Walk Free: eradicating modern slavery

Rebecca Archer

Welcome to The Remarkables – Grant Thornton’s podcast that seeks to uncover stories about remarkable people doing incredible things for their community, bettering the world for future generations and inspiring others to do the same. 

I’m Rebecca Archer, and today I’m joined by Katharine Bryant who is the Director of Operations at Walk Free – an international human rights group focused on eradicating modern slavery. Today, we’ll discuss Walk Free's commitment to abolishing modern slavery and the strategies they employ to combat this global issue.

Welcome Katharine – thank you for joining us on the podcast all the way from London!

Katharine Bryant

Fantastic. Thanks so much for having me, Rebecca. Really excited to join you today.

Rebecca Archer

Now, Katharine, we do like to start each episode by asking our guests what they're reading right now or listening to or watching. Could you share some insights into what some recommendations might be?

Katharine Bryant

Of course. So, I've just finished a book by Ece Temelkuran – Together: 10 Choices for a Better Now – and basically, it's reflecting on some of the crises we've been experiencing over the last few years around COVID, around conflict, and giving kind of lessons learned of how we can kind of pivot and respond and actually kind of take action. So, I found it a really hopeful read over the last… well the last few months that I've been looking at it. 

Outside of that, I also love true crime. So, I'm listening to a great podcast called the Creep Dive at the moment, which is basically three Irish women who get together who've known each other for years, and they share some of their retellings – sometimes inaccurately – of true crime stories. Yeah, it's a good laugh. It's definitely one I'd recommend.

Rebecca Archer

Oh, thank you very much for those recommendations. I have to check those out. 

Now, if we can have a bit of a look at the big picture for Walk Free – can you talk to us about the origin story of Walk Free and what the organisation aims to achieve?

Katharine Bryant

So, Walk Free was actually founded over a decade ago by Grace Forrest, and it was directly in response to her experiences in Nepal. She'd actually gone and done some volunteering work in an orphanage in Nepal, and then when she went back, she discovered that a lot of the children she'd been working with had actually been trafficked into sexual exploitation, and that experience for her, was really life changing. 

As a result of that, she really wanted to take action, change the course of her life completely, to set up Walk Free – which is an organisation set up to eradicate the root causes of all forms of modern slavery. I realise modern slavery may not be a familiar term to some listeners, so modern slavery is...we define it as an umbrella term that encompasses many different forms of exploitation, but predominantly we focus on forced labour. That's work that an individual cannot leave or refuse because of threats, coercion, etcetera and forced marriage, which is a marriage where an individual has not consented to be in that particular marriage, or they find it particularly difficult to leave.

Rebecca Archer

Who makes up the team? Is it quite a diverse bunch? I would imagine you've got some lawyers on staff, some statisticians. How does it work?

Katharine Bryant

So, we have an amazing team. We're actually quite a small team. There's only about 18 of us at the moment, but we are lawyers, criminologists, statisticians, human rights experts, people who have engaged with business/finance sector. So, we're a pretty diverse bunch. 

We're predominantly women, which we're very proud of, although we've just rehired a man recently. So, we are starting to get better on the kind of gender balance, and those individuals bring a lot of experience and wealth to the team to focus on eradicating modern slavery. Research is a really core part of what we do, so we also have a lot of researchers.

Rebecca Archer

And how do you educate people about what it is that you're doing? Has it sort of been a bit of a grassroots campaign? How do you get your message out?

Katharine Bryant

So, when we look back to ten years ago, we knew that there was a real gap in terms of the data that existed. So, one of the things that was often said is that we don't know how big the problem is, we don't know what we're going to be doing to respond to it, and with that kind of simple sense of, if you can't measure it, you can't end it, it was very stagnating in terms of responses. 

As a result of that, we produced something called the Global Slavery Index, which aims to educate individuals about what the problem is, how big it is, and what governments should be doing to respond to it. Through that report, we provide a lot of evidence, a lot of data, but it is very much focused on influencing policy, influencing change, to try and drive action to eradicate modern slavery.

Rebecca Archer

And for you personally, is this something you've always had a bit of an interest in or a desire to sort of go and work in this particular sector?

Katharine Bryant

That's a great question, and the answer is no, not always. I actually started my career as a history teacher in southeast London, and then at age 25, decided I was panicking, that I wasn't quite sure that's what I wanted to do with my life. So, I quit my job, went travelling as every mature 25-year-old does, and ended up traveling around for a bit and ended up in East Timor, where I actually ended up doing a bit of an intern with the International Organisation for Migration on their counter trafficking program. 

