NATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS ACTION PLAN

CONSULTATION ON DRAFT BASELINE STUDY

Thank you for taking the time to provide feedback on the consultation draft Baseline Study on human rights in Australia. Submissions are due by 31 August 2011.We look forward to hearing from you soon.

The Justice and International Mission Unit of the Synod of Victoria and Tasmania, UnitingChurch in Australia, welcomes this opportunity to provide input into the draft Baseline Study on human rights in Australia. The input to selected questions below represents feedback on particular areas of our work, and should not be taken as an indication that the UnitingChurch in Australia does not have an interest in human rights issues outside of these areas.

Dr Mark Zirnsak

Director

Justice and International Mission Unit

Synod of Victoria and Tasmania

Uniting Church in Australia

130 Little Collins St

Melbourne, Victoria, 3000

Phone: (03) 9251 5265

E-mail:

For sections of the Baseline Study that you would like to provide feedback on, please consider:

Introduction:

  • What other information (if any) would you include in the introduction?

Limit: 100 words

Chapter 1: Protection and promotion of human rights in Australia

  • What other information (if any) would you include in summarising the key institutional and legal protections and arrangements for promoting human rights in Australia?

Limit: 500 words

Chapter 2: Human rights concerns of the general community

  • Are there additional concerns that could be included in this section? (Please specify)

Limit: 500 words

Compensation for the survivors of human trafficking

The obligation to provide compensation to victims of serious crimes and human rights abuses is contained in a number of human rights treaties that Australia has voluntarily signed up to. It is contained in the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children supplementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organised Crime (Article 6.6).

To date there have been more than 180 victims of human trafficking recognised in Australia since 2004. Only a handful have been able to access compensation through State based compensation schemes for victims of crime. The state schemes all work differently, meaning survivors of trafficking can get very different levels of compensation depending on which state they were trafficked into.

In order to be compliant with the international obligations Australia has accepted, it should either create a compensation scheme at the Federal level for survivors of trafficking, or ensure survivors of human trafficking can receive compensation under the current state systems.

Goods entering Australia where slavery or trafficking have been used in their production

There can be no doubt there are goods entering Australia that are produced using slavery or trafficked labour. While not specifically on slavery and trafficked labour, the US Department of Labor has identified a wide range of goods that involved the use of forced labour and exploited child labour that are imported into the US.[1] Many of the same goods from the same countries are imported into Australia.

The Australian Government has made it an offence for any Australian individual or company to engage in any financial transaction involving a slave, regardless of where it occurs in the world. However, no effort is currently made to identify Australian companies importing goods that involve the use of slavery in their production. No Australian company has been prosecuted from being associated with slavery in the production of goods they have imported.

The options available to the Australian Government to take action include:

  • Introducing legislation that requires Government to engage with industries to create a standard set of practices that reduce the likelihood that slavery or human trafficking is involved in the production of imported goods;
  • Require companies where there is substantial risk of slavery or trafficking being in the supply chain, to mandatorily report on what steps they are taking to mitigate the risk of these human rights abuses;
  • For industries that fail to take adequate action to address serious risks of slavery and human trafficking, the Government should introduce mandatory codes of conduct; and
  • Amend the Financial Management and Accountability Act 1997 and the ‘Commonwealth Procurement Guidelines’ to require suppliers to provide guarantees that their supply chains are free of slavery and human trafficking.
  • What additional statistical data or research findings could be included to better paint the human rights picture? (Please provide references)

Limit: 1000 words

Research into Goods imported into Australia

The Australian Government should conduct research into goods imported into Australia where there is a reasonable risk that slavery or human trafficking may have been involved. This would be similar to the research done by the US Department of Labor on goods imported into the US where there was substantial risk of forced or child labour being involved in their production.[2] Based on the US Department of Labor list, goods imported into Australia where forced labour may have been used in the production of the goods include cocoa, bricks, pavers, cotton clothing and fabric, carpets, rice, palm oil, and embroidered textiles. Forced labour is a wider category than slavery and trafficked labour, but will include instances of both. The UnitingChurch is also aware there is a high risk of trafficking and slavery being used in the sourcing of seafood from Thailand.

Research into Australians as consumers of online child sexual abuse material

There are Australians who are consumers of commercial child sexual abuse material sold online. The purchase and trade in commercial sexual abuse material generates a market, stimulating demand for the human rights abuses involved in the production of such material.

