Evaluating University Efforts to Combat Modern Slavery and Labour Abuses in Supply Chains

Hundreds of cleaners and security guards keep each university in Australia clean and safe. Until around 20 years ago, universities directly employed these workers. Today, these services are outsourced, and universities are grappling with their responsibility for the labour conditions of workers they pay someone else to employ and manage.

In 2021, the Cleaning Accountability Framework (CAF) launched a pilot project in the Australian university sector to help universities improve the ways they monitor and assure fair working conditions for cleaners and security guards. This report fulfilled the purpose of gathering baseline information about the level of knowledge amongst those responsible for procurement of cleaning and security, their priorities, their perceptions of their ability to address labour conditions at the point of tender and in contract management, and other matters concerning their power to oversee the ethics of procurement.