Chapter 4Education and awareness
4.1Every four years, Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety (ANROWS) undertakes the National Community Attitudes towards Violence against Women Survey (NCAS). This survey provides insight into how people understand violence against women, their attitudes towards it and whether there has been change over time.
4.2In the 2021 NCAS, ANROWS reported that harmful myths and stereotypes about violence against women persist, with women still being blamed for causing their own victimisation or for lying about their experiences, for example:
34% of respondents agreed that it is common for sexual assault accusations to be used as a way of getting back at men
24% of respondents agreed that a lot of times, women who say they were raped had led the man on and had regrets.
4.3Multiple submitters and witnesses referenced the NCAS findings, arguing that Australia’s sexual consent culture remains problematic. Body Safety Australia explained that this culture is the internal and external expression of the understanding of consent:
It is much more than a legal definition, it is embedded in healthcare, education, economics, politics, media, policing, employment, recreation, raising children, family life, and every social interaction. The evidence shows Australia’s consent culture is not healthy.
4.4Body Safety Australia supported cultural change through a sustained whole‑of-community approach. Its submission emphasised that, while consent education must begin at school, it must be supported and validated by adults outside the classroom, to ensure that the lessons learned at school are not ‘unlearned outside the classroom’:
We can help and support children and young people to develop a positive and healthy consent culture, but we cannot place the burden of such a large and relatively rapid cultural shift solely on such young shoulders. Everyone must participate.
4.5This chapter examines consent education in:
primary and secondary schools;
tertiary education settings; and
the Australian community.
Consent education in primary and secondary schools
4.6In 2022, La Trobe University published its 7th National Survey of Secondary Students and Sexual Health (SSASH), which explores the sexual health and well‑being of school-age young people (14 to 18 years) in Australia:
More than half (60.6%) the young people surveyed reported that they had sexual experience or were currently sexually active (defined as having experienced oral, vaginal or anal sex)…Young women were more likely than young men or trans and non-binary people to report that they were sexually active.
…
The average age at which young people first experienced sex was approximately 15 years, but this differed with different sexual practices. Theaverage age was:
13.6 years for viewing pornography
14.6 years for deep kissing
15.2 years for oral sex
15.3 years for vaginal sex
15.6 years for anal sex
4.7SSASH also asked young people about their experiences of unwanted sex. SSASH reported:
Over one in three young people indicated that they had experienced unwanted sex during their life (39.5% of those who had experienced sex).
Trans and non-binary young people (55.4%) and young women (44.5%) were more likely to report that they had experienced unwanted sex than young men (21.3%). LGBQ+ young people (48.2%) were more likely to report that they had experienced unwanted sex than heterosexual young people (33.8%).
…
For 60.1% of young people who had experienced unwanted sex, this occurred for the first time in the context of an intimate relationship. One in five young people (20.7%) had experienced unwanted sex in the context of a familial or friendship relationship, while 9.9% had experienced unwanted sex that was perpetrated by someone known to them but not a friend or family member.
4.8In response to the survey, young people wrote:
…consent involves verbal communication, physical indicators of consent, sharing of sexual images and messages, or a combination of these factors. Young people wrote that verbal communication includes genuine and confident agreement to have sex. Physical indicators of consent were numerous and included flirting, facial expressions, being affectionate, kissing and other sexual activities, removing clothes, going somewhere private, picking up a condom or touching. Young people described consent as an ongoing process with either partner able to stop at any time.
4.9SSASH reported that over 95 per cent of respondents considered Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE) to be an important part of the school curriculum, with 93 per cent having received RSE at school. However, only 24.8 per cent of the respondents found their most recent RSE class to be very or extremely relevant to them.
4.10Specifically, in relation to consent:
While some students felt that consent was addressed, it was more common for students to include consent as one of the topics they felt was inadequately addressed. Some students also felt that issues of sexual assault, or where to seek help following sexual assault, should have been included in the curriculum.
4.11Ms Angelique Wan, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Consent Labs, remarked that this had also been her experience and also that of her Co-Founder, Dr Joyce Yu:
[RSE] felt not relevant or in touch with what we were living through as young people. It was often delivered in a very victim blaming or fear based manner and did not address conversations around intersectionality or consent.
4.12Voices of Influence Australia agreed that there are several ways in which the curriculum must be ‘strengthened’, such as by including or addressing: asex‑positive approach; scenarios which undermine women’s equality (forexample, pornography); and emerging issues where consent has been violated/sexual violence has been perpetrated (for example, the increased prevalence of stealthing and image-based abuse (dubbed ‘revenge porn’)) (alsosee ‘Content of consent education’ below).
