The UK’s approach to tackling modern slavery through the aid programme

The UK’s work to tackle modern slavery in developing countries has had limited long-term impact, did not build on existing international efforts and experience, and failed to adequately involve survivors – though the government played a prominent role in raising the profile of the issue globally.

Score: Amber/Red
  1. Status: Completed
  2. Published: 14 October 2020
  3. Type: Full review
  4. Subject: Cross-government aid spend, Democracy, governance and human rights
  5. Assessment: Amber/Red
  6. Location: Bangladesh, Nigeria
  7. Lead commissioner: Sir Hugh Bayley
  8. SDGs covered:No poverty, Reduced inequalities, Climate action, Peace, justice and strong institutions, Gender equality, Decent work and economic growth

Read the approach paper

Our approach

We set out to cover modern slavery programming funded by the UK aid programme and related influencing activities since November 2014, when the UK’s first Modern Slavery Strategy was launched.

We reviewed:

  • The UK government’s use of, and contribution to, the evidence base on modern slavery to inform sound investments in current and future programming.
  • Dedicated modern slavery programmes and other programming that the government identifies as having a modern slavery element.
  • The coherence, co-ordination and appropriate oversight of the UK government’s approach across the responsible departments.
  • The UK’s influencing work with other donors, multilateral partners and developing countries in promoting effective international cooperation on modern slavery.

In order to assess how modern slavery is integrated across a country programme and how well modern slavery programmes interact with other sectoral programmes, including on governance and livelihoods, we conducted case studies of the UK’s modern slavery approach in Nigeria and Bangladesh, conducting visits to each country. We conducted a review of the current literature on modern slavery (below) and assessed the evolution of the UK government’s strategies and theories of change. We also assessed the strategies and effectiveness of the UK government’s attempts to influence action on modern slavery at the international and national level.

As well as conducting key informant interviews and focus groups with stakeholders, thought leaders, civil society, UK government and partner government counterparts, we used a variety of ethical and safe methods to incorporate survivor voice into our work, and to assess how well UK modern slavery initiatives reflect the needs and priorities of the people expected to benefit from UK government support.

Review questions

We sought to answer the following review questions:

  1. Learning: How well has the UK government gone about building and applying the evidence base in support of its modern slavery work?
  2. Relevance: How well has the UK government gone about building a relevant, strategic, coordinated and credible portfolio of modern slavery programmes and influencing activities?
  3. Effectiveness: How well is the modern slavery portfolio delivering results and value for money?

 

Timeline

Approach

Published 26 Feb 2020

Evidence gathering

Complete

Review publication

Published 14 Oct 2020

Government response

Published 24 Nov 2020

Parliamentary scrutiny

IDC hearing 14 April 2021

ICAI follow-up

Published 30 June 2022

Further follow-up

Published 18 July 2023

Third follow-up

Expected summer 2024