Seeking Freedom is Anti-Slavery Australia’s child-rights initiative. The purpose of this project is to better protect, respect and fulfil the rights of children in the context of modern slavery. Through policy development, collaboration, education and awareness-raising, we seek to increase the identification of children in or at risk of human trafficking, slavery and slavery-like practices as well as develop a better understanding of, and ability to meet, the needs of children affected by modern slavery in Australia.
Our Motivation
Modern slavery involving children can take various forms including slavery, servitude, trafficking, forced labour and forced marriage. Children face intersecting vulnerabilities that place them at increased risk of experiencing modern slavery and make them more susceptible to other forms of abuse and exploitation. They are less likely to be identified as victims, and their wellbeing and psycho-social development can be harmed, sometimes irreparably.
Global estimates by the ILO and Walk Free Foundation suggest that one in four survivors of modern slavery are children, while UNODC statistics indicate that children account for one third of all detected victims of human trafficking worldwide. However, reported cases of child trafficking, slavery and slavery-like practices in Australia remain low and there is a clear research gap on the prevalence and experience of children affected by modern slavery.
Given the low identification figures and the lack of data on the nature and scope of the issue, we are concerned that children in Australia are not being identified as victims of modern slavery and as such are being deprived of their fundamental rights to protection and support. The development and adoption of a child rights framework is central to ensuring Australia’s response to combatting modern slavery is comprehensive, evidence-based and survivor informed and aligns with its international human rights obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child and its Optional Protocols.
Our Expected Outcomes
Through collaboration with relevant stakeholders including those with lived experience, government departments, child protection organisations, service providers, national and state/territory human rights institutions and civil society organisations, we aim to deliver on the following outcomes:
- Policy and guidance paper – outlining a child rights framework, designed for use by decision makers to contribute to the implementation of effective policies that protect, respect and fulfil the rights of children affected by modern slavery. A defined framework enables coordinated action by providing guidance around the roles and responsibilities of stakeholders, focusing advocacy for policy across the sector and providing structure to education and awareness-raising.
- Co-developed resources – to build the capacity of frontline workers to identify children affected by modern slavery and respond effectively. These resources will be co-developed with frontline workers and set out practical guidance on child-specific standards of good practice in the context of modern slavery.
- Webinar series – to increase awareness and knowledge of local actors regarding key intersectional issues and good practice responses. The webinar series will explore in greater detail the key findings of the research project, in particular the child rights framework.
- Publications, reports and submissions – to build the evidence base on the issue of children affected by modern slavery in Australia.
- Community of practice – to facilitate multi-agency collaboration and information sharing across sectors.
- Child-led prevention and advocacy initiatives – to elevate the voices and perspectives of children, particularly those with lived experience and increase opportunities for their meaningful participation.
The development of the above outcomes will contribute towards strengthening Australia’s response to modern slavery by ensuring that the national policy response is comprehensive, evidence-based, child-specific and survivor-informed.
Our Progress
In March 2022, the Seeking Freedom team convened an online webinar on the rights of children in the context of modern slavery that brought together stakeholders from diverse sectors to discuss Australia’s response to at risk children. The webinar was designed to be the first step in engaging relevant stakeholders on the need to develop a child-specific modern slavery response in Australia that safeguards the rights of children. Our esteemed panel of speakers included Professor Jennifer Burn (Director, Anti-Slavery Australia), Professor Parosha Chandran (International Human Rights Barrister), Natalie Siegel-Brown (Managing Director, Child Wise), Frances Finney PSM (Assistant Secretary, Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking Branch, Australian Border Force) and Sandeep Dhillon (Human Rights Legal Practice Manager, Anti-Slavery Australia).
Drawing on the momentum gained from the webinar, Anti-Slavery Australia facilitated a series of four roundtables between November 2022 and March 2023. The roundtables were attended by experts from key child rights, child protection and modern slavery sectors. Each of the four sessions focused on key aspects of the child-rights framework: prevention, identification, protection and participation – and examined Australia’s current response to child trafficking, slavery and slavery-like practices as well as good practice policy measures that could be adopted.
A key theme raised across all four roundtables was the need for a holistic, coordinated, multi-agency, multidisciplinary response that respects and embeds the views of children, particularly those with lived experience. Our findings confirmed the lack of national coordination and cross-sector collaboration and revealed a data deficit to support a more robust policy response. Furthermore, the findings highlighted the lack of child-specific measures incorporated in the current policy framework that address the unique needs of children affected by modern slavery in Australia.
Seeking Freedom has been presented to the National Children’s Commissioner, the US Ambassador-at-Large to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, the UN Special Rapporteur on the sale and sexual exploitation of children and the UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery and has informed several policy submissions made to national and international inquiries.
In the next phase of the project, our proposed activities include targeted consultations with key stakeholders and the presentation of a webinar series.
The Seeking Freedom project is guided by an expert Steering Committee and has been approved in line with the University of Technology Sydney Human Research Ethics Committee (UTS HREC) guidelines (Ref: ETH22-7198). Anti-Slavery Australia extends its gratitude to the UTS Centre for Social Justice and Inclusion for providing support to enable the facilitation of the roundtable discussions via the award of a 2022 Social Impact Grant.
For further information on this project, please contact Cassandra Bourke – Project Lead or Professor Jennifer Burn AM – Director on ASAresearch@uts.edu.au.