Below is a statement of the steps we take aimed at ensuring there is no slavery or human trafficking in our organisations or our supply chains.
The Haines Watts Group is a network of member organisations, each of which is a separate and independent legal entity. Individually, member organisations do not meet the threshold above which they are required to issue a Modern Slavery Act Statement. However, we recognise the importance of taking steps aimed at ensuring there is no slavery or human trafficking in our organisations or our supply chains and this statement reflects that.
Structure and services
Haines Watts are a professional services group offering financial and other business advisory services from over 50 locations throughout the UK. The majority of our services are provided to UK based clients, principally in the SME sector.
We are regulated by recognised supervisory bodies, in most cases, the Institute of Chartered Accountants In England and Wales.
We operate predominantly from our own office environments, or client office premises for site based assignments. The vast majority of our services are provided by employees in the UK rather than contractors. Where we use third party organisations to assist in provision of services we expect them to comply with the Modern Slavery Act as well as be suitably qualified for the work they undertake. We have a close and often long term working relationship with our contractors who themselves are generally operating under a similar regulatory environment We do outsource a small proportion of services outside the UK and we obtain assurances from the appropriate UK based holding company that their organisation has policies in place to meet UK obligations under the Modern Slavery Act.
General supplies to us are for office goods and services such as office equipment, stationery, property maintenance, travel & accommodation. We consider this to be a low risk area and that our normal supplier approval procedures are adequate.
We do not operate in high risk areas and so do not consider any of our activities to be at high risk of slavery or human trafficking. Consequently, we consider that the combination of the regulatory environment we operate in and our own current procedures on supplier approval are adequate to meet our responsibilities and obligations. We will however continue to keep our procedures under review.
Board Approval
This statement has been approved by the Board of Haines Watts Limited which is responsible for Group policies.