The UN Office of Drugs and Crime has noted that human trafficking feeds particularly the commercial child sexual abuse industry on the Internet.[3] The UNODC report estimates the commercial child sexual abuse industry on-line, as opposed to non-commercial peer-to-peer networks, generates an estimated 50,000 new child sexual abuse images each year and is worth about US$250 million globally. It involves thousands of commercial child sex abuse sites and has an estimated two million consumers globally. Commercial child sexual abuse sites are more likely to involve younger children than non-commercial material. The Internet Watch Foundation found that 73% of the child victims on commercial child sexual abuse sites appear to be under 10 years old and 66% of the images and videos depicted sexual activity between adults and children including the rape and sexual torture of the child.[4] A minority of commercial sites cater to individuals with a sexual interest in very young children, showing mainly infants and toddlers.[5] Cybertip.ca found that 29.7% of images on commercial child sexual abuse sites depict children being sexually assaulted, with 3.3% of images on commercial sites being of extreme sexual assaults (compared to 2.7% of images on all child sexual abuse websites).

The UNODC report that the majority of commercial child sexual abuse operations are located in Eastern Europe. This is apparently due to lower levels of law enforcement in Eastern Europe against this transnational criminal activity and that their customers, who appear to be largely from Western countries, have a preference for ‘white’ girls.

The Internet Watch Foundation has identified 715 unique sources of commercial child sexual abuse websites, each with a distinct website name and brand. They found 321 of these were active in 2010. Of these, the ten most prolific ‘brands’ account for at least 47.7% of the commercial webpages seen by the Internet Watch Foundation, with the most prolific using 862 urls. Analysis found the criminals running these operations do so in a cluster of commercial child sexual abuse ‘brands’ from the manner in which they share hosting patterns, payment arrangements, advertising systems and registration details as well as from the overall appearance of the websites.[6]

The 2009 analysis of child sexual abuse images online by Cybertip.ca reported they had examined 800 commercial child sexual abuse sites (representing 12.6% of all child sexual abuse sites they had dealt with). They concluded there is clearly a large consumer market for child sexual abuse images.[7]

A BBC report from 2006 indicated that UK ISP BT were blocking 35,000 attempts to access child sexual abuse material each day by their clients, 18 months after they started using the Internet Watch Foundation list of known child sexual abuse sites.[8] BT provided service to one third of UK internet users.

Cybertip.ca reported in their 2009 report that in the UK, a single ISP blocked more than 20,000 daily attempts to access child sexual abuse material and in Norway the estimate was 15,000 – 18,000 daily attempts.[9]

At this stage there is a lack of research into Australians as consumers of online child sexual abuse materials. Specific issues to be researched would include:

  • What sources do offenders use to collect child sexual abuse material online? One study overseas found 78% obtained images using Internet Relay Chat software, 42% used the World Wide Web, 39% used newsgroups, 30% e-mail and 21% ICQ.[10]
  • How much material is purchased and how much of the purchased material is from commercial sites? Research from Canada found that nearly 40% of non-contact Canadian offenders purchased child abuse material
  • Estimates of the size of offenders accessing child sexual abuse material;
  • The proportion of offenders accessing child sexual abuse material that are non-contact offenders versus those that are contact offenders as well as accessing child sexual abuse material;
  • The nature of business model used by commercial child sexual abuse operations. This would require collaboration with overseas bodies that already conduct some of this research, such as Cybertip.ca in Canada, the Internet Watch Foundation in the UK and the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children;
  • Methods to combat and disrupt online child sexual abuse, including combating the commercial child sexual abuse industry, including their relative effectiveness.
  • Assessment of preventative offender education and how to do it.

The available methodology would include:

  • A literature review;
  • Interviews with offenders already in the criminal justice system;
  • Australian Federal Police analysis of collections of child sexual abuse material;
  • Interviews with offenders that have run commercial child sexual abuse operations overseas;
  • Matched comparison of an ISP using a block message related to child sexual abuse sites and an ISP providing ready access, examining number of visits to these sites and difference in repeat visits to commercial child sexual abuse sites.
  • What major existing government initiatives are missing that should be included?

Limit: 100 words

The Federal Government’s Cyber-Safety plans, which include efforts to combat child sexual abuse material online. The UN Office and Drugs and Crime states commercial child sexual abuse material is fed by human trafficking. The Government’s plan includes access disruption to child sexual abuse material by Internet Service Providers, a measure recommended by INTERPOL.[11] Currently, this measure is opposed by the Greens and Coalition opposition parties in the Parliament.

Chapter 3: The human rights experience of specific groups in Australia

  • Are there additional specific groups that could be included in this section? (Please specify)

Limit: 300 words

  • What additional statistical data or research findings could be included to better paint the human rights picture for a specific group? (Please provide references)

Limit: 2000 words

It is a well recognised fact that breastfeeding is the best start in life for a baby, where breastfeeding is possible. This view is held by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and UNICEF and continues to be confirmed by medical research. The World Health Organisation recommends exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months of life, the introduction of local, nutrient rich complementary foods thereafter with continued breastfeeding to two years of age and beyond.[12] In reaching this conclusion the WHO Expert Consultation reviewed more than 3,000 references.[13] Thus breastfeeding is related to both the right to the best possible health for both mothers and infants.