I was there for about two, three years in the end, so took on increasing responsibility, one of which was actually managing their victim assistance program. So, through that, we would do screenings of individuals to see if they would be eligible to receive support in Timor, but then also with repatriation home. The first one I did myself, by myself, after having done the training and everything, was actually a young Burmese boy – about 15 years old. He'd jumped ship into Timor through crocodile infested waters. So, it was through South Timor. So, for people who are familiar with Darwin, it's very similar in terms of the experiences that he would have had swimming to shore. 

So, I did that interview. He was obviously eligible for support, and at the end of that interview, he asked something through the translator, and it transpired that he wasn't the only one that swam to shore, and we never found out what actually happened to his five friends. 

So that is a very personal experience for me, but what that showed me at that point in time is that our system is pretty messed up if, you know, he's there fishing because we want cheap fish, and that supply chain basically means that that individual has experienced the most horrific experiences on that boat, that the only alternative for him is to swim to shore when the first chance that he gets.

And so that's something that really made me want to change things and really tackle that system to be, like, unpacking, what are those baked in inequities and what should we be doing to respond to it?

Rebecca Archer

Yeah, I can only imagine how pivotal an experience like that was for you in terms of… I think I found what I really want to do now. Walk free undertakes research called the Global Slavery Index. Can you tell us a bit more about that, and how do you use that data to drive change?

Katharine Bryant

Certainly. So, the Global Slavery Index – we released the fifth edition of it last year. At its very core, it aims to answer kind of three key questions. That is, how big is the problem? What are governments doing to respond and what makes people vulnerable? And we collect that data for over 160 countries around the world, and by doing that, we aim to highlight what is the issue, what are we talking about, and then also provide really concrete policy recommendations, a bit of a roadmap for governments to then take action. Throughout the report, we also highlight thematic issues. So current trends or changes in the responses to modern slavery or in some of the trends that we're seeing coming through.

So, the last report that came out last year highlighted that there had been a 10 million person increase in modern slavery in recent years. So, we now know there's some 50 million people experiencing either forced labour or forced marriage, and we know that all countries are affected by it. We saw that increase largely as a result of conflict, climate change, the kind of lingering impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. So that has kind of shown us that there is an awful lot more that we need to be doing, but it also provides some concrete solutions as well. 

Rebecca Archer

Those figures are just staggering. Do you do a sort of breakdown of where this is maybe the worst in the world and sort of on a sliding scale from there?

Katharine Bryant

We do. So, at its core, it's an Index where we rank countries based on the size of the problem, and we also rank regions as well. So, some of the most affected regions are the Arab States, where we know there's a very large migrant worker population who's particularly vulnerable. They don't have the same access to their rights or to resources as citizens of those countries. 

We also know countries where there's a lot of conflict can have high proportions of exploitation, as well as where we see authoritarian governments that kind of crack down on people's rights as well. So common across all of that, kind of the top ten of countries like North Korea, Eritrea, Afghanistan – we see conflict affecting the prevalence rates. In the Gulf States, we see the kind of the really reduction of rights for migrant workers, as well as kind of the lingering impacts of the pandemic as well.

Rebecca Archer

According to your research, countries which have high prevalence of modern slavery tend to be, as you mentioned, conflict affected, have State imposed forced labour and weak governance. Are you able to perhaps step us through the process of how you identify these countries?

Katharine Bryant

Of course. So, we actually ask individuals who've been affected by these forms of exploitation. So, sitting behind those prevalence estimates and sitting behind the list of countries of who are, you know, the most affected, we've actually done surveys in about 75 countries, interviewing over 110,000 individuals to ask them about their experiences of themselves and also their families – their relatives – to see if there's any instances of forced labour and forced marriage. 

Through this, we're able to then extrapolate to about 129 countries around the world as showing their experiences of exploitation. On the other side, where we do our assessment of government responses, that's actually done through a really detailed assessment desk, research, interviewing NGO's, verifying information. 

So, to put it into context, every time we do the index, that's about 25,000 data points that we're updating every time, and that gives a really detailed pictures of what governments are doing right now, but also gives some recommendations of where the gaps are of the actions that they're not taking. 

