Slavery, scrutiny and the fair work act: Lessons from the Nordics

As the Fair Work Agency comes online and scrutiny of modern slavery and labour standards intensifies, UK construction faces a new reality: inspections and questions about who is really in the supply chain are inevitable. This session shows how Nordic construction has already moved from fragmented, manual right to work checks to digital workforce ecosystems that give real-time visibility of entire subcontractor chains.

Instead of focusing only on individual workers at the gate, Nordic platforms are built to govern which companies are allowed onto projects, how subcontractor chains are structured, and how data flows between contractors, clients and financiers. The session will share practical lessons from Nordic collaboration models where banks, asset owners and contractors work together to drive better labour standards and more resilient supply chains – insights that are directly relevant to a post-Carillion UK market.

Attendees will see how a “client’s cockpit” approach can provide pre-approval rights, live monitoring of who is on site, and robust audit trails for both regulators and investors. The result is a clear roadmap for moving from reactive compliance to proactive, ecosystem-level control of workforce and supply chains.