Research has shown while overall duration of breastfeeding remained fairly constant in Australia between 1995 and 2004-2005, the gap between the breastfeeding rates of the most disadvantaged families in terms of income and those families on the highest incomes has widened considerably. For example, in the 1995 National Health Survey, the proportion of infants being breastfed at 6 months was 37.7% in the lowest Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA) quintile compared with 53.1 % in the highest quintile. By contrast, in the 2004-2005 National Health Survey, the breastfeeding rate at 6 months was 37.1% in the lowest quintile compared with 66.0% in the highest quintile.[14]

  • Are there any additional human rights issues that could be added which affect the specific groups identified in this section?

Limit: 500 words

An additional issue to be added would be children in employment, as they are at greater risk of being exposed to dangerous workplace environments or exploitation by unscrupulous employers. Work, for the majority of children and young people can be a formative, rewarding and valuable experience. Unfortunately however, research shows that this is not the case for some children and young people.

Most young people work[15] however there is a lack of comprehensive data about the details of the nature of work that is undertaken. The Australian Bureau of Statistics completed one study into the employment of children between the ages of 5 and 14[16]. The survey found that in Australia in the 12 months up to June 2006, 175,100 children aged between 5 -14 had worked. Of the children who worked, 83% of the children who worked had worked during school terms and 11% of those worked 10 hours a week or more.

There is a lack of detailed data pertaining to workplace injuries related to children, and particularly those below the age of 15. In Victoria, available data indicates that there were between 700 and 1,000 injuries per annum of children aged under 20, between1996 to 2006.[17] Research undertaken by the South Australian Children, Youth and Women's Health Service stated that, "On average, 30 children aged 0 to 14 years die on Australian farms each year and around 600 are admitted to hospital because of farm-related injuries”[18]. Earlier analysis (2005) conducted by the NSW Commission for Children and Young People[19], Children at Work, found that ‘40 per cent of the workers surveyed had sustained some form of work-related injury, with half of those requiring treatment’[20] and that, ‘girls are more likely than boys to be injured … and children from the most disadvantaged areas are most likely to be seriously injured’[21]. 48 per cent of those surveyed had suffered verbal harassment, while one-fifth had experienced physical harassment.[22]

A Parliamentary inquiry into ‘Combining school and work: supporting successful youth transitions’[23] by the Federal House of Representatives Standing Committee on Education and Training, found[24]:

…. the committee has received feedback from students—particularly those employed by smaller businesses—where their employer is unable to offer the same degree of flexibility. Students working longer hours during the school week are finding that they are too tired and unmotivated to study.

Available evidence suggests that in the right circumstances some level of work can have positive benefits for children, but as hours of work increase there is likely to be negative impacts on completion of formal education.

There is a need to ensure there are adequate child employment laws across Australia that are consistent with Articles 31 and 32 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and as a minimum, child employment laws should cover:[25]

  • the minimum age for the performance of certain types of work, ensuring work undertaken is not hazardous to the child;
  • the minimisation of conflicts between work arrangements and schooling;
  • limitations on working hours; and,
  • employer obligations, including appropriate supervision.
  • What major government initiatives are missing that should be included?

Limit: 100 words

The Australian Health Ministers are developing the Australian National Breastfeeding Strategy 2010 – 2015 that aims to “increase the percentage of babies who are fully breastfed from birth to six months of age, with continued breastfeeding and complementary foods to twelve months and beyond.” This initiative is in the best interests of the child and in the interests of the right to health for both the child and the mother.

Issues that a National Action Plan could address:

  • What further actions or desired outcomes would you include toprotect or promote human rights?

Limit: 500 words

  • What specific measures would you suggest to address these issues?

Limit: 500 words

Do you have any other comments or suggestions for improving this baseline study?

Limit: 500 words

1

[1] US Department of Labor, Bureau of International Labor Affairs, Office of Child Labor, Forced Labor and Human Trafficking, ‘The Department of Labor’s List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor’, 2009.

[2] US Department of Labor, Bureau of International Labor Affairs, Office of Child Labor, Forced Labor and Human Trafficking, ‘The Department of Labor’s List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor’, 2009.

[3] UNODC, The Globalization of Crime: A Transnational Organized Crime Threat Assessment on 17 June 2010

[4] Internet Watch Foundation, ‘2010 Annual and Charity Report’, p. 9.

[5] Canadian Centre for Child Protection, ‘Child Sexual Abuse Images. An Analysis of Websites by Cybertip!ca’, November 2009, p. 41.

[6]Internet Watch Foundation, ‘2010 Annual and Charity Report’, p. 8.

[7]Canadian Centre for Child Protection, ‘Child Sexual Abuse Images. An Analysis of Websites by Cybertip!ca’, November 2009, pp. 10, 56.

[8]

[9]Canadian Centre for Child Protection, ‘Child Sexual Abuse Images. An Analysis of Websites by Cybertip!ca’, November 2009, p. 16.