Start the music to raise awareness on human trafficking

Added by on August 13, 2011

“People should not be bought and sold.” This was the message that the music show, ‘Start the Music’ sent out to the world from the Royal Melbourne Hotel, Melbourne on Friday.

Human trafficking is the buying, selling and exploiting of human beings of all ages for various purposes. What is even more disturbing is the fact that human trafficking is happening every day in Australia too.

The United Nations has described the ‘what, how and why’ of human trafficking. The very act of recruiting, harboring, transporting or receipt of persons by threat, use of force, coercion, abduction, fraud, abuse, deception, for payment or for any benefit of the person in control of such vulnerable persons for the use of exploitation that includes, but is not restricted to, prostitution, slavery or removal of organs.

The Australian Federal Police (AFP) set up Human Trafficking Teams and in the last 6 years have investigated 270 cases of human trafficking and referred 39 cases to the CDPP( Commonwealth Department of Public Prosecutions). As of June 1, 2011, 35 people have been charged with human trafficking by the AFP. A majority of the victims included Thai nationals, followed a close second by South Koreans.

The music extravaganza was not just intended to make people aware of the magnitude of the trafficking problem in the world, but was also intended to raise funds for action on human trafficking. Statistics reveal that one human being is trafficked across the border every minute. This is equal to five Jumbo jet planes full of people every day!

The show was called, ‘Start the music, stop the traffic 2011,’ and included a raffle, stalls and cocktails for AU$ 12 per presale ticket and AU$ 15 at the door. The last event was held on May 7, 2010 and was a roaring success both, by way of fund raising and gathering.

All proceeds were going to be used for action against human trafficking; however, the stellar bands that performed helped bring up the attendance by hordes and setting the entrance age limit to 18 and above did not affect the sale of tickets, either. The bands that performed at the show included: Sol Nation, The Adam Cousens Band, White Summer and Floyd Thursby.