Modern Slavery Statement

Our full statement

L&Q is one of the UK’s leading housing associations and one of London’s largest residential developers.  We own or manage approximately 105,000 homes primarily across London, the South East and North West of England.

We are an exempt charity committed to a wider social responsibility. This commitment has been integrated throughout the work of the organisation.

We are committed to ensuring that we comply with our legal and regulatory responsibilities, including the Modern Slavery Act 2015.  We continue to take care to ensure that slavery and human trafficking do not exist in any part of L&Q’s business or supply chain.

As a landlord, we're alert to all forms of modern slavery, particularly those that may exist in our tenancies. We are working on strengthening our ability to identify and thereby act on this form of resident vulnerability, exploitation and fraud.  We will come across a wide range of residents who reflect a diverse variety of backgrounds and needs. We recognise that isolated residents and people with learning difficulties may be particularly vulnerable or at risk.

Our safeguarding of adults at risk policy highlights modern slavery as a type of abuse. The types of abuse included in our policy comply with those defined in the Care Act 2014. We fully understand the safeguarding duties that apply under the Care Act and our responsibilities as a social landlord to keep people safe from abuse or harm. To enable us to keep people safe from modern-day slavery, training is crucial. All staff must complete safeguarding adults and children at risk e-learning training regardless of their role. This is refreshed on an annual basis and falls under our approach of safeguarding being ‘everyone’s business’. Front-line staff, for example, care workers and housing officers must also attend further classroom training. Since last year, we've also introduced additional mandatory training on modern-day slavery that all staff at L&Q must complete. This includes how to identify potential risk factors, including signs of exploitation and respond to them.

We continued, through our unauthorised subletting, tenancy fraud and tenancy management policies and procedures, to work to ensure that we understand who is living in the properties we manage.

As an employer, we continue to pay the living wage rate as set out by the Living Wage Foundation as a minimum for all staff other than apprentices – who receive the National Living Wage as a minimum.

We manage projects and procurements where services and products are sourced from suppliers. Most of these products are not sourced by us directly but are sourced by our contracted suppliers of services, goods and works. As an organisation that does not wish to work knowingly with any business involved in slavery or human trafficking in any part of its operations, we have taken the following steps:

• we require new suppliers to declare that they are not involved in slavery or human trafficking and have not been subject to any investigation in connection with any offence involving slavery or human trafficking
• our template contract and sub-contract documentation include provisions requiring our suppliers to take appropriate steps to ensure that there is no slavery or human trafficking in their supply chains
• our tender documentation notifies potential suppliers that we will expect them to comply with the Modern Slavery Act
• we have published a Supplier Code of Conduct on the L&Q website. This includes the requirement that all suppliers comply with the Modern Slavery Act
• we recognise the need to pay particular attention to those procured goods/services carrying the highest risk of modern slavery within the L&Q supply chain, namely construction, agriculture and textiles
• we have a whistleblowing policy for all staff
• we continue to work with the Living Wage Foundation and have sought internal governance approval to obtain full accreditation as a Living Wage Foundation employer in 2024/25 which will involve embedding new clauses in our supplier contracts binding our suppliers to pay the Living Wage rates.

We will assess any evidence of non-compliance and will take appropriate remedial action. We will only trade with those who comply with this statement and the terms of our contracts or those who are taking verifiable steps toward compliance.

Future plans

L&Q will begin to implement a Category Management approach to procurement activities this year. As part, we will assess the feasibility of moving to a broader supply chain management approach over time.  This will provide greater visibility and assurance of labour practices including identification of activity that could constitute modern slavery beyond our first-tier supply chains and be addressed by visits to the factories of tiers 2 and 3 suppliers (the suppliers to our contractors) where the risk of modern slavery could be greatest.

This statement is made under section 54(1) of the Modern Slavery Act 2015. It constitutes our Group's slavery and human trafficking statement for the financial year ending 31 March 2024. The turnover of the L&Q Group exceeds £36 million for that period.

This statement will be reviewed and updated on an annual basis and is approved by L&Q’s Group Board. It applies to all companies and organisations within the Group except for:

• the L&Q Estates portfolio and the L&Q Group’s strategic land business, which has a separate statement that reflects the distinct nature of its activities, but is consistent with the Group Policy