ASDA GROUP LIMITED modern slavery statement summary (2020)

Organisation address

Asda House,
South Bank,
Great Wilson Street,
Leeds,
LS11 5AD

We asked the organisation a series of questions about its modern slavery statement. Its answers are published on this page as a statement summary.

This statement provides information for all 6 recommended areas

What is a modern slavery statement?

UK law requires certain organisations to publish an annual modern slavery statement on their website, setting out the steps they are taking to address modern slavery risks in their operations and supply chains. Read more in the government guidance on publishing modern slavery statements.

Link to full statement

Go to full modern slavery statement on organisation’s website

PDF version of the statement (optional)

There is no PDF version of this statement.

PDF statements were first introduced to the registry for the 2023 statement year.

About this statement summary

All answers relate to the financial year covered by the statement. The organisation is responsible for all the information it provided. Some of our questions are optional, so organisations may not have answered all of them. The statement summary does not replace the full modern slavery statement – below we provide a link to the full statement on the organisation’s website.

Contents

Organisations covered by the statement

ASDA GROUP LIMITED modern slavery statement for 2020 is a group statement covering 8 organisations. See the full list of organisations covered by this statement

Legal requirement to publish

ASDA GROUP LIMITED has confirmed it is required to publish a 2020 statement by law.

Statement period and sign-off details

The statement covers the following period:
1 January 2019 to 31 December 2019

The statement was signed off by:
Roger Burnley (President and CEO)

It was approved by the board (or equivalent management body) on:
1 May 2020

Recommended areas covered by the statement

Government guidance encourages organisations to cover a range of areas in their modern slavery statements, setting out the steps they’re taking to address modern slavery risks in their operations and supply chains. Read about the recommended areas in the statutory guidance.

We asked the organisation to tell us which areas its statement covers.

Areas recommended by government guidance	Organisation’s response
The organisation’s structure, business and supply chains	Covered
Policies	Covered
Risk assessment	Covered
Due diligence (steps to address risk)	Covered
Training about modern slavery	Covered
Goals and key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure the effectiveness of the organisation's actions and progress over time	Covered

The organisation’s sectors and turnover

Sectors

The organisation operates in the following sectors:

• Retail

Turnover

Its turnover in the financial accounting year of this statement was:

Over £500 million

If the organisation is a public body, this amount is based on the organisation’s budget for the year of the statement.

What does 'turnover' refer to in group statements?

If this is a group statement, this includes the total turnover for all the organisations covered by the statement.

Number of years producing statements

The organisation has been producing modern slavery statements for the following number of years:

1 to 5 years

How does this work for group statements?

If the statement is for a group of organisations, this answer applies to the organisation with the longest history of producing statements.

Policies (optional)

We asked the organisation whether its policies include the following provisions in relation to its domestic and international supply chains, as well as its own operations.

Policy provisions we asked about	Organisation’s response
Freedom of workers to terminate employment	Included
Freedom of movement	Included
Freedom of association	Included
Prohibits any threat of violence, harassment and intimidation	Included
Prohibits the use of worker-paid recruitment fees	Included
Prohibits compulsory overtime	Included
Prohibits child labour	Included
Prohibits discrimination	Included
Prohibits confiscation of workers' original identification documents	Included
Provides access to remedy, compensation and justice for victims of modern slavery	Included
Other	Not included

Training (optional)

We asked the organisation whether it provided training on modern slavery, and who it was for.

What counts as training?

We explained that by ‘training’ we meant anything designed to increase knowledge and skills around identifying, addressing or preventing modern slavery risks. This could range from formal training courses to broader awareness-raising activities such as workshops or webinars.

We asked who the training was for	Organisation’s response
Your whole organisation	Yes
Your front line staff	Yes
Human resources	Yes
Executive-level staff	Yes
Procurement staff	Yes
Your suppliers	Yes
The wider community	Yes
Other	No

Monitoring working conditions (optional)

Engaging with others

We asked the organisation to tell us who it engaged with to help monitor working conditions across its operations and supply chains.

We asked who the organisation engaged with	Organisation’s response
Your suppliers	Yes
Trade unions or worker representative groups	Yes
Civil society organisations	Yes
Professional auditors	Yes
Workers within your organisation	Yes
Workers within your supply chain	Yes
Central or local government	Yes
Law enforcement, such as police, GLAA and other local labour market inspectorates	Yes
Businesses in your industry or sector	Yes

Social audits

We asked the organisation to tell us about any social audits it used to look for signs of modern slavery.

What are social audits?

A social audit is a review of an organisation’s working practices from the point of view of social responsibility, and should include an evaluation of working conditions in the organisation’s operations and supply chains. By their nature, audits of supplier workplaces represent a snapshot in time.

