At left, Ann Sathasiwan  taking us through the Freedom Partnership initiative of the Salvation Army and above with President Chris Hanson acknowledging the clubs appreciation.
 
Last year the Salvation Army launched an initiative, the Freedom Partnership, designed to equip Australians with the information and knowledge to identify slavery and slave-like practices which currently exist in the Australian community and thereby helping to bring to an end this exploitative system in society.
 
Guest speaker Ann Sathasiwan from that organisation brought to our attention the aspects of modern slavery existing today even in Australia.  We think of the horrible stories in the sex trade which from to time to time emerge but don’t contemplate that there are issues re slavery other areas, e.g. in the cleaning, construction, beauty, domestic service, hospitality and retail industries.  This is quite apart from aspects of forced and slave like marriages.  Of course there is a continuous spectrum from what we think of as overt slavery to simple exploitation of the vulnerable.  World wide huge profits are derived with estimates of over 100 million people (mainly women and children) suffering overt slavery.
 
Features of low wages, bonded employment with debt hooks, one way relocations, low cost raw supply arrangements all trap the vulnerable person who initially sees the “job” prospect as a way to a better life. Doubtless for some the alternative is worse but still…..
 
Ann stressed that the Freedom Partnership is aimed at alerting and making Australians aware of the problem broadly and to question direct situations in Australia; and consider the underlying source of imported cheap goods and why there are low costs in the supply chain.  Many products can ultimately trace back to low cost input labour or raw material supplies in countries where slavery/exploitation is rife.
 
Questions from the audience noted the blurred continuum of “slavery”.  We concluded that there some basic actions which we could employ, i.e. product purchase preferences, gift selections, learn and discuss and above all check websites.
 

We were pointed to detail about modern slavery, and to gain more information about the Freedom Partnership initiative, on the website endslavery.salvos.org.au.

It was a most interesting but sobering presentation, thanks Ann.