Linda Reynolds (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I, too, rise to speak on the Modern Slavery Amendment (Australian Anti-Slavery Commissioner) Bill 2023. It is with a great sense of pride that I do so as the minister that brought this legislation into this place. I think it's also a great day of pride for everybody in this chamber, because what people don't see is that there are many common causes that, on all sides of this chamber, we work together on. I see Minister McCarthy there, who started this journey with me and Chris Crewther to get up a parliamentary inquiry into the need for a modern slavery bill in this nation. It was an amazing, 12-month, multipartisan inquiry that led to this bill, which was introduced and has now made the milestone of being reviewed and expanded.

It will come as no surprise to anybody in this chamber that I am incredibly passionate about the serious and important issue of modern slavery. I'm passionate about it because, as a Liberal, there is no greater cause than individual freedoms, including the freedom from servitude and slavery. It's about people's individual freedoms and liberties. I am so proud to have been involved in this, and it is a cause that I still continue to champion globally and here in Australia.

This coordinated and multipartisan approach started with the Australian government's 2004 Action Plan to Eradicate Trafficking in Persons, which was released by then prime minister John Howard. In 2015 the action plan was succeeded by the National Action Plan to Combat Human Trafficking and Slavery 2015-19, which really laid out the framework for this current piece of legislation. As I said, in 2018, there was no prouder moment for me in this place than, as then Assistant Minister for Home Affairs, taking the first modern slavery legislation through this place. Those of you who were here at the time will know that it didn't have necessarily the smoothest of passages through this place. 'Modern slavery', at that point, was not a term that was well known in this country. Certainly, a lot of Australians didn't know that slavery existed in our own country and they weren't aware of their inadvertent contributions to slavery globally.

There were a lot of negotiations at that time. I was a little disappointed that Senator Sheldon's contribution had a go at the coalition, because we did the best that we could to get a bill through this place. There were compromises that were made then, including the establishment of the Anti-Slavery Commissioner. But, now that businesses understand what modern slavery is, they understand their reporting requirements and they understand the prevalence of slavery throughout their global supply chains, I think this is a bill whose time has come.

In that context, the bill initially was designed to help businesses better control their own risks and also focus on businesses in their supply chains who benefit from the servitude of others. It also, at the time and subsequent to that, shone a light on the slavery risks in our international supply chains, including our supply chains for critical minerals and rare earths. That's one aspect I'd like to focus on here in the chamber today. I'd ask colleagues to remember that the supply chains today for our clean, green—so-called—supply chains are riddled with the servitude and enslavement of millions of people globally, particularly in China.

I've had it suggested to me by some that the environment is the greater good and that we should not worry about the human servitude that is not just prevalent but endemic in the solar panels that we buy, in the wind turbines that we use, in electric vehicles, in batteries and in many other new energy technologies. This is something that I will be pursuing further this year. We cannot turn a blind eye. It's just the right thing to do. We should never, ever accept a single person being enslaved for the production of these goods.

There's also a huge commercial cost. These goods are produced cheaply because they are produced on the backs of women, children and men who have been denied their freedoms, and many of them are in bonded labour as well. We can't go green on the backs of these millions of men, women and children who are forced to mine the minerals and rare earths and fabricate components of the goods that I've talked about. This year, the challenge for us as a nation is to deal with both. How do we get to net zero and net zero technologies but not on the backs of these men and women?

The committee process for this legislation did take over 12 months, but it was a significant achievement. I would like to acknowledge all of those in this place and those who have now left this place who were involved. The committee's report was Hidden in plain sight. I think that accurately captured the nature of what we discovered through this process. We had 225 submissions, we had 10 public hearings and we received this amazing amount of evidence which clearly demonstrated that slavery was something we needed to deal with. As the report name suggests, modern slavery is hidden in plain sight, but quite often we just don't know what we're looking for or, when we see it, what we are looking at. These heinous crimes that are committed against 50 million people—50 million people are today enslaved—are mostly in our supply chains. There are more people in slavery, in servitude, in bonded labour and in child labour today than at any other time in our nation's history—in fact, in human history.

