Preamble
We, the Home Affairs, Interior, Security and Immigration Ministers of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States (the ‘Five Countries’), recognize the importance of drawing in the voices and experiences of victims and survivors of child sexual exploitation and abuse, and in particular, their ongoing advocacy efforts petitioning for increased responses from government and industry to eliminate child sexual abuse and resulting material.
We want to acknowledge the important work and advocacy of survivors’ coalitions, such as the Phoenix 11, a consortium of brave victims and survivors from the United States and Canada who have engaged with the Five Countries. Other victims and survivors coalitions are supported by non-governmental organizations. All of these brave victims and survivors continue to engage and call on government, lawmakers and industry to champion the rights of children to be safe online.
We acknowledge that more work needs to be done to ensure all levers are used to combat this crime, and to that end, the expertise of victims and survivors is key to enabling meaningful, trauma-informed change.
Commitment
We, the Ministers of the Five Countries, commit to work more proactively and collaboratively with victims and survivors of child sexual exploitation and abuse and the organisations working to support them, to ensure Five Country efforts to combat this crime type are informed by their lived experiences and expertise.
The Five Countries will continue to adopt, both individually and collectively, an approach to policy and engagement that is victim-centric and trauma-informed. Our commitment to victims and survivors of child sexual exploitation and abuse rests on the understanding that respect, care and protection, ongoing dialogue, and empowerment are central to this process and will enable victims and survivors to report their abuse and access the support they need to heal from their experiences.
Next Step
The Five Country Ministerial Tackling Child Sexual Abuse Working Group will engage organizations and advocates in their respective regions in late 2024 to determine the best path forward and identify concrete actions to undertake.