PARLIAMENT OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA Hidden in Plain Sight An inquiry into establishing a Modern Slavery Act in Australia Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade December 2017 CANBERRA © Commonwealth of Australia ISBN 978-1-74366-753-8 (Printed Version) ISBN 978-1-74366-754-5 (HTML Version) This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License. The details of this licence are available on the Creative Commons website: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/au/. Contents Foreword.............................................................................................................................................ix Members ...........................................................................................................................................xiii Terms of Reference ..........................................................................................................................xix Abbreviations ...................................................................................................................................xxi List of Recommendations............................................................................................................xxvii The Report 1 Introduction...............................................................................................................1 Overview of inquiry ...............................................................................................................2 Combatting modern slavery.....................................................................................2 Support for addressing modern slavery .................................................................2 Summary of evidence ................................................................................................3 Conduct of the inquiry...........................................................................................................4 Previous inquiries.......................................................................................................4 Delegation to the UK..................................................................................................5 Interim report..............................................................................................................5 Outline of report .....................................................................................................................6 2 A Modern Slavery Act for Australia?...................................................................9 UK Modern Slavery Act.........................................................................................................9 Offences, prevention orders and enforcement.....................................................10 Prevention ................................................................................................................11 iii iv Protection of victims ................................................................................................11 Transparency in global supply chains...................................................................12 Whole-of-government anti-slavery measures......................................................12 Australia’s response to modern slavery............................................................................14 Offences, prevention orders and enforcement.....................................................14 Whole-of-government anti-slavery measures......................................................15 Key differences .....................................................................................................................20 Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner............................................................21 Transparency in supply chains ..............................................................................21 Protections for victims.............................................................................................22 Support for an Australian Modern Slavery Act ...............................................................23 3 Defining and measuring modern slavery .........................................................29 Definitions of modern slavery ............................................................................................29 ‘Modern slavery’.......................................................................................................29 International law ......................................................................................................31 UK Modern Slavery Act ..........................................................................................34 Australian law...........................................................................................................36 Defining modern slavery ........................................................................................41 Prevalence of modern slavery.............................................................................................48 Global estimates........................................................................................................48 Prevalence of modern slavery in Australia ..........................................................55 Prevalence of modern slavery in Australian supply chains ..............................63 4 Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner ........................................................73 UK Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner .................................................................73 International equivalents.....................................................................................................75 Europe – National Rapporteurs .............................................................................75 United States .............................................................................................................77 Support for an Australian Commissioner.........................................................................78 Current Australian Government roles ..................................................................79 v Proposed role in Australia ......................................................................................82 5 Transparency in supply chains............................................................................93 International developments ................................................................................................93 Australian Government proposed model .........................................................................94 Committee views on the proposed model ........................................................................95 Legislative basis........................................................................................................95 Terminology..............................................................................................................96 Timeframe for reporting..........................................................................................99 Approval of modern slavery statements ............................................................101 Threshold.................................................................................................................101 Focus of reporting ..................................................................................................104 Reporting areas.......................................................................................................107 Guidance for business............................................................................................117 Monitoring and evaluation ...................................................................................123 Compliance mechanism ........................................................................................131 6 Support for victims ..............................................................................................141 Victim-centred approach ...................................................................................................141 Victim support measures...................................................................................................147 Support for Trafficked People Program..............................................................147 Human Trafficking Visa Framework ..................................................................152 Defence for victims.............................................................................................................160 Principle of non-punishment................................................................................161 National compensation scheme........................................................................................164 Additional supports...............................................................................................171 7 Criminal justice responses .................................................................................181 Identifying, investigating and prosecuting modern slavery........................................181 Barriers to addressing modern slavery ...............................................................183 Relevant provisions of the UK Act...................................................................................196 Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner..........................................................198