In 2017 the Commonwealth Government announced that it proposed to enact Australian Modern Slavery in Supply Chain Reporting Requirements. The announcement came amid an increasing international and domestic focus on addressing modern slavery in the business community, including throughout the extended supply and transport chains.
Identifying modern slavery is not as easy as a reviewing a workplace and confirming the conditions on that site alone; we need to think about the contractors, suppliers, materials and resources we use, the manufacturing, handling and transport processes, and our extended supply chains.
Due to the flow on effects of a supply chain, this legislation will affect every workplace and everyone. For many organisations the process of verifying across a supply chain could take multiple years. The legislation will:
- require certain entities to provide Modern Slavery Statements
- provide for an administrative and compliance framework around the Reporting Requirements, to promote awareness of, and transparency in relation to, modern slavery in supply chains.
The need for organisations to increase transparency and sustainable business models is ever increasing. This touchstone function will be the first of multiple events to examining the modernisation of the supply chain. Did you know it is reported that around 15000 Australian’s are enslaved?!!!
I have written to the Commonwealth Government Office to ask for more information on this Act and what it means for Local Government, our reporting requirements, record keeping, education. I will advise as soon as I have an answer.
The Act’s reporting requirement is expected to be in place by 2020. As you know, any new legislation introduced requires record keeping. I have asked whether this will be a digital reporting mechanism, and for detail how this will be gathered, stored, managed. It seems there will be a central repository established but where, how and who has responsibility is unclear as yet.
The following articles are for your information, to start the conversations and to keep you up to date with this topic.
- New Legislation – Fact Sheet – Modern Slavery Legislation Australia
- New Legislation – The three things you need to know about the new Modern Slavery legislation
- New Legislation – Fashion identified as one of five key industries implicated in modern slavery
- New Legislation – New transparency in Modern Slavery using technology
- New Legislation – Modern Slavery Still Exists – What companies can do to erase it
- New Legislation – Modern slavery bill needs tougher penalties and oversight
- New Legislation – Modern Slavery Act – Andrew Forrest takes aim at G20
Send your news article contributions to Ruth Edge r.edge@cardinia.vic.gov.au
The following article is an exciting acknowledgement of our profession’s worth.