1. Our Business Model and Supply Chain Relationships

Anti-Slavery and Human Trafficking Policy

1. Our business model and supply chain relationships

Organisational background The RNIB group of charities includes Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB), Action for Blind People, RNIB Charity, Cardiff Institute for the Blind, and Bucks Vision. RNIB Group now employs circa 2,500 people across the UK, and has the support of around 4,800 volunteers. RNIB has an annual expenditure of circa £119million.

RNIB is the UK’s leading sight loss charity, providing support and advice to blind and partially sighted people in the UK. RNIB was founded in 1868.

RNIB operates a wide range of activities which reflects our efforts to stop people losing their sight unnecessarily, supporting people to get the education, jobs, and income they deserve, increase access to TV, culture and information, and enable people to get support and become independent.

To find out more about the nature of our business, please click here: www.rnib.org.uk

Action’s Organisational background Action for Blind People is a national charity with local reach, providing practical help and support to blind and partially sighted people of all ages.

Action was founded in 1857 as the Surrey Association for the General Welfare of the Blind and later became the London Association for the Blind. The Association's main activities in the early days were teaching blind people to read and to learn practical trades such as basket weaving.

Action has many services which help blind and partially sighted people with different aspects of their lives

Action speaks up for nearly 30,000 visually impaired people every year, always placing their needs at the heart of everything they do. Action supports individuals in many aspects of their lives and helps them to find the right services and products they need to live independently.

Action works as part of RNIB Group to provide a unique combination of complementary strengths and expertise to help an ever increasing number of people with sight loss. 2.6 You can learn more about Action by visiting their website at www.actionforblindpeople.org.uk/

As the UK’s leading sight loss Charity, providing support and advice to blind and partially sighted people in the UK, we provide a wide range of services reliant on a range of diverse goods and services sourced through our global supply chain including: China, India, USA, Canada, Norway, Europe and the UK.

RNIB’s Procurement Policy establishes ethical business conduct as critical to our operation and our expectation of compliance with applicable laws. RNIB is committed to ensuring that its employees, contractors and suppliers do not knowingly use slave labour or engage in human trafficking through our supply chain activities. Further to this RNIB prohibits its suppliers from using forced labour of any kind.

2. Due diligence and auditing processes

We will work to reduce the risk of modern slavery and human trafficking occurring within our supply chains. To do this we will review and monitor our supply chain for compliance with this policy by undertaking appropriate due diligence checks, by obtaining compliance statements from our suppliers, and by engaging in quarterly business reviews with preferred suppliers to evaluate them and the process that they have in place to comply with this requirement.

In order to ensure this process is correctly followed, no supplier should be appointed to provide goods or services to RNIB without first ensuring that the above checks have been made and confirmations received that no slavery or human trafficking is occurring in their respective supply chain.

In order to achieve this, all new suppliers must receive a copy of RNIB’s Supplier code of conduct with the set up questionnaire and be expected to abide by this, and provide confirmation before any supply is undertaken that they will do so.

As part of the appointment process RNIB seeks to: a) Evaluate the supply chain to verify and address the risks of human trafficking or slave labour and to; (b) Audit suppliers where necessary to evaluate compliance with standards for slavery and human trafficking in our supply chains.

The Procurement team must be notified of any suspected slavery or human trafficking, and will promptly and thoroughly investigate any claims or allegations that a supplier is engaging in slave labour activities or human trafficking, or is otherwise not complying with this policy. If necessary the procurement team will escalate its findings to the Board of Directors, Corporate Governance or the Audit Committee along with the findings of the investigation and the resolution of the claim.

3. Training

Our policies and statements are available on our intranet and website. Staff must familiarise themselves with this policy, our supplier code of conduct and our anti-slavery statement. Specific training on eradicating slave labour or human trafficking is available to relevant members of staff on Ethics & Anti-Slavery approach to our supply chain. Any queries or questions must be directed to the procurement team who will be happy to assist. Training (Where we need to be) We invest in educating our staff to recognise the risks of modern slavery and human trafficking in our business and supply chains. Through our training programmes, employees are encouraged to identify and report any potential breaches of the organisations anti-slavery and human trafficking policy. Employees are taught the benefits of stringent measures to tackle slavery and human trafficking, as well as the consequences of failing to eradicate slavery and human trafficking from our business and supply chains. Examples of training courses we have adminstered over the past year include:

4. Monitoring and Reporting

In order to monitor and maintain effective records of our anti-slavery programme, the procurement team will keep records in the procurement system of all evaluations and records to evidence the checks that are undertaken. Any documents provided by a supplier must be sent to the procurement team to review and file against a suppliers record. Procurement will report on the assessment of our supply chain on a quarterly basis to identify the actual numbers of suppliers appointed and assessed and to identify any possible gaps and areas that require further investigation and or audit. These reports will be passed to the senior management team as part of normal reporting.

Adopted November 2015

Chris Day Group Procurement Manager RNIB

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