Rebecca Archer

And does Walk Free have dialogue directly with governments?

Katharine Bryant

Yes. So, at Walk Free, we definitely do have dialogue at governments. We engage directly, and we're open to having a conversation with all governments around what they should be doing and highlighting good practice and sharing that information. But at its very core, we are an data driven advocacy organisation. We're also not afraid of holding governments to account, and that's largely what the GSI does – the Global Slavery Index – I should say, it gives us that kind of real pointy point of saying, actually, this is where the issues are. Now let's have a conversation about how we can actually change things.

Rebecca Archer

Is it potentially quite dangerous work, especially if we're looking at those conflict affected regions or countries?

Katharine Bryant

It can be. We know that modern slavery and conflict intersects in many different ways. So, people who are on the move conflict can be affected, they can be vulnerable to traffickers who want them to go and work in forced labour. As the conflict becomes more protracted, it can also lead to increases in forced labour and forced marriage. Say, for example, a family who's been in a refugee camp for a really long time, has young daughters, is worried about security. Forced marriage may be the only solution unfortunately, at that point in time. 

We've also seen that conflict is a bit of a…it can be used as a tactic of war. If we think back to the Syrian conflict and ISIS, we know that the Yazidi community was very vulnerable to forced marriage as a result of them trying to subjugate that particular population. 

So, there's many ways in which conflict in modern slavery intersects. It's also very difficult to get data on it. So, we've done a couple of surveys where we've gone into internally displaced camps and asked questions about people's experiences of forced labour, and that's where that data comes from. We do know that there are solutions as well. 

So, if you look at the Ukraine conflict, we actually didn't see the huge spike in trafficking that we thought would happen immediately after that conflict took place, and that's largely because the countries that all border Ukraine – so Poland, for example – had a pretty good trafficking response, or relatively strong trafficking response already. They had things like a hotline. The police had been trained to identify cases of human trafficking and modern slavery, so they were able to kind of step up and kind of respond to that flow of people. 

In other countries where that response doesn't exist, there's a bit of a preventative measure needed to happen there where we actually work with governments ahead of time to make sure that those responses are in place. We've also been really proud to partner with UNHCR, so the refugee agency, to create guidelines for people who are actually in the field, who may come across individuals of exploitation, to be able to identify them and also point them to the right services. So those guidelines are available and have been kind of socialised to many humanitarian practitioners around the world.

Rebecca Archer

Are there any regions that we see modern slavery occurring that listeners may be a bit surprised by people?

Katharine Bryant

I mean, modern slavery occurs everywhere, and I think that's the key message that people are often surprised by. So not necessarily maybe regions, but individual countries. So, in the UK, where I'm based, modern slavery occurs. In Australia, we know modern slavery occurs. So that's often the message that we find people find surprising, because it can be seen as a thing that happens over there that doesn't affect us directly. 

In terms of actual regions, the Arab States has the highest proportion of people in modern slavery, and that's largely as a result of their huge migrant population, who are particularly vulnerable, and then they're followed by Europe and Central Asia, Asia Pacific and the Americas, but we do find modern sovereign in every single country, in every single region.

Rebecca Archer

I think you are right. People will be surprised to learn that. I mean, it is a global issue. Maybe the difficulty sometimes is that people find it somewhat intangible, and they may feel a bit helpless. Oh, how can I possibly make a difference? But what's the best way for people to support the mission of organisations like Walk Free?

Katharine Bryant

It's a really good question, and while we use statistics to kind of lead to policy change, it also can be quite overwhelming when we say 50 million people. Like, it can feel like, where do I start with that kind of number? 

So, throughout our research, we also include case studies to really kind of give the personal element to this. This is not just a number, this is an individual who shared their story behind this. Throughout our research and also through all advocacy, we provide that information. So, a kind of key message for everybody, for citizens, for consumers, is to kind of educate yourself and to learn about this. So, we have a website – walkfree.org – where all of this information is housed, and then once you've educated yourself, it's to ask questions. 

So, let's just take that example of a consumer. So, we know modern slavery is very likely to affect most supply chains around the world, from, you know, the laptop we're talking on, the technology, the electronics, through to the shirt that I'm wearing today, or the coffee I had this morning before I joined this call. There will be some elements of forced labour in those supply chains. 

