This statement is made pursuant to section 54 of the Modern Slavery Act 2015. It constitutes BFBS’s slavery and human trafficking statement for the financial year ended 31 March 2024. This statement provides background to our organisation and our supply chains and sets out the steps we have taken to ensure that slavery and human trafficking is not taking place in our organisation or any of our supply chains.
Our Organisation
BFBS is a pioneering military charity with a mission to entertain, inform, connect and champion the UK armed forces, their families and veterans through radio, television, news and live entertainment.
We broadcast to more than 20 countries worldwide and have permanently-staffed studios in 10 countries, including Bahrain, Cyprus, the Falkland Islands, Nepal and Canada.
Our activity is complemented by the services provided through our trading arm, BFBS Media Limited, which delivers communications and media expertise to a wide range of clients – in the military, not-for-profit and commercial sectors.
Our commitment
We are committed to improving our practices to combat slavery and human trafficking. Our commitment is expressed through corporate and strategic aims and in formal policies, processes and procedures. We will act ethically and with integrity in all our business relationships, implementing and enforcing effective systems and controls to ensure slavery and human trafficking is not taking place anywhere across our business or in our supply chains.
Our staff
We have around 260 members of staff who are directly employed and are not in any category which is seen to be vulnerable to modern slavery and so our main focus is to ensure there are policies and due diligence procedures in place for our suppliers and customers.
Our policies to underpin our approach to tackling the risk of modern slavery include:
Recruitment – we operate a robust recruitment policy, 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
Whistleblowing – our whistleblowing policy ensures that all employees know that they can raise concerns about how colleagues are being treated, or practices within the business or the supply chain, without fear of reprisal
Health and Safety – this policy sets out our approach to ensure we provide a healthy working environment for our staff and contractors that work out of our premises
Our Supply Chain
By way of context our main categories of procurement are technical services, satellite capacity, premises & utilities, broadcasting equipment, TV programme rights, software licences, professional services and sundry equipment. The large majority of our suppliers are UK based companies.
Our approach is to procure quality products and services while maintaining the highest ethical standards. Our suppliers and contractors are subject to a formal process of approval and review; our robust supplier selection process means that all prospective preferred suppliers and contractors are evaluated prior to their inclusion on the Supplier and Contractor List and before the procurement of goods or services are made. As well as ongoing supplier management reviews, all organisations on our preferred supplier and contractor list are formally re-evaluated every three years as a minimum, subject to initial contract length.
Additionally we expect the highest standards of conduct and probity throughout our supply chain, requiring all staff engaged and all of our people to act with integrity and honesty. Many of our supply-chain providers are pre-approved by public sector commissioning bodies. In addition, our procurement processes include due diligence checks about modern slavery and trafficking and we scrutinise our supply chain using our audit, legal and risk specialists.
Ben Chapman
Chief Executive
9 December 2024