The clothes you are wearing, the food you ate for dinner last night, and the component parts of your mobile phone – who made them, and how? Maybe they have a sticker or stamp that guarantees the environment wasn’t harmed, that any animals were treated humanely, or that workers were treated well. What if those claims aren’t true? And what’s more, what if the audits that produce those stamps make labour conditions and environmental standards worse by preventing governments from regulating and legislating? That is the claim in a new report (pdf) released today from the Sheffield Political Economy Research Institute, part of Sheffield University. The report, based on interviews with business executives, NGOs, supplier firms and auditors, is blunt in its condemnation: “ultimately the audit regime is ‘working’ for corporations, but failing workers and the planet. Audits are ineffective tools for detecting, reporting, or correcting environmental and labour problems in supply chains. They reinforce existing business models and preserve the global status quo.”