AUSTRALIA — REPORT OF THE INQUIRY ON MODERN SLAVERY: Hidden in Plain Sight (December 2017)

Slav­ery is one of the most appalling crimes in human his­to­ry. Regret­tably, the term ‘mod­ern slav­ery’ reminds us that slav­ery and slav­ery-like prac­tices are still preva­lent around the world today, includ­ing here in Australia.

Mod­ern slav­ery is often ‘hid­den in plain sight’. These heinous crimes are present across a range of indus­tries in Aus­tralia and in the glob­al sup­ply chains of busi­ness­es and organ­i­sa­tions oper­at­ing here. Lat­est esti­mates sug­gest that over
40 mil­lion peo­ple around the world, and 4 300 in Aus­tralia, are vic­tims of some form of mod­ern slav­ery, which includes human traf­fick­ing, slav­ery, debt bondage, forced labour and oth­er slav­ery-like practices.