Modern Slavery Statement 2023
Who we are as an organisation
Hireup is an Australian NDIS-registered provider of disability support services, operating through an online platform where people with disability can find, hire and manage support workers who fit their needs and share their interests. At the time of reporting, we had more than 7,000 clients and more than 7,400 disability Support Workers across Australia approved to use Hireup’s platform.
Hireup Support Workers are engaged as casual and permanent employees, to provide one on one support services to people with disability. Hireup is a national company with 380 office personnel working across Australia.
We submit this Statement on behalf of all operations of Hireup Holdings Pty Ltd (parent company) and Hireup Pty Ltd, both of which are reporting entities. The two companies operate in the same sector and share suppliers. Hireup policies and procedures are applicable to both. Hireup Holdings Pty Ltd and Hireup Pty Ltd created this Statement in collaboration with each other and are herein referred to as “Hireup”.
Consultation
This Statement for the 2023 financial year period was developed through consultation between both entities and discussions on: the Modern Slavery Act, potential actions to mitigate against Modern Slavery risks, reporting requirements, and how to raise awareness of Modern Slavery internally and externally to Hireup.
The CEO and Executive Leadership Team of Hireup Pty Ltd and the Chair of Hireup Holdings Pty Ltd participated in the Statement’s development and input was received from key business units including Trust & Safety, Legal, Risk, Finance and Procurement teams.
Combined oversight of the implementation of this Statement by the Hireup Pty Ltd Executive Leadership Team and the Hireup Holdings Board will ensure there is a consistent approach and commitment to its application across both companies.
Our activities
Hireup’s key supply chains are:
- the provision of disability support services by Hireup’s Support Workers; and
- procurement of products and services for use by Support Office personnel.
Our understanding of Modern Slavery risks for Hireup
Hireup’s previous Statements have outlined the steps we have taken to understand the risk posed to Hireup by Modern Slavery. This has included supply chain mapping, which considers geographic origins, pricing index and total annual spend in assessing risk of our key suppliers.
Hireup’s business operations remain largely unchanged since our last Statement. Since our last Statement Hireup has continued to provide other disability sector providers with access to Hireup’s Support Workers (Providers Venture). This venture may create some additional, albeit low Modern Slavery risks; namely that a third party provider utilising Hireup Support Workers may engage in discriminatory, unethical or illegal workplace practices such as wage theft, unsafe working conditions or exploitative labour practices.
It remains our belief that the provision of support for people with a disability, either directly through Hireup, or through our existing partner providers does not create a significant risk of Modern Slavery.
Despite this belief, we continue to monitor Modern Slavery risks in our procurement of goods and services with particular focus on those goods and services which are identified as carrying higher risks of Modern Slavery such as, cleaning and maintenance services, garments such as staff t-shirts, and IT hardware and software.
How we are addressing Modern Slavery risks
Hireup has continued to progress and mature the implementation of our Modern Slavery framework across both entities and has assessed the processes put in place in the previous reporting period to address our Modern Slavery risks.
We have maintained close relationships with our existing suppliers and new suppliers have been assessed through our supply chain mapping processes. We have reviewed Hireup’s procurement processes and the associated policy and procedures. During this review there were no material changes made to any of the existing procurement related documentation or processes. Hireup’s Procurement Policy (Policy) continues to provide a comprehensive framework for sourcing strategies and purchasing processes. Our Policy ensures that all goods and services acquired by Hireup are valid, fit for purpose, cost effective, and that they reflect our commitment to operate in a socially and ethically responsible manner. The Policy also ensures adequate levels of due diligence are conducted on new and existing suppliers to allow us to identify and manage any Modern Slavery risks and to provide us with a better understanding of how our suppliers actively manage their own Modern Slavery risks. Hireup will continue this practice in 2023/24 for all new and existing suppliers. We will continue to monitor and re-evaluate suppliers compliance to Modern Slavery practices.
Training which covers an awareness of and the compliance requirements for Modern Slavery, is provided for employees involved in procurement activities. Hireup’s Procurement Team provides guidelines for the sourcing and procuring of goods and services and how our suppliers’ Modern Slavery risks are identified and assessed. We continue to utilise the Modern Slavery Supplier Approval Form, which links to our Modern Slavery Supplier Code of Conduct (Code”). Hireup’s Enterprise Resource Planning tool enables us to manage Supplier Approval Forms electronically. Supplier responses to Modern Slavery questions are recorded against their supplier profile in our ERP system. This enables Procurement to effectively monitor and report on supplier Modern Slavery answers and track supplier changes to these questions.
In addition, as Hireup expands its Provider Venture we are applying additional controls to mitigate the possibility of Modern Slavery risks arising. This includes ensuring that all contracts between Hireup and a provider contain appropriate clauses relating to ethical workplace practices and modern slavery, monitoring of the work undertaken by Hireup’s Support Workers when they are engaged with a provider, and ensuring all Support Workers engaged with a provider have clear and open feedback channel to raise issues or concerns.
Our governance structure and continuous improvement
We have continued to utilise Hireup’s management and governance structures to support the ongoing development of our Modern Slavery Statement.
The Enterprise Risk Team has responsibility for maintaining the overarching strategy, direction, management and coordination of our Modern Slavery projects and Modern Slavery Working Group.
The Risk & Safety Committee of the Hireup Board monitors and reviews key risk areas within the business and assists and advises the Board on decision making around Modern Slavery risks. The Committee also oversees Hireup’s continuous improvement in responding to these risks.
Hireup’s Finance team delivers our Procurement function, with emphasis on managing all supplier onboarding, modern slavery questionnaires, supplier spending, supplier payments,sourcing activities and supplier compliance with our Code. This is enabling Hireup to help drive and deliver better compliance across our supplier base.
Effectiveness
Building on Hireup’s Third Statement where we identified and assessed risks associated with existing supply chains and operations, we have continued to monitor the
effectiveness of our actions to improve our response and strengthen Hireup against the risks of Modern Slavery.
Assessments to measure the effectiveness of these actions include:
- Continued monitoring of suppliers reviewed in 2021-2022. This includes a current state assessment of their own positions on Modern Slavery including a review of their Modern Slavery Statements.Monitoring new suppliers who completed, signed and returned Hireup’s Supplier Approval form.
- Monitoring of existing suppliers who completed, signed and returned Hireup’s Supplier Approval form.
- Monitoring outcomes for actions taken on supplier risks.
- Monitoring any Modern Slavery complaints received and reported to the Risk and Safety Committee and the Board (which have been nil at the time of writing this Statement).
Emerging risks
In 2023 we continued to review existing and new suppliers, using our updated risk assessment processes (deepening our analysis of procurement spend per country), which have enabled us to capture, document and manage identified risks, possible risks and emerging risks.
This Statement was endorsed by Hireup Pty Ltd on 19 December 2023
Laura O’Reilly Co-founder and CEO
This Statement was approved by the Board of Hireup Holdings Pty Ltd on 19 December 2023
Greg Couttas
Chair