In March 2022 the Australian govt launched a review of the Australian Modern Slavery Act to be led by Professor John McMillan, AO. The review was to consider the operation of the Act over its first three years and whether further measures to improve the Act and improve compliance are necessary. The review completed on 31 March 2023. The review report and recommendations are now publicly available.

Key recommendations from the review are:

Recommendation 8

[…] consider the desirability of amending the mandatory reporting criteria in s 16 of the Modern Slavery Act:

• to add new mandatory reporting criteria that would require an entity to report on:
  • modern slavery incidents or risks identified by the entity during the reporting year
  • grievance and complaint mechanisms made available by the entity to staff members and other people

Recommendation 11

The Modern Slavery Act be amended to provide that a reporting entity must:

• have a due diligence system […] , and
• in the entity’s annual modern slavery statement, explain the activity undertaken by the entity in accordance with that system.

This duty should not apply to an entity with a consolidated annual revenue of between $50-100M until two years after the entity has become subject to the reporting requirements of the Act.

Recommendation 20

The Modern Slavery Act be amended to provide that it is an offence for a reporting entity:

• to fail, without reasonable excuse, to give the Minister a modern slavery statement within a reporting period for that entity
• to give the Minister a modern slavery statement that knowingly includes materially false information
• to fail to comply with a request given by the Minister to the entity to take specified remedial action to comply with the reporting requirements of the Modern Slavery Act
• to fail to have a due diligence system in place that meets the requirements [..] of the Act.

The penalty offence provisions should not apply to an entity with a consolidated annual revenue of between $50-100M until two years after the entity has become subject to the reporting requirements of the Act.

Recommendation 29

The Modern Slavery Act s 24 be amended to provide that a further review […] be undertaken in another three years...