Social audits we asked about	Organisation’s response
Audit conducted by your staff	No
Third party audit arranged by your organisation	Yes
Audit conducted by your supplier’s staff	No
Third party audit arranged by your supplier	Yes
Announced audit	Yes
Unannounced audit	Yes

Grievance mechanisms

We asked the organisation how workers in its operations or supply chains could raise concerns or make complaints.

We asked if workers could raise concerns this way	Organisation’s response
Using anonymous whistleblowing services, such as a helpline or mobile phone app	Yes
Through trade unions or other worker representative groups	Yes

Other ways of monitoring working conditions

We asked the organisation whether it had any other ways of monitoring working conditions across its operations and supply chains:

We have implemented a Forced Labour Dashboard, combining Asda data with insight from Sedex risk scoring used to focus our approach and drive insight into areas which impact the Asda business.

Modern slavery risks (optional)

Identifying modern slavery risks is a vital step towards eradicating it. The government encourages organisations to be as open and transparent as possible, to improve understanding, collaboration and best practice around tackling this worldwide problem.

We asked the organisation to describe up to 3 priority risks it focused on during the period of the statement, including details of the affected workers, the activity involved, and the location.

Priority risks for this organisation (1 of 3)

Our George apparel business (China)

Questions we asked about this risk	Organisation’s response
Where it was most likely to occur	Organisation’s response: Within your supply chains. Tier 1 suppliers Provide their products and services directly to your organisation. Tier 2 suppliers Provide products and services to your organisation via your Tier 1 suppliers. Tier 3 suppliers and below Provide products and services to your organisation via your Tier 2 suppliers or the next higher level in the chain.
Who was it most likely to affect	Organisation’s response: Women Migrants Refugees Children
In which country	Organisation’s response: China
Actions or plans to address this risk	Organisation’s response: We have begun to prioritise our activity with a focus on training and awareness to suppliers and our commercial teams of the impact that buying practices can have within facilities. In 2020, we intend to collaborate with various external stakeholders about working hours more generally sharing our approach and insights to start to make a difference. Alongside this work, we have mapped our second tier supply chain and provide transparency via our Sourced by George website.

Priority risks for this organisation (2 of 3)

UK vegetables (IPL)

Questions we asked about this risk	Organisation’s response
Where it was most likely to occur	Organisation’s response: Organisation selected ‘Other’ and wrote: Both within our own operations and within our supply chains.
Who was it most likely to affect	Organisation’s response: Migrants
In which country	Organisation’s response: United Kingdom
Actions or plans to address this risk	Organisation’s response: Training and Awareness

Priority risks for this organisation (3 of 3)

Bananas from Colombia and Costa Rica (IPL)

Questions we asked about this risk	Organisation’s response
Where it was most likely to occur	Organisation’s response: Within your supply chains. Tier 1 suppliers Provide their products and services directly to your organisation. Tier 2 suppliers Provide products and services to your organisation via your Tier 1 suppliers. Tier 3 suppliers and below Provide products and services to your organisation via your Tier 2 suppliers or the next higher level in the chain.
Who was it most likely to affect	Organisation’s response: Women Migrants Refugees Children
In which country	Organisation’s response: Colombia Costa Rica
Actions or plans to address this risk	Organisation’s response: Training and Awareness

Indicators of forced labour (optional)

We asked the organisation whether its statement refers to finding any International Labour Organization (ILO) indicators of forced labour.

What are ILO indicators of forced labour?

The International Labour Organization (ILO) has produced a list of the most common signs of forced labour. They’re based on the definition of forced labour as ‘all work or service which is extracted from any person under the menace of any penalty and for which the said person has not offered himself voluntarily.’ More details and guidance are available on the ILO website, and in their publication ILO indicators of forced labour

ILO indicators we asked about	Organisation’s response
Abuse of vulnerability	Yes
Deception	Yes
Restriction of movement	Yes
Isolation	Yes
Physical and sexual violence	Yes
Intimidation and threats	Yes
Retention of identity documents	Yes
Withholding of wages	Yes
Debt bondage	Yes
Abusive working and living conditions	Yes
Excessive overtime	Yes
Other	-

Actions taken in response to finding ILO indicators

We asked the organisation to tell us whether its statement refers to any actions it took after finding indicators of forced labour

Actions we asked about	Organisation’s response
Financial remediation, including repayment of recruitment fees	Yes
Change in policy	Yes
Change in training	Yes
Referring potential victims to government services	Yes
Supporting victims via NGO	Yes
Supporting investigations by relevant authorities	Yes
Other	-

Demonstrating progress (optional)

We asked the organisation how its statement demonstrates progress over time in addressing modern slavery risks. They provided the following answer:

Annual objectives are set to enhance our risk assessment, increase training and awareness, take steps to strengthen policies, increase our focus on partnerships and increase our focus on scalable initiatives.