Ethical training and guidance for commercial and procurement employees in the public sector, developed by the Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply (CIPS), has been announced by the UK Government, to improve their understanding of how to mitigate against risks of modern slavery in public procurement supply chains.

The online training and test on ethical procurement, developed by The Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply (CIPS) has been launched along with a free Modern Slavery Assessment Tool for suppliers developed by the Home Office.

The CIPS Ethical Procurement and Supply eLearning and online test includes over two hours of e-learning resources and enables procurement professionals around the world to demonstrate their absolute commitment to, and understanding of, how to act ethically in their organisations. 

• The e-learning is designed to prevent:Modern Slavery
• Fraud
• Bribery and corruption
• Human rights abuses; and
• The impact of procurement and the environment.

CIPS and a number of other contributors have also been involved in the development of new guidance on tackling modern slavery in supply chains, which will be published by the Cabinet Office shortly. The guidance will be made available for commercial staff across the public sector.

Malcolm Harrison, Group CEO, CIPS said, “We are pleased to continue our work with the Government on this issue of immense importance – ethics in the supply chain, and modern slavery as one of the most heinous of crimes in our modern society must have more focus.

“Professionals must be equipped with the best possible knowledge and guidance so they have the confidence to tackle the issue appropriately and not just close their eyes and hope that no slaves exist with their suppliers.

“Also employers must be confident that the professionals they employ and entrust their significant spend to have the latest knowledge to hand and can act with speed, agility and thoroughness throughout all the tiers in their supply chain.”

The online training course on ethical procurement developed by The Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply (CIPS) is available at a special discounted rate for all civil service commercial staff, and is available to all current CIPS members for free.

ENDS

Press contacts:

CIPS

Trudy Salandiak; CIPS PR Manager; trudy.salandiak@cips.org; +44 (0) 1780 761576; 07554 400 731

The Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply

The Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply (CIPS) is the world’s largest procurement and supply professional organisation. It is the worldwide centre of excellence on procurement and supply management issues. CIPS has a global community of over 200,000 in 180 different countries, including senior business people, high-ranking civil servants and leading academics. The activities of procurement and supply chain professionals have a major impact on the profitability and efficiency of all types of organisation and CIPS offers corporate solutions packages to improve business profitability. 

www.cips.org; @CIPSNews