behaviours of our suppliers in the aims to prevent modern slavery in our supply chains. The SCOC establishes the expectations defines our commitment to having an ethical decorum in our acts as a business, to which our suppliers are required to align against in order to have an active business relationship. In our aim to reduce unethical acts in our supply chains, our SCOC gives reference to the Modern Slavery Act 2015, Anti Bribery Act 2015 and the Equality Act 2010.
Equal Opportunities Policy
Our Equal Opportunities policy outlines a commitment established by Signet Resources for our employees to adhere to. This policy is in full recognition of the Equality Act 2010 and implies equal treatment for all employees, with reference to the protected characteristics.
Health and Safety Policy
Our Health and Safety policy defines our stance on ensuring our employee’s health and safety is applied with the highest importance to our businesses standards. Whilst we understand that each individual employee has a responsibility to control and minimise risks within their own activities – we as a business must ensure we are managing risks accordingly through a proactive risk assessment approach to managing the health and safety in our business.
Public Interest Disclosure Policy
Our employees are encouraged to report any wrongdoing or actions by employees that do not follow our high standards of integrity and honesty. All Signet Resources employees have access to mechanisms through which they can voice their concerns. It is imperative that we protect employees in raising their concerns through supporting their anonymity, confidence and morale to comfortably speak out against malpractice.
This statement is made in pursuance of Section 54(1) of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and will be reviewed for each financial year.
