Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking Statement For Financial year 2022/2023

This statement is made pursuant to the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and sets out the steps that Meon Valley Travel Group has taken and is continuing to take to ensure that modern slavery or human trafficking is not taking place within our business or supply chain.

Modern slavery encompasses slavery, servitude, human trafficking and forced labour. Meon Valley Travel Group has a zero tolerance approach to any form of modern slavery. We are committed to acting ethically and with integrity and transparency in all business dealings and to putting effective systems and controls in place to safeguard against any form of modern slavery taking place within the business or our supply chain.

The Company is committed to:

  • ensuring compliance with The Modern Slavery Act not just within the UK but in any other country within which the Company may carry out its business or in relation to which its business may be connected.
  • enabling employees and persons associated with the Company to understand the risks associated with The Modern Slavery Act and to encourage them to be vigilant and effectively recognise, prevent and report any wrongdoing.
  • providing suitable and secure reporting and communication channels and ensuring that any information that is reported is properly and effectively dealt with.
  • maintaining an effective framework for dealing with any suspected instances of Modern Slavery.

Our business

Founded in 2002 Meon delivers three core specialties of Leisure, Business, and 24-hour Emergency Assistance. Customers range from Private Clients through to global Brands requiring loyalty, the UK’s best SMEs, Corporates, and multi-national insurance and assistance providers worldwide.

Our unique and privileged expertise delivers Emergency Assistance around the globe for our clients.

Our high risk areas

As an organisation working globally we recognise the importance of understanding other cultures and the risks these present in relation to modern slavery.

All of our employees are trained fully to understand these risks and carry out relevant checks where appropriate to ensure we are not at any point working or associating with any organisations conducting any behaviour deemed to be Modern Slavery.

Our policies

We operate a number of internal policies to ensure that we are conducting business in an ethical and transparent manner. These include:

  1. Modern Slavery Policy.
  2. Ethical Conduct and Corporate Social Responsibility Policy – This policy sets out the organisation’s stance on modern slavery, Equality and Harassment Anti Bribery, and child labour and explains how employees can identify any instances of this and where they can go for help.
  3. Supplier Code of Conduct Policy – This policy sets out the organisation’s stance on modern slavery, Equality and Harassment Anti Bribery, and child labour and explains behaviour expected of our suppliers.
  4. Recruitment procedure. We operate a robust recruitment procedure, including conducting eligibility to work in the UK checks for all employees to safeguard against human trafficking or individuals being forced to work against their will.
  5. Whistleblowing policy. We operate a whistleblowing policy so that all employees know that they can raise concerns about how colleagues are being treated, or practices within our business or supply chain, without fear of reprisals.
  6. Code of conduct. This code explains the manner in which we behave as an organisation.
  7. Anti-Money laundering Policy.

Our suppliers

Meon Valley Travel Ltd works with supply chains on a global basis operates a supplier policy and maintains a preferred supplier list.  We conduct due diligence on all suppliers before allowing them to become a preferred supplier.  This due diligence includes an online search to ensure that particular organisation has never been convicted of offenses relating to modern slavery.  Our Supplier Code of Conduct ensures all suppliers comply with our determined behaviours and they are required to confirm that no part of their business operations contradicts our Policy.

Our code of conduct for suppliers dictates that they:

  1. Have taken steps to eradicate modern slavery within their business.
  2. Hold their own suppliers to account over modern slavery.
  3. (For UK based suppliers) they pay their employees at least the national minimum wage / national living wage (as appropriate).
  4. (For international suppliers) they pay their employees any prevailing minimum wage applicable within their country of operations.
  5. Uphold equality and prevent harassment in their organisations.
  6. Take appropriate steps to prevent bribery.
  7. Take steps to prevent child labour.
  8. Act in accordance with Health and Safety at all time.
  9. We may terminate the contract at any time should any instances of modern slavery or other breaches of our Supplier code of Conduct come to light.

Training

We regularly conduct training for our teams so that they understand the signs of modern slavery and what to do if they suspect that it is taking place within our supply chain.

Our performance indicators

We will know the effectiveness of the steps that we are taking to ensure that slavery and/or human trafficking is not taking place within our business or supply chain if:

  • No reports are received from employees, the public, or law enforcement agencies to indicate that modern slavery practices have been identified.
  • Internal training is completed on understanding and preventing Modern Slavery.