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Anti-Slavery Commissioner remit must be stronger, says HRLC
The Human Rights Law Centre has urged the government to strengthen and expand the Anti-Slavery Commissioner’s roles to better combat modern slavery in Australia.
Grace Robbie
Despite the establishment of an Anti-Slavery Commission being a step towards the right direction when dealing with modern slavery, the Human Rights Law Centre (HLRC) believes that more needs to be done.
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Per the NSW Anti-Slavery Commissioner’s Strategic Plan 2023–2026, “modern slavery occurs when one person treats another as if they owed them – restricting their freedom”.
Legal director at the HRLC, Keren Adams, noted that “41,000 people are estimated to be living and working in conditions of modern slavery” in Australia.
The government plan also outlined that “modern slavery happens when our legal, financial, procurement, healthcare, immigration, child protection and other systems fail to identify vulnerability to exploitation and fail to prevent and address it”.
In response to these challenges, the federal government introduced the Modern Slavery Amendment (Australian Anti-Slavery Commissioner) Bill 2023 (Cth) on 3 November 2023, which established the role of the Anti-Slavery Commissioner.
This bill, which amended the Modern Slavery Act 2018, was characterised by the Attorney-General, the Hon Mark Dreyfus KC MP, as a “landmark reform” that was a part of the government’s “election commitment to add a new, independent pillar to Australia’s comprehensive response to modern slavery”.
While the reformed bill delineated the core functions of the Anti-Slavery Commissioner of “supporting victims and survivors of modern slavery and supporting businesses to address risks of modern slavery practices in their operations”, the HRLC believes the commissioner can do more.
The specific improvements that the centre is calling for the Anti-Slavery Commissioner to make include:
- Monitoring and enforcing compliance with the Modern Slavery Act (including through the issuing of penalties or infringement notices).
- Undertaking investigations to detect and expose cases of modern slavery.
- Receiving complaints and support people subjected to modern slavery to seek redress.
- The budget for the officer (currently set at $8 million over four years) should be expanded to support the wide range of functions to be performed by the commissioner.
“However, it is critical that the Anti-Slavery Commissioner has the necessary powers and resources to undertake this work effectively and drive real changes in corporate practices. This should include powers to investigate suspected cases of modern slavery, enforce penalties against companies, and to support workers to take action and seek redress”, she stated.
