Standards in the Supply Chain

As a small business which relies on intermediaries, we cannot enforce labour standards within our supply chain, but we can advise our suppliers on what we deem to be acceptable standards and we will not conduct business with any supplier that we feel falls short of the high standards that we uphold.

As we cannot directly enforce policy around labour standards upon our partners that are in our backwards supply chain, we rely on the Fairtrade foundation to maintain the highest possible standards of labour with regards to our international suppliers.

We as a company feel that any supplier that meets the criteria for Fairtrade certification will satisfy our principles and any product that is not certified by Fairtrade will never be allowed to be part of our supply chain. This is due to the distinguished reputation of the aforementioned NGO which we feel has the resources and prestige required to uphold the high standards that we as a company pride ourselves on maintaining.

With regards to the forward part of our supply chain, we only supply to business that we feel are ethical, such as other co-operatives and the John Lewis Partnership.

Support for British Farmers

Although it is incredibly rare for coffee to be grown on British soil, we are very aware of the impact of imported crops on British farmers. We are sympathetic to local farmers and their concerns, therefore we are members of the NFU so that we ensure that we can support our farming compatriots in any way we can.

Workers and Human Rights Practices

We always follow the letter of the law, both domestic and international, with regards to worker’s and human rights, and in the vast majority of situations we go above and beyond what the law demands. We are members of the Co-operative Party, closely affiliated with the Labour Party and support their campaigns for rights in these areas.

Furthermore, we know that all of our co-operative partners uphold high standards with regards to these rights- they are without fail in line with international law and in many cases they far exceed the standards set by their national governments.

Living Wage

We are delighted to be a Living Wage Foundation organisation, not to be confused with the National Living Wage, which is paid at a substantially lower-sum.

In Costa Rica for instance, where minimum wage is in operation, our member Coop Tarrazu ensures that itinerant workers (used to bring in the coffee harvest and who come in for Nicaragua and Ecuador) are also paid Costa Rica’s minimum wage and many pickers earn substantially above the minimum threshold.

Taxes

Revolver Co-operative is committed to paying our fair share of tax. We make a commitment not to abuse the tax system by utilising tax havens through transfer-pricing, or undertake tax avoidance schemes.

We are committed to paying all the taxes that we owe in accordance with the spirit of all tax laws that apply to our operations. We believe that paying our taxes in this way is the clearest indication we can give of our being responsible participants in society.

We will fulfil our commitment to paying the appropriate taxes that we owe by seeking to pay the right amount of tax (but no more), at the right rate, in the right place at the right time. We aim to do this by ensuring that we report our tax affairs in ways that reflect the economic reality of the transactions we actually undertake in the course of our trade.

What we will never do is seek to use those options made available in tax law or the allowances and reliefs that it provides in ways that are contrary to the spirit of the law. Nor will we undertake specific transactions with the sole or main aim of securing tax advantages tat would otherwise not be available to us based on the reality of the trade that we undertake.

As a result the company will never undertake transactions that would require notification to HM Revenue & Customs under the Disclosure of Tax Avoidance Schemes Regulations or participate in any arrangement to which it might be reasonable anticipated that the UK’s General Anti-Abuse Rule might apply.

We believe tax havens undermine the UK’s tax system. As a result, whilst we will trade with customers and suppliers genuinely located in places considered to be tax havens we will not make use of those places to secure a tax advantage.

Our accounts will be prepared in compliance with tis policy and will seek to provide all that information that users, including HM Revenue & Customs, might need to properly appraise our tax position. We will review this policy with our accountants annually to ensure that it is complied with.

We are certified by the Fair Tax Mark. More information about the Fair Tax Mark can be found at https://fairtaxmark.net.

Animal Welfare and Testing

We do not use any animals in an artificial manner in the production of our coffee. We source coffee cherries from farms that actively encourage biodiversity, by leaving their fields fallow at the field-edge. This encourages hedgerow propagation which creates a habitat for a variety of animals, such as bees, butterflies, birds and small mammals and the animals that flourish around these fields naturally pollenate the crops.

We are pleased to have Labour animal welfare activist Malcom Butt MBE on our board and, with his support, we as a company adhere to the Labour Animal Welfare Society policy on both animal testing and welfare. We are members of LAWS. Although it does not directly relate to our company and its operations, we believe it is important to have a strong stance on these issues.

The policies which we subscribe to can be found on the LAWS website at labouranimalwelfaresociety.org.uk/laws-animal-charter.