Iris Supplier Code of Conduct

What is it?

Iris Nation Worldwide LTD (and its affiliate companies) (“Iris”) is committed to sourcing the highest quality goods and services from many countries with diverse cultures and economies.

Our goal is for all suppliers (and their employees, agents and contractors) who provide Iris with goods and services (“Iris Suppliers”) to adhere to Iris company standards and demonstrate a compatibility with our core values. All Iris Suppliers are therefore required to conduct themselves fully in accordance with this Code of Conduct.

This Code of Conduct is considered to be a mandatory and minimum standard for any Iris Supplier and may be subject to audit by Iris or a third-party auditor nominated by us. Iris reserves the right to update the Code of Conduct from time to time.

Iris Principles

Employment & Human Rights

Employment must be freely chosen

An Iris Supplier must not use any forced or involuntary labour. Workers shall not be required to pay unnecessary or unjustified fees which unfairly disadvantage them and shall be free to leave their employer after reasonable notice.

An Iris Supplier will support the elimination of child labour and ensure that they only employ workers who meet or exceed the minimum legal working age.

Health and Safety

An Iris supplier must provide a safe and hygienic working environment with adequate safety measures in place and must take adequate steps to prevent accidents or injury. This includes:

• The provision and maintenance of safe systems of work and appropriate protective clothing where necessary;
• The provision of a health and safety advisor who is responsible for the daily monitoring of all health and safety related issues and the provision of competent First Aiders and Fire Wardens who are regularly trained;
• Provisions for serious and imminent danger;
• Safe means of access and egress into and out of the Agency;
• Maintenance of plant and machinery, including providing test certificates, where appropriate;
• Conducting risk assessments and continual monitoring of the effectiveness of the provisions for health and safety;
• Providing employees with health and safety information and consulting  on health and safety issues, where appropriate;

 

Working hours

Working hours must comply with national laws and benchmark industry standards, whichever affords greater protection. Wages and benefits paid for a standard working week must meet, at a minimum, national legal or industry standards.

Freedom of association

An Iris Supplier must allow workers, without distinction, to have the right to join or form trade unions of their own choosing and to bargain collectively. Workers’ representatives will not be discriminated against and shall have access to carry out their representative functions in the workplace.

Where the right to freedom of association and collective bargaining is restricted under law, the Iris Supplier shall facilitate, and will not hinder, the development of parallel means for independent and free association and bargaining.

Environment

An Iris Supplier must comply with local environmental laws and/ or regulations and, as a minimum, implement practices which seek to serve the best interests of the environment. Iris’ commitment to the environment shall be shared by an Iris Supplier who shall only engage with suppliers whose practices (as a minimum) conform to applicable environmental standards.

Sustainable resources management

An Iris supplier should implement a resource management policy designed to:

• Minimise negative environmental impact
• Reduce resource usage

 

We recommend following the AdGreen production guidelines which include:

• Considering if any materials be rehomed or reused before being recycled and/or sent to landfill
• Avoid baking an excessive use of materials (and waste!) into the script with specific set ups.
• Try to minimise repeats of specific material heavy elements, and consider removing wet downs/weather elements from the script, to avoid excessive use of materials
• Consider a smaller build, and try to use sustainably sourced materials (and reuse old items if possible); items like poly carving create a lot of waste and are best avoided
• Consider delivering certain elements in CG/VFX instead to avoid materials associated with shooting them in camera

Waste reduction

An Iris supplier should implement a waste reduction policy designed to:

• Ensure that the company is committed to increasing the percentage of waste recycled year on year. Waste volumes are measured to monitor progress against this commitment
• Recycling facilities exist on desktops and at recycling points to cover paper, card, plastics, cans, batteries, glass, CDs, mobile phones and printer toner cartridge
• The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive of the storing, collecting, treating, recycling and disposing of electrical items separately from other waste is followed

Water

An Iris supplier should implement a water consumption and management policy designed to:

• Reduce the negative impact on water resources or ecosystems through its direct operations, and wider impacts and dependencies within the value chain.
• You should identify material issues and ensure good water stewardship across all operations and priority areas of the value chain.
• You should measure consumption and set target to reduce

 

Green House Gas emissions & decarbonisation

As part of Iris’s commitment to reducing its Scope 3 emissions we want to work with suppliers who are working on and making progress to reduce their own emissions. 

Preference will be given to suppliers who are:

• Measuring their own scope 1, scope 2 and scope 3 emissions in accordance with an internationally recognised methodology ISO 14064
• Have set a Science Based Target to reduce their emissions and publish or share their progress towards it
• Are committed to and making progress to decarbonization by having an environmental management plan and emission reduction plan which is in accordance with an internationally recognised standard, such as ISO14001 or PAS 2060

Non-discrimination and fair treatment

An Iris Supplier must ensure that there is no discrimination in hiring, compensation, access to training, promotion, termination, or retirement based on race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, age, disability, gender, marital status, sexual orientation, union membership or political affiliation.

An Iris Supplier must ensure that no employees suffer any form of harassment including (but not limited to) physical, sexual, or psychological.

Business practices and compliance

An Iris Supplier must ensure that bribery, corruption, money laundering, tax evasion and fraud are eradicated from any supply chain and that such practices are not facilitated (directly or indirectly).

An Iris Supplier must respect all applicable data privacy, data protection and intellectual property laws and regulations and ensure compliance with such laws.

Ethical recruiting

All advertising and recruitment literature should reflect your commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion and not enhance stereotypes. Your philosophy with regards to recruitment should be to select the applicant best qualified for the position, according to the specified job requirements.

The recruitment process should not disadvantage disabled people and reasonable adjustments to the process (and particularly at any interview) should be considered.

