Modern Slavery

To celebrate 200 years of Ashurst in 2022 we worked on a way to honour our founder. William Henry Ashurst was a progressive advocate who was deeply committed to social justice, particularly women's equality and the abolition of slavery.

William's four daughters also poured their energy into the fight to abolish slavery and the fight to achieve equality for women, forming correspondence networks across countries and movements. What William's daughters achieved in their lifetimes is remarkable and we have chosen to name our four key initiatives after them. Through this we not only connect our future efforts to the Ashurst family's historical work; we also pay a long overdue public tribute to four incredible women.

Recognising the continued growth of all forms of modern slavery and our global presence, we took the decision to expand our existing pro bono work in this area into a global focus for the firm. This provides a way for us to acknowledge our founder's legacy and commit to actioning that legacy on an issues that remains a massive threat today; and has only been exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic. 

"As this is our first Modern Slavery Action Plan, we fully expect that some of these actions will need to be re-evaluated and reimagined overtime; however it is as means by which we can formally think about the potential role we can play in combatting all forms of modern slavery and the steps we can take to achieve this, as a firm and with our clients, colleagues and other stakeholders." 

Sarah Morton-Ramwell, Global Head of Pro Bono and Social Impact. October 2020.