Australian Religious Against Trafficking in Humans

Australian Religious Against Trafficking in Humans

Chair’s Report to the Annual General Meeting

20 -22 February 2012

2012 has seen a massive growth in the work and outreach of ACRATH! This is no small feat and is the result of hours of dedicated work by over 50 volunteers who have contributed over 11,000 hours in 2011 in service of this ministry, coupled with the dedication and hard work of our small part-time workforce.It has also been pleasing to see an ACRATH group established in South Australia in 2012. Thank you to each one for your commitment over the past twelve months.

Social psychologist, Diarmuid O’Murchu MSC, proposes the notion of the Companionship of Empowerment as an apt metaphor for a rendering of the Gospel vision that inspires contemporary Christians to engage in the struggle for justice. I believe the descriptor Companionship of Empowerment, with Jesus as the wellspring and inspirer, captures both the motivation ACRATH members have for this ministry and the goal: liberation and empowerment of trafficked people. Tweaking the poetic words of O’Murchu referring to another form of oppression:

Imagine an end to the traffickers’ (patriarch’s) reign

Collapsing the power from on high.

Imagine a circle empowering within,

A freedom new to employ.

Imagine the demons, controlling through fear,

No longer command the high ground.

A new world order can break through at last;

Imagine ... Imagine ... Imagine!

The work of the past year has created chinks of light that suggest that such circles of empowerment are possible. There is no end to the imagination of what we could do with more time and more resources; there are myriad projects on the drawing board and it is with hope and imagination that we look to a better future for survivors of human trafficking into Australia.

ACRATH is recognised as making a significant contribution to the anti-trafficking agenda in Australia. The new three yearPOCA (Proceeds of Crime Act) grant from the Attorney General’s Department which began in July is a recognition of this. Collaboration with the Attorney General’s Department, and particularly with the former Minister for Justice, Hon Brendan O’Connor, has strengthened the work of ACRATH and we are most appreciative of the open communication and dialogue. ACRATH could not achieve as much without this support from government.

A highlight of 2011 was ACRATH’s annual advocacy and networking visit to Canberra in August. The ‘doors’ were open to the 12 ACRATH members who met with over 100 MPs, department personnel and embassy staff. This is a logistical planning exercise that needs to be experienced to be believed and is great energy! But it has been so worthwhile in furthering our advocacy and advancing the provision of care for people trafficked into Australia. A second highlight was ACRATH’s participation in the visit of Ms Joy Ngozi Ezeilo, a human rights lawyer and the UN Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons, Especially in Women and Children. ACRATH members were active participants in the Rapporteur’s many functions in Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne; ACRATH was also privileged to host a meeting with her at the ACRATH office in Melbourne.

An overview of our work

ACRATH’s final report on the first AGD grant was submitted in July 2011. Some examples of the achievements of the previous 21 months in relation to our goals were as follows:

Community awareness raising:

Over 30 presentations were made each six months – leading to fundraising, volunteer registrations and the distribution of thousands of postcards promoting FAIRTRADE chocolate.
ACRATH website was redesigned to make it more user-friendly and to allow weekly uploads by ACRATH personnel.
An ACRATH volunteer ran a Sydney to Melbourne Cycle against the Traffik event with 657 people attending events and $4,918 raised for anti trafficking work.
An ACRATH volunteer organised 7 events of Opera against the Traffik involving about 400 people and raising in excess of $7,000.

Direct service:

ACRATH members have accompanied 6 trafficked women in their journey of healing.
ACRATH negotiated pro bono work with Allens Arthur Robinson to run test cases for victims of crime assistancefor people trafficked into Victoria.
ACRATH has developed a database of support organisations across Asia which can +offer practical support for trafficked women who wish to return home or who ask for support for their families.
ACRATH has contributed to the safety and protection of trafficked women in Australia by supporting the provision of high-quality legal advice services by Anti Slavery Australia at the University of Technology Sydney.

Networking to form alliances to achieve change through advocacy:

Three FAIRTRADE campaigns have been supported or initiated with anti trafficking partners: FAIRTRADE chocolate, FAIRTRADE cotton from Uzbekistan, slave-free seafood from Thailand. The FAIRTRADE chocolate campaign in Australia has successfully persuaded Cadbury, Nestle and Mars to begin importing ethically produced cocoa from West Africa.

ACRATH made successful representations to the Victorian government concerning trafficking survivors’ access to TAFE, and consequently in Victoriathree trafficked women began vocationally oriented TAFE courses in 2011.
A second roundtable on financial assistance for the victims of the crime of trafficking in Victoria was held in May 2011 with participation by many community sector groups and three senior Victorian magistrates.
In meetings in Canberra with government and key anti-trafficking stakeholders ACRATH continued to advocate for improved housing options for trafficking survivors in Australia.This contributed to the Minister calling a national roundtable on housing in May.

The new POCA grant puts before ACRATH members a challenge to continue the good work being done and to expand this in new ways as we endeavour to address this area of human rights violation in Australia. Our goals for the coming 3 years extend much of the work that has only just begun and give us scope to take new initiatives. We intend to:

Raise awareness of human trafficking, its causes and the scope for local action.
Undertake work to ensure that the needs of people trafficked into Australia are met: education and retraining, access to financial compensation, meeting physical needs (medical, dental & other health needs) and pastoral care.
Collaborate with like-minded organisations in Australia, in the Asia Pacific region and internationally to advocate for measures to address human trafficking.

