BUSINESS AND HUMAN RIGHTS / Šturma, Mozetic (eds)

all internationally recognized rights, not merely those a host government has ratified.” 49 Numbers easily demonstrated that although labour rights still have the largest portion of complains, issues related to health and housing, destroying sources of livelihood, or the security of persons steadily increase. The home countries with the highest number of cases are advanced and high-income economies, especially in Europe – the United Kingdom, the United States, France, Germany, and the Netherlands. 50 These numbers can be caused by the actual complained business operations, by companies headquartered in the jurisdictions, as well as stakeholders’ engagement and functionality of a local NCP. What is debated and criticised is the procedural handling specific instances because of the divergent approach of respective NCPs. 51 The Guidelines are open to various kinds of interpretation and NCPs enjoy broad discretion of how to treat them. 52 For some observers the greatest shortcoming is the lack of an enforcement mechanism 53 while the issue of an effective remedy before the NCPs was also a subject to the scrutiny of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights under the Accountability and Remedy Project (ARP). The UN found room for improvement, e.g. in the case of the Korean, 54 Mexican 55 and Brazilian NCPs; 56 and called for “a comprehensive improvement of the effectiveness of the NCP system [which] would be a significant contribution toward strengthening implementation of the Guiding Principles across a number of countries.” 57 The mechanism is also criticised by civil society actors. 58 The increasing number complaints before NCPs nevertheless have been becoming frequently used to test the effectiveness of 52 For some observers this “freedom to choose their procedural rules suggests the autonomy of the normative system within which these entities [MNEs] were judged” strengthens the institutional legitimacy of the NCP process. BACKER, L. C.: Rights and Accountability in Development (RAID) v DAS Air and Global Witness v Afrimex: Small Steps towards an Autonomous Transnational Legal System for the Regulation of Multinational Corporations, 10 Melbourne Journal of International Law , 2009, p. 301-303. 53 ČERNIČ, p. 94; VENDZULES, S. F.: The Struggle for Legitimacy in Environmental Standards Systems: The OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, 21 Colorado Journal of International Environmental Law & Policy , 2010, p. 479. 54 Report of the Working Group on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises on its visit to the Republic of Korea, A/HRC/35/32/Add.1, 1 May 2017, par 76. 55 Report of the Working Group on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises on its mission to Mexico, A/HRC/35/32/Add.2, 27 April 2017, par 108(u). 56 Report of the Working Group on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises on its mission to Brazil, A/HRC/32/45/Add.1, 12 May 2016, par 70(g). 57 UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights Blog: The National Contact Point (NCP) System – Aligning NCP Processes with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, Cambridge Core blog , 28 November 2017. Available at: http://blog.journals.cambridge.org/2017/11/28/the-national- contact-point-ncp-system-aligning-ncp-processes-with-the-un-guiding-principles-on-business-and- human-rights/ (accessed 29 December 2017). 58 E.g. OECDWatch. Effective NCPs now! Remedy is the reason. November 2017; OECDWatch. Remedy Remains Rare, June 2015; Amnesty International UK. Obstacle course: How the UK’s National Contact Point handles human rights complaints under the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, 19 February 2016. 49 Ibid, p. 179. 50 Ibid, 175-176. 51 DAVARNEJAD, p. 363; ROBINSON, p. 72-73.

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