The Albanese government has chosen a former immigration and workplace relations minister under the Rudd and Gillard governments as Australia’s first anti-slavery commissioner.
Former Western Australian Senator Chris Evans will begin his five-year term in December, Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus has announced.
“Modern slavery deprives victims of their dignity, fundamental rights, and freedoms,” Dreyfus said when announcing the decision.
“It encompasses a range of exploitative practices, including human trafficking and slavery-like practices such as forced marriage, forced labour, deceptive recruiting, and debt bondage.”
Evans is also the former CEO of the Global Freedom Network, the faith-based arm of the international human rights group Walk Free, which aims to eradicate modern slavery.
Walk Free’s Global Slavery Index puts the national figure 41,000, which works out to 1.6 people per thousand.
However, Australia also receives the second-highest rating, 67 percent, for prevention efforts, equal with the Netherlands and just one behind the United Kingdom.
The organisation particularly praises the Modern Slavery Act, passed in 2018, which requires companies that have a consolidated revenue of over $100 million ($67 million) a year to report on the actions they are taking to respond to modern slavery.
Evans will focus on how the Act is being implemented and whether Australia can further improve its response to modern slavery practices such as human trafficking, forced labour, forced marriages, deceptive recruiting, and debt bondage.
“The Anti-Slavery Commissioner will further strengthen the work undertaken across government, business, and civil society to prevent and respond to modern slavery by supporting victims and survivors, raising community awareness, and helping business address the risk of modern slavery practices in their operations and supply chains,” Dreyfus said.
The government committed $8 million over four years in the 2023/24 budget to support the work.
Walk Free says the largest estimated numbers of people in modern slavery are found in India, China, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Indonesia, Nigeria, Turkey, Bangladesh, and the United States.
“Collectively, these countries account for nearly two in every three people living in modern slavery and over half the world’s population,” it says. “Notably, six are G20 nations: India, China, Russia, Indonesia, Türkiye, and the U.S.”
It also warns that the growth of demand for renewable energy technologies to tackle the climate crisis has led to further risks of exploitation, “with evidence of state-imposed forced labour of Uyghurs and other Turkic and Muslim majority groups in China occurring in the supply chains of solar panels and other renewable technologies.”
