Decent Work and Economic Growth

Case studies

Promote development-oriented policies that support productive activities, decent job creation, entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation and encourage the formalisation and growth of micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises, including through access to financial services.

We contributed our expertise to working groups supporting the G8 Social Impact Investment Taskforce, including the UK National Advisory Board and the Mission Alignment Working Group, examining how investors and others can trust that businesses that are driven by a social mission will continue to stay true to that mission into the future, beyond a change of ownership.

We have a strong partnership with Empact in Singapore, supporting social entrepreneurs through needs analysis and mentoring.

By 2030, achieve full and productive employment and decent work for all women and men, including for young people and persons with disabilities and equal pay for work of equal value.

We advised the underwriters on the largest-ever social bond issued by the European Commission (‘the Commission’). At €17 billion, the Commission’s inaugural Covid-related social bond is the largest ever bond issuance under the EU SURE programme – the European instrument for temporary Support to mitigate Unemployment Risks in an Emergency.

In Madrid we support an organisation called Adisli, a Spanish not-for-profit that aims to support people with intellectual disabilities to live full and independent lives. This includes supporting people to find employment - Linklaters provide volunteers and facilities for employability training.

In Asia we participate in a number of programmes designed to enable decent work for marginalised groups. Through partnerships with local NGOs, we provide employability skills training, CV and interview advice and career insights to groups such as children from care homes in Tokyo, refugees in Hong Kong, impoverished students in Cambodia, and youth in China and Singapore.

As a firm, we are committed to equal opportunities and fairness in our recruitment, development, promotion and reward practices and we are confident that we pay our people fairly for equivalent roles, regardless of their gender or ethnic diversity. In our 2021 Gender Pay Gap report, we have once again gone beyond the statutory gender pay reporting requirements and have voluntarily published our data relating to equity partners and ethnicity pay.

By 2020, substantially reduce the proportion of youth not in employment, education or training.

In partnership with Goldman Sachs in Brazil  we launched the LIFT  program which is aimed at mentoring university students from the  poorest neighbourhoods. The pilot project was a success, with two of the original 14 participants hired by Goldman Sachs at the end of the school year. Now after many cohorts, LIFT has expanded to include Bank of America, Bloomberg, Santander and JP Morgan as program partners.

Our hugely popular virtual internship for university students has been extended to offer 16-18-year olds the opportunity to gain work experience. The launch comes at a vital moment when students are being cut off from work experience opportunities due to Covid-19 restrictions in relation to office work. The programme - on the Forage platform - aims to capture the minds of students from all backgrounds at a crucial stage and inspire them to explore a career in law. There is the same free access for all to the new programme to create greater access and social mobility within the legal profession.

Take immediate and effective measures to eradicate forced labour, end modern slavery and human trafficking and secure the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child labour including recruitment and use of child soldiers and by 2025 end child labour in all its forms.

For anti-human trafficking NGO Oasis Belgium, we compiled a legal toolkit relating to the social and immigration rights of trafficked Thai women. We also provided advice on collecting evidence to prosecute traffickers.

In the US we represented a victim of human trafficking in her petition for T Nonimmigrant Status, which allows victims of human trafficking, and certain immediate family members of the victim, to remain and work in the US for up to 4 years if the victim reports the crime to law enforcement and cooperates with the investigation and/or prosecution of human trafficking. Recipients of a T visa may adjust their status to become legal permanent residents.

Protect labour rights and promote safe and secure working environments for all workers, including migrant workers, in particular women migrants, and those in precarious employment.

We led a cross-firm landscape analysis on behalf of NGO Visayan Forum Foundation of the rights of fishing industry workers across 14 jurisdictions, which facilitated modern slavery conditions being  addressed in the Philippines and elsewhere. Stronger legislation has now been introduced in the Philippines to tackle labour exploitation and fishers have since reported having access to medical protection and earning more than double their usual pay. Offices involved included Amsterdam, Dusseldorf, Madrid, London, Bangkok, Beijing, Shanghai, Singapore and Hong Kong.

Our lawyers assist at clinics where legal information and assistance is provided to migrant workers. In Hong Kong we have partnered with HELP for Domestic Workers for a decade and have helped to turn their clinic virtual during Covid. In Singapore we partnered with TWC2 and facilitated weekly clinic volunteering by our lawyers and our in-house counsel clients.