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Human rights lawyers disappointed with Australia’s low score
Australian human rights lawyers have graded the country low in fulfilling its obligations to international guiding principles on business and human rights.
Naomi Neilson
Australian Lawyers for Human Rights (ALHR) gave Australia a “C” grade and noted an improvement in some aspects, but an overall need for improvement to ensure “modern slavery offences are not committed” either nationally or internationally.
ALHR noted it was “disappointing” the Modern Slavery Act 2018 (MS Act) is still yet to come into effect. Although commending the NSW government for being the first state or jurisdiction to introduce modern slavery legislation, ALHR called for “strengthening of the MS Act and MS regulation in order to ensure it would achieve its purpose”.
Extending its criticisms to the Commonwealth Modern Slavery Act 2018 Guidance for Reporting Entities, ALHR took the view that it failed to provide businesses with correct and sufficient information about modern slavery offences defined in the act.
ALHR said the guidance “falls short on highlighting the penalties” that are associated with “committing modern slavery offences which would act as a deterrence”.
It noted that the guidance defines the term of modern slavery as “including eight types of serious exploitation”, but by doing so, it “omits a number of modern slavery offences including the offence of trafficking in children, the removal of organs offence”.
The guidance also fails to refer to the Criminal Code Act 1995 and makes no mention of the term “modern slavery offences”. Instead, it uses the term “types of exploitation” in defining modern slavery, “which, respectfully, is not reflective of how it is defined in the act and can be potentially confusing to businesses”, ALHR noted.
“ALHR is of the view that the guidance should be amended to correctly define modern slavery in accordance with the act and provide further information to businesses about penalties for committing modern slavery offences pursuant to the Criminal Code.”
For 2020, ALHR is urging the government to introduce a National Action Plan (NAP) for businesses that will address all effective implementations of the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs).
“In light of Australia’s forthcoming United Nations Universal Periodic Review and from recalling the recommendations of the 2016 UPR to adopt an Australian NAP… it is of critical importance that Australia introduce a NAP without further delay to foster best practice and promote a culture of human rights,” ALHR noted.
Naomi Neilson
Naomi Neilson is a senior journalist with a focus on court reporting for Lawyers Weekly.
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