Guides published to help companies deal with human rights

By Brian Collett — Two guides have been issued to help UK companies to understand how to perform their human rights duties and manage complaints. 

 

They come from the Manchester-based Equality and Human Rights Commission, an independent body formed specifically to promote equality, diversity and human rights and eliminate discrimination. 

 

The first guide, aimed at managers, shows them how to ensure that their companies embed human rights commitments in business, culture and practice and then deal with the most serious risks. 

 

It goes on to advise managers how to ensure that their companies involve stakeholders in managing human rights risks and being transparent about their actions. It then sets out the ways managers can be sure their companies apply remedies for any damage done.    

 

In the second guide the companies themselves are advised on ways to spot human rights problems before they can escalate and improve compliance with industry standards and statutory directives on handling complaints and grievances.

 

In addition, companies are given guidelines on monitoring complaints, seeing tell-tale patterns, and assessing how these methods are working. 

 

The commission believes the guides will be particularly valuable in medium-sized and large companies, but will be useful too, to smaller businesses in drawing up procedures suitable for the size and nature of their activities.