In the past 6 months so much has been achieved in relation to these goals as the following examples testify:

30 presentations have been made across four states with participants varying in number from 7 to 200.
For some time ACRATH has hoped to reach some of the ethnic communities. Great beginnings have been made in South Australia with the Vietnamese and Filipina communities and new contacts made in Victoria and NSW with PacificIsland groups.
An active Education Group is working on ways of engaging men and boys to a greater degree in countering this problem of human trafficking.
Our revamped website has received 626,582 hits and there has been considerable uptake in Australia and internationally of our 3 newsletters. We are indebted to Noelene Simmons for her extensive work on the website and Joan Kennedyand her team for theircompilation of the newsletters.
8 trafficked women in Australia have received pastoral support from ACRATH members and 2 have been awarded victims of crime assistance.
ACRATH has continued its productive networking with Anti Slavery Australia, Project Respect, Red Cross and Stop the Traffik, and has met with another 9 community agencies.
Our international links have strengthened with exciting developments with Catholic Religious in New Zealand, new contacts in the Pacific, renewed collaboration with anti trafficking workers across Asia, and new possibilities being explored with Franciscans International,Edmund Rice and a number of other congregations in Geneva.

It is still a source of concern for ACRATH, and our NGO partners, that the major need for safe affordable housing for trafficked persons has not been met. ACRATH continues to advocate vigorously on this and on access to English classes. Whilst some progress has been made in discussions with government, access to high standard English courseswithout overseas fees is still to be achieved. Thiswould be invaluable in assisting trafficked women to begin a new life.

A significant challenge for ACRATH in 2011 was the relocation of the Vic ACRATH office from the Good Shepherd building in Abbotsford to Kilbride Centre in Albert Park and, in this change, establishing a National Office. ACRATH is most grateful to Good Shepherd for the hospitality in providing a space for ACRATH since we began in 2004 and for their generous assistance with relocation costs.

ACRATH is grateful for the generous support of Catholic Religious Australia and is very pleased that this aspect of social justice work is recognised. It was very good to have the opportunity to speak about our work and meet CRA Council on 20 April 2011, and now to be liaising with the new CRA Justice Network Coordinator. We are appreciative of the ready assistance of Sr Veronica McCluskey during the past year and for her sage advice. We are most grateful to Mr Dinal Jayamanne for his expertise in attending to the financial requirements of the AGD grant. Dinal’s professional competence has ensured professional reporting and given peace of mind to the National Committee. ACRATH is also grateful for the pro-bono service of our evaluators, Erin Cassells and Will Dunn. They have assisted us greatly to gain greater clarity of focus and have made valuable suggestions that have enabled us to maintain more professional data-gathering and reporting frameworks.

ACRATH’s growth is in no small part due to the competent and enthusiastic work by our ACRATHworkers. The growth has led to redefining Christine Carolan’s role to include National Projects coordination. We are grateful to Christine for her dedicated and tireless work , and her attention to many details that have mushroomed. The National Committee thanks Noelene Simmons for her initiative in community education and awareness-raising in NSW and her stirling work in maintaining our up-to-date and vibrant website. In Western Australia Kathy Fagan has energetically engaged in dialogue with multicultural groups, government and sex industry support groups, all with a view to finding people who have been trafficked and ensuring their needs are met. Kathy has also lead ACRATH into new relationships with Caritas Asia and other Asian anti trafficking support groups. All three women contribute untold volunteer hours in addition to their paid work. The National office is indebted to Denise Mulcahy for her days of voluntary service each week that keep our operation running. Who could forget the detailed planning and the delicate negotiations that made the Canberra trip run so smoothly and so fruitfully? Thank you to each one.

Over the past two years I have been gifted with an enthusiastic and hard-working National Committee. Thank you to our secretary and Victorian convenor Carol Hogan for her energetic work in advocacy with MPs, with thorough facilitation of communications with our networks, and with her community awareness work in Victoria; Joan Murphy, our Treasurer for her willingness to oversee two sets of financial books, one for the grant from the AGD and the other from our own fundraising endeavours; Suzette Clark who stepped in to fill an ad-hoc ACRATH deputy chair position when my Brigidine commitments gave me less time for ACRATH, and who has been able to link ACRATH to the CRA Justice Network; Anne Tormey who has begun ACRATH in SA and has lead us into exploring processes for tackling human trafficking in ethnic communities; Janine Bliss who has held the fort in Queensland for ACRATH and provided patient and long term accompaniment to a trafficked woman; Lucy van Kessel for her energy and her willingness to offer serious consideration to any project that involves human trafficking in the West; Sarah Menassa-Rose who has generously agreed to juggle her NSW ACRATH commitments with her work with the Franciscan Friars and the demands of a new baby; Sarah has also linked ACRATH to the global Franciscan network.

“Imagine a circle empowering within, A freedom new to employ”. This is indeed the experience of ACRATH in 2011! We have become stronger advocates in our shared work for justice. ACRATH has been an active collaborator with other key agencies , and with government, in endeavouring to address this heinous phenomenon of human trafficking and exploitation. Catholic Religious’ commitment to this cause was highlighted in the inaugural Anti-Slavery Australia awards. Margaret Ng sosj received one as co-ordinator of the Josephite Counter-Trafficking Project. Pauline Coll and I, as Chairs of ACRATH, were humbled by this award and see it as symbol of the recognition of the whole team of ACRATH volunteers and workers.

I thank each ACRATH member for the dedicated work of 2011 and wish you every blessing.

Louise Cleary

Chair ACRATH