Modern Slavery describes situations where offenders use coercion, threats, or deception to exploit victims and undermine their freedom.

The Australian Government is taking a global leadership role in combating modern slavery through its landmark Modern Slavery Act (Cth) 2018. The Act defines modern slavery as including 8 types of serious exploitation:

1. trafficking in persons;
2. slavery
3. servitude
4. forced marriage
5. forced labour
6. debt bondage
7. deceptive recruiting for labour services; and
8. child labour.

The objective of the Act is to increase transparency and accountability in identifying modern slavery practices and to ensure that supply chains are free from exploitation.

The Australian Sports Commission (ASC) is supporting the sport sector to raise awareness of modern slavery practices and maintain responsible transparent supply chains. The ASC Modern Slavery Statement is available at Australian Sports Commission Modern Slavery Statement (ausport.gov.au) and outlines what the ASC is doing to identify and address the risk of modern slavery practices in its supply chains.

The Act established a national Modern Slavery Reporting requirement which applies to large businesses and other entities operating in the Australian market with an annual consolidated revenue of AUD$100 million or over.

Sporting organisations that meet this threshold are required to:

• publish annual statements outlining their actions to assess and address modern slavery risks in their global operations and supply chains
• prepare and submit their annual statements to the Government’s online register at Modern Slavery Statements Register (modernslaveryregister.gov.au)

While organisations that do not meet this threshold are not currently required to take action under the Act, sporting organisations are encouraged to utilise the resources below to implement appropriate practices to identify and report suspected abuse and exploitation.

By improving transparency and increasing awareness of modern slavery risks, sporting organisations can reduce modern slavery in the production and supply chains of Australian goods and services and improve workplace practices.

• A procurement toolkit is available to provide guidance to procurement officers to identify, assess, and manage risks related to Modern Slavery and in particular to ensure vulnerable workers in an organisation’s supply chains are not exposed to modern slavery. Modern slavery (homeaffairs.gov.au)
• Modern slavery e-learning modules
• Guidance for reporting entities (homeaffairs.gov.au)
• News and Resources (modernslaveryregister.gov.au)
• Modern Slavery Statements Register