This again is quite a shocking situation, but all too often we can think, 'Well, it's not an Australian thing; we don't have slavery here.' Yes, we do, but what's worse is that we contribute to the enslavement of others overseas. Slavery comes in many forms, and one of the forms of slavery that I became aware of on a field trip to Cambodia in 2016 with Save the Children and other parliamentary colleagues is what's now called orphanage trafficking. It was absolutely shocking to realise that there were at least eight million children who had been trafficked into these congregate care institutions that were called orphanages when most of these children had parents. They had been removed from their families to scam money from us, from well-meaning church groups, from well-meaning social clubs, from well-meaning schools and from volunteers who come and have tourist experiences with children. It's hideous to think about.

That started a very long journey for me, here and globally, which still continues today. One of the things I am particularly proud of is that the Australian parliament led the way, because, in the Hidden in plain sight report, which led to this bill, Australia became the first parliament and then the first nation to recognise orphanage trafficking as a form of modern slavery. Australia still continues that work, and we're doing so on a bipartisan basis. I see Senator O'Neill here. She's been a wonderful support at the IPU and elsewhere on the matter of raising awareness and tackling orphanage trafficking. So thank you for that ongoing support.

One of the other things about modern slavery that is important to note in this place is that it distorts global markets, undercuts responsible business and can pose significant risk to entities that find themselves inadvertently benefiting from slavery practices at some point in the supply chain. I think most Australians who have solar panels on their house or who bought an EV that was made in China did so for all the right reasons. But it's most likely that they not only were made and assembled in Xinjiang but have components and minerals that come from other countries that have child labour and the most revolting environmental practices all the way through their supply chains. Australians don't realise this, but we, as a chamber and as people, have to highlight that so that we can change practices so that, when people purchase these goods, they don't purchase goods that are made off the backs of children, women and men who have been enslaved.

Sadly our region is also the global epicentre of modern slavery, with about two-thirds of victims right here in our region across the Asia-Pacific. One of the most egregious things about slavery is that this exploitation of people, this commoditisation of people, is a highly lucrative business. Not only does it provide those who manufacture the goods with slave labour and give them a competitive edge but it generates over US$200 billion a year. The commodification and the exploitation of people is a very lucrative business. We can change that. We can make change, and this legislation is a great vehicle for Australians to do that. But to start to do that we also have to realise the personal and the human cost of producing the things that we consume every day here in Australia, which come off the back of women and children.

I conclude by reflecting on the key pillars in our national strategy against modern slavery. There are five national strategic priorities that provide the foundation for our ongoing fight against modern slavery. The first is prevention. The second is a national strategic priority within the criminal justice system and criminal law: disrupt, investigate and prosecute modern slavery. Here in our nation—never mind overseas—we still have a long way to go to work with law enforcement and particularly border protection officials to actually recognise what slavery looks like, as people come through the borders: people who come through on legitimate visas, minors who come through accompanied by adults who are not their parents, and women who come through to work in the sex trade in Australia, and who are cycled through brothels on legitimate visas. We've still got a lot of work to do. The fourth national strategic priority is partnerships. This is not something the federal government can deal with on its own. It requires law enforcement, welfare agencies and victim protection organisations to understand what is required and to have the courage to work together to do that. The fifth national strategic priority is research. The five pillars were established in 2020 by the former coalition government, and they do provide a good framework. This is a proud coalition achievement.

I will finish by talking about something else that the coalition is very proud of: the first Magnitsky style thematic sanctions framework to hold to account perpetrators of human rights violations and abuses, particularly those involved in modern slavery practices. Let's call a spade a spade. We've got a tool that we introduced that we can use to highlight this. Let me again be very honest and clear. There are millions of these 50 million people enslaved in China today. They are in enormous detention facilities, primarily in Xinjiang. There are Uighurs. There are Tibetans who have been taken away from their families at a very young age and put into Han language boarding schools. In fact over 80 per cent of Tibetan children have now been removed from their families. They go into these education facilities. They lose their cultural identity, and then they get shipped into farms and factories, pretty much as indentured labour. There are also North Koreans provided by the North Korean government to China in bonded labour in servitude. What I would say to the government is that it is time to have a look at the powers that we have to call this behaviour out and say that it is not okay.

There is a lot more that we can do together. While there are many other things on our agenda, including net zero, let's strive for a future here. We can use this bill and the amendments in this bill to say that net zero is important, but so are the human lives of those who will build that new future.