So, what we ask people as consumers to do is to really ask questions of some of their favourite brands about who made their clothes. We estimate that some, if you look at just G20 countries, nearly half a trillion US dollars worth of goods at risk of being produced by forced labour enters those G20 countries every single year. So, there is an awful lot that we can do as consumers to ask questions of those governments about what they're doing. 

There are some great apps out there, one called Good On You, which talks about textiles and clothing, where you can look into individual brands and see what information you have. Whereas also in Australia and also in the UK, there's something called a Modern Slavery Act, which means that companies, over a certain amount, so certain larger companies, have to report on what they are doing to respond to modern slavery, and all of those statements are very publicly available.

They're on websites, there's a central registry, so consumers can go to their favorite brands online, click on the Modern Slavery Act statement, and just read about what they're doing and understand where the action are, and so that helps them to make informed choices about where you're purchasing your goods.

Rebecca Archer

But I guess it depends on the legislation in the certain countries or jurisdictions that you're dealing with, doesn't it? I mean, can you sort of speak to anyone that does a particularly good job of policing this?

Katharine Bryant

Definitely. One of the success stories of the last few years is many businesses are starting to take this very, very seriously, and that's a result of this changing regulation, this legislation landscape that we're seeing. 

So, the UK and Australia kind of led that work in many ways with something called mandatory reporting legislation, and that's that Modern Slavery Act I was just referring to where companies have to report on what they're doing to respond, but the world is shifting and we're seeing actually more action being taken. 

So, in Europe there's something called the Corporate Sustainability Directive, or due diligence, which is a very snappy title, but basically it's around asking companies to go beyond reporting on what they should be doing, to actually taking active steps to investigate their supply chains, to make sure that there's no exploitation occurring, and then some of those pieces of legislation have a next step where if exploitation then does happen in that company's supply chain, the worker who's exploited then has the right of action, has the right to then hold that company accountable for their failure to do due diligence. 

So, there is a bit of a change in the legislation, it's getting a little bit stronger, which is fantastic, and we would encourage countries like Australia and the UK to then start to follow suit around some of these more legislation changes.

Rebecca Archer

Now, you've already covered off on the garments, fabrics, textiles, things like that. You mentioned electronics. Are there other industries that have a particularly strong association or risk of their products being produced via modern slavery?

Katharine Bryant

There are probably in most supply chains there'll be some elements of forced labour, but the ones that you just mentioned. So, garments, electronics, the cocoa industry has had a lot of focus on it over the years, with children being forced to work in Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire to pick the cocoa beans that end up in our coffee and our chocolate. 

We also know that solar panels, for the first time ever, were actually included in the last report, where there is some evidence that the production of solar panels or the elements that go into solar panels, polysilicon, for example, is actually made with forced labour in the Uyghur region in China, and so, we know that that's a real issue that we need to make sure when we're focusing on climate change, for example, that we are respecting both people and planet in terms of responding to these issues. 

But yeah, it definitely affects an awful lot of the supply chains that we experience day to day, but those would be some of the bigger issues that we see.

Rebecca Archer

And I think that this generation that's moving through, the younger people who are coming up are becoming, they certainly are a lot more socially, ethically responsible. They won't work for organisations that are deemed to not have a great record when it comes to ESG. 

So, is that sort of something that you find some hope in as well? The fact that people do seem to be becoming more aware and their advocating for the kind of work that you do.

Katharine Bryant

Completely, it gives me an awful lot of hope. We get contacted an awful lot by university students who are going through programs like the human rights space, but also in the kind of business management space as well, of like, how can we engage with these issues? We have a program with an organization called Wikirate where we actively encourage students going through business and human rights programs to look at those Modern Slavery Act statements and to kind of educate themselves in the hope that then when they go into the workforce, these are kind of second nature to them, but we find there is an awful lot of demand for it. It gives us an awful lot of hope that younger people are asking these questions. They're thinking about climate change, they're thinking about labour rights in a way, perhaps, that our generation didn't so much.

Rebecca Archer

What are some of the success stories from your work? Do you perhaps have some personal examples of where the work that you have been doing has perhaps freed some people from modern slavery?

Katharine Bryant

Definitely. So, we are really pleased to partner with the Freedom Fund, which is an organisation based here in London. They take our research and do more kind of frontline work in high prevalence countries. So, they work in what they call hotspots, with grassroots organisations doing direct support to vulnerable populations, including those that have experienced forced labour or forced marriage. 

