Due diligence needs trade union participation

The meeting underscored the importance of the ongoing shift from voluntary approaches to binding obligations. Laws such as the EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive require companies to identify risks, prevent violations and provide remedy. This creates space for unions to intervene across supply chains. Organizing around compliance can improve transparency, strengthen bargaining and expose violations early.

Atle Høie, general secretary of IndustriALL emphasized:

“We have many instruments available, but we are tired of tools that have no teeth. Binding laws are opening new doors, but workers must walk through them.”

Worker participation and real oversight

A key message was that due diligence is meaningless without trade union participation. Workers must be involved in risk assessments, monitoring and remediation.

Participants noted that companies often bypass unions or present false compliance narratives. Independent, worker-led assessments are essential to reflect conditions in informal units, subcontracted factories and home-based work.

Participants identified access to information, protection from retaliation and stronger social dialogue as critical.

Ground realities and gaps

Interventions highlighted serious challenges. Workers in energy, mining, textile and home-based sectors face high risks with limited protection. Unsafe conditions, lack of protective equipment and repeated accidents show the urgency of preventive action.

Concerns raised included precarious employment in the supply chain with very low union density, exclusion from inspections and employer-controlled unions. Language barriers further limit access to information.

Cases of denied compensation, retaliation and weak enforcement show how companies evade accountability.

Pakistan HRDD: trade unions at the centre

Strengthening union capacity emerged as a priority, including supply chain mapping and plant level education.

Participants called for stronger coordination across unions and borders, with international solidarity seen as indispensable.

Using HRDD as leverage

Binding frameworks can shift power only if unions act collectively. Instruments like the Pakistan Accord, global framework agreements, OECD guidelines and ILO standards can be used to support organizing.

With growing pressures from climate change, industrial policy and trade shifts, unions stressed the need to ensure worker voices shape these transitions. The meeting reaffirmed that due diligence is a pathway to accountability and stronger worker power.

Ashutosh Bhattacharya IndustriALL South Asia regional secretary, said:

“Accountability begins where workers can speak without fear. Real change will only come when workers are including in shaping industrial and climate policy.”