The criteria for selection should be fair and appropriate. Any criteria which disadvantages those with certain protected characteristics should be retained only when justifiable in terms of the job to be done.

Questions at interview should relate to the requirements of the job. Where it is necessary to assess whether personal circumstances will affect performance of the job (for example where it involves unsociable hours or extensive travel) this should be discussed openly and objectively with all candidates without assumptions based on marital status or sex.

Questions should not be asked which could disadvantage certain groups, and questions should not be asked of those with a particular protected characteristic that would not be asked of everyone.

Selection procedures should be objective. Each candidate should be assessed according to their capability to carry out the job. It should not be assumed that certain groups should perform certain kinds of work or “will not fit in”.

When considering a disabled candidate’s suitability for the job, they should be assessed on the assumption that any reasonable adjustments have been made (for example, if someone needs a special keyboard and this is a reasonable adjustment, their ability to do the job compared with other candidates should be assessed on the assumption that the keyboard has been provided).

Wherever possible, more than one person should be involved in the recruitment process.

Diversity Equity and Inclusion

We expect our suppliers to be committed to promoting diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace by ensuring fairness in the manner in which decisions are made to maintain working relationships with employees and clients.

You should value diversity and equity in all its policies and working practices which support your commitment in ensuring potential and current employees, subcontractors and clients are not discriminated against. Equality of opportunity is the responsibility of each and every staff member and forms a fundamental part of the expected standards of conduct and attitude. Every employee has a personal responsibility to ensure that their conduct is consistent with Agency policies and procedures.

This policy explains the law and how it relates to certain employment practices. It also explains some specific legal issues relating to disability and pregnancy and then sets out our expectations on the following areas:

• pay and benefits;
• promotion and training;
• disciplinary, performance management and redundancy procedures.

UK Legislation

It is unlawful to discriminate against individuals either directly or indirectly in respect of:

• age
• disability
• gender reassignment
• marriage and civil partnership
• pregnancy and maternity
• race
• religion or belief
• sex
• sexual orientation

It is important to remember that making casual remarks in conversation, in an email, or obtaining or forwarding jokes about any of the above could be construed as offensive by others and could render employees in breach of our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion policy. Iris will treat all such instances very seriously under our company Disciplinary procedure.

The law divides discrimination into four broad categories – direct discrimination, indirect discrimination, harassment and victimisation.

Direct discrimination

This involves treating a person less favourably because of a protected characteristic (for example not promoting an individual because of their race or sexual orientation). It includes discrimination because of perceptions or assumptions about a person’s characteristics, even if these are incorrect (for example, not promoting an individual because they are assumed to be gay). It also includes discrimination because a person associates with someone who has a protected characteristic (for example, not promoting an individual because they have a disabled child). Direct discrimination can never be justified (with the exception of age discrimination in some circumstances).

Indirect discrimination

This occurs when an apparently neutral provision, criterion or practice is applied across all groups, but which would put members with a particular protected characteristic at a particular disadvantage when compared with others who do not share this characteristic. In contrast to direct discrimination, indirect discrimination will not be unlawful if it can be justified.

Disability Discrimination

The legislation covering disability discrimination is complex. As well as the types of discrimination explained above, the law also makes it unlawful to treat a disabled person unfavourably because of something arising in consequence of their disability unless this is justifiable. This is a broad test and includes, for example, treating a person unfavourably because they need to take time off work for medical treatment due to a disability. The legislation also imposes a duty to make reasonable adjustments to accommodate the needs of the disabled person, which could include alterations to workstations, duties, hours or working practices.

The group of people protected as “disabled” within the legislation is wider than you might think. It covers not just those with physical disabilities, such as people in wheelchairs, but also people with mental impairments and less obvious physical impairments (such as, for example, some forms of RSI and clinical depression). Depending on the circumstances, lack of knowledge that someone is disabled may not be a defence. You should always consider that an individual might have an impairment that counts as a disability without you knowing this.

Pay and Benefits

Equal pay should be paid for work of equal value, unless there is a material factor that accounts for the variation.

Benefits should be offered to all employees equally unless there is a good justification for not doing so.

Promotion and Training

Employees should have equal opportunities for promotion and training and all employees should have the opportunity to discuss their future development and promotion prospects with their managers. When general ability and personal qualities are the main requirements for promotion to a post, care should be taken to consider properly candidates with differing career patterns and general experience. There should be no stereotypical assumptions about the ambitions or otherwise of any individual from a particular group.

Training and development should not stop because someone is pregnant or has childcare responsibilities. Nor should it be assumed that such employees are not interested in promotion.

Disciplinary, Performance Management and Redundancy Procedures

Care should be taken to ensure that those with a particular protected characteristic are not sanctioned for performance or behaviour that would be condoned or overlooked in another group. For example, a man who takes emergency time off to deal with a domestic situation should be viewed no less sympathetically than a woman would be viewed in the same circumstances.

If selection for redundancy becomes necessary, direct and indirect discrimination should not occur in the selection criteria or process. For example, be careful when using absence-related criteria (because these may disadvantage disabled or pregnant workers) and adjustments might need to be made to ensure that such criteria are fair.

Reporting

Iris is committed to full compliance with all applicable the laws and regulations where we conduct business and will not knowingly operate in violation of any such law or regulation.

Iris is committed to adhering to the principles of this Code of Conduct and will not knowingly use suppliers who violate applicable laws and regulations.

Where an Iris Supplier breaches this Code of Conduct, we will always try to work with them to improve business standards and employee welfare.

However, we reserve the right to terminate our agreement with that Supplier immediately if they are found to be in breach.