In the policy space, we were also really heavily involved in the advocacy for the Australian Modern Slavery Act, along with other partners in civil society across Australia, which obviously passed, and we're really pleased to see that some of the most recent legislative developments, such as the independent Anti-Slavery commissioner, which was actually announced just a few weeks ago, and then we've also been heavily involved in that EU corporate sustainability directive on due diligence that actually passed earlier this year. It looked like it was at real risk at certain points because of some of the political playing going across the EU at the moment, but actually, we worked really closely with civil society here to actually make sure that legislation passed.

So definitely at the policies level, we're seeing a lot of changes as a result of our work, and then also really pleased that we can then translate that all the way down to grassroots, where we see individuals being supported day to day based on some of the work that we're doing.

Rebecca Archer

And do you have any examples or feedback from those grassroots levels where people have been able to reach out and say, were it not for the work that was done here, I would still be in that awful situation where I just had no agency whatsoever?

Katharine Bryant

Yeah, certainly. So, actually, I was in Ethiopia earlier this year with our group called Survivor Alliance, and that's a group of survivors of exploitation who've worked around the world and they're coming together as a network to try and do their own advocacy, their own research, their own support to other survivors, and we worked there with a local organisation called Casma, which was actually established through the Freedom Fund programming that we've seen. 

That group of individuals has about 15 survivors of various forms of exploitation often being exploited in domestic work in the Gulf States, but then returning to Ethiopia, were there to actually review our research, to then give us feedback on what we'd said about the Ethiopian Government, and then to help them to actually do their own advocacy off the back of it, and that group is now putting together a proposal and hopefully we'll be able to support them, to then actually do their own advocacy. 

So, it becomes this beautiful circle of we have identified these individuals; we can provide them support. We provide them with the support where they're then able to come back to us, give us feedback on our own work, and then take that and do their own change off the back of it. So definitely we're seeing that impact at the grassroots level as well.

Rebecca Archer

And Katharine, obviously you must be so busy. What are some of the upcoming projects that you've got on the boil at walk free?

Katharine Bryant

So, this year we're all about translating the Global Slavery Index into action. So, that sets our kind of work plan for the next four years. So key things on the calendar for us is doing some work in countries that are source countries for the Gulf States. 

So, my colleagues were just in Sri Lanka a few weeks ago working with some business leaders there to really get some concrete commitments from business, to start to do advocacy on changing legislation around this human rights due diligence that we're interested in. 

Looking forward, we're also going to be engaging with faith leaders, potentially doing some work with the Vatican in the next year or so, and then also looking forward to UNGA. So, the UN General Assembly that takes place in September to make sure that this is actually on the agenda there, to make sure that people are continuing to focus on.

Rebecca Archer

And Katharine, we do like to wrap up all of our episodes by asking our guests what the most remarkable advice might be that they've received. It could be in a professional or a personal capacity. Is there anything that springs to mind for you?

Katharine Bryant

Yes. So, the advice is follow your gut, I think is kind of the one that stuck with me. So, although I told the story of being in East Timor, during that process, I had an offer to come back to London, to come back into teaching, and I was umming and ahhing. 

I was putting lists together, pros and cons, all of these things about what I doing with my life, you know, etcetera, and my now husband, who I met there, he asked me just off the cuff one day, I think I was doing a washing up or something, and he was like, do you really want to go back to London? And I just, without even thinking, went, God, no, and so it was that moment of saying, actually, if I just followed my gut, I knew exactly what I really wanted to do. It wasn't just about doing these lists and overthinking it.

So, yes, I think that's the best advice I have of actually. You often know the answer of what you really want to do, but you just, just need to follow that gut, and kind of follow it through.

Rebecca Archer

And talking about following through, if people who are listening today would like to follow the journey of walk free and find out more and maybe even get involved, what's the best way that they can find the organisation and do just that?

Katharine Bryant

Of course. So, we have a website, so walkfree.org is the best place to read more about our work and find the Global Slavery Index. We're also on LinkedIn and we also have an Instagram, so I recommend people reach out and look at those places to begin with, and then to contact us, our email address is info@walkfree.org. So nice and simple and straightforward.

Rebecca Archer

If you liked this podcast and would like to hear more remarkable stories, you can find, like and subscribe to The Remarkables podcast by Grant Thornton Australia on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Leave us a review or ideas on who you’d like to hear from next. I’m Rebecca Archer – thank you for listening.