4.13Women With Disabilities Australia (WWDA) highlighted that the curriculum is also not addressing the specific needs of all children and young people. Inparticular, WWDA voiced concerns about the need for accessible and appropriate education for young women and girls with disability:
…targeted education is needed for young women and girls with disability who are more likely to experience sexual and reproductive coercion than almost any other group and are significantly more likely to experience coercion in the context of decisions around reproductive health issues such as menstrual management, contraception, abortion and sterilisation. While changing legislation may impact how consent is taught in schools, it will have no bearing on the safety, sexual and reproductive health and rights of women and girls with disability if the education around it is not made accessible to and tailored to meet the specific experiences of the disabled community.
Children and young people’s current understanding
4.14As indicated in the SSASH, several submitters and witnesses agreed that children and young people do not have a good understanding of consent and sexual assault. The Youth Affairs Council of South Australia submitted:
…today in Australia young people lack an understanding of consent and can continue to hold misinformed views on sexual assault. Young people are experiencing a stage in life where expressions, values and understandings can be impacted by exposure to violence against women and attitudes that support it.
4.15Some stakeholders commented specifically on the role of pornography in shaping children and young people’s views about relationships and sex. TheAustralian Christian Lobby (ACL) argued that exposure and access to pornography is ‘particularly damaging to a healthy understanding of sexual consent’.
4.16The ACL’s submission referenced research conducted by Bravehearts, a child protection not-for-profit organisation, which commented on the long-term impacts of pornography, as follows:
Itcan influence [children, pre-teens and teenagers’] sexual lifestyles, practices and attitudes and decrease their concern around unsafe or unprotected sex. It can also impact on their wellbeing, relationships and their sexual and psychological development…Alarmingly, some evidence exists proving that viewing pornography has the potential to increase the likelihood of a young individual committing a sexual crime.
4.17La Trobe University and the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society highlighted that pornography is ‘not designed to educate on sexual communication and consent’. They noted, however, that many young people are disenfranchised from school and, for these young people, pornography may be a source of information about sex and relationships.
4.18At the Canberra public hearing, witnesses noted the multiple mental and sexual health benefits resulting from comprehensive RSE. Consent Labs’ representative Ms Wan provided the following example:
…international and local research…has been done around, more broadly, comprehensive sexuality and relationships education, of which consent is a part. That research continues to demonstrate that these conversations should be had in an age-appropriate manner and that these conversations can start from as young as kindergarten and go on as a young person goes on to high school and then university. Of course, they can continue past formal education institutions. This form of education is incredibly important because research has demonstrated that it delays the initiation of sexual intercourse. It reduces risk taking. It increases the use of contraceptive methods. Beyond just improvements in sexual health realms, it also demonstrates a reduction in gender-based violence. It increases gender equity and it increases capacity for building healthier relationships.
Australian curriculum
4.19In 2019, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) reported that one in five women (16 per cent) and one in nine men (11 per cent) have experienced physical or sexual abuse before the age of 15.
4.20In 2021, Ms Chanel Contos, then a graduate student, posted an Instagram poll, asking her followers if they or someone close to them had been sexually assaulted by someone when they were at school. Within 24 hours, she received nearly 300 responses, with 73 per cent of responders saying ‘yes’.
4.21As followers continued to respond in the affirmative, the Instagram poll morphed into a petition, calling for more holistic and earlier consent education in the Australian curriculum, and a platform where people could share anonymous testimonies of sexual assault (teachusconsent.com).
4.22On 1 April 2022, the Education Ministers Meeting, comprising federal, state and territory education ministers, endorsed updates to the Australian Curriculum (Version 8.4). These updates included ‘strengthening the explicit teaching of consent and respectful relationships from F–10 in age-appropriate ways’.
4.23Submitters and witnesses welcomed the education ministers’ decision to mandate holistic and age-appropriate consent education in all Australian schools. The National Women’s Safety Alliance and Teach Us Consent considered that ‘by educating the next generation about sexual consent…we can prevent normalised sexual violence, and demolish rape culture’.
4.24However, it was argued that there will be challenges in the delivery of consent education. La Trobe University and the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society submitted, for example, that there is ‘no national strategy or framework for the development, implementation, and delivery of school-based [RSE], including consent education’.
Respectful relationships education
4.25Our Watch, a national leader in the primary prevention of violence against women and their children, submitted:
Respectful relationships education [RRE] is the holistic approach to school‑based, primary prevention of gender-based violence, which includes teaching and learning about healthy relationships, gender, power and control in relationships and consent education.
4.26Our Watch explained that RRE is not just what is delivered in a classroom but requires a whole-of-school approach to ensure that policies, school culture and teaching practices support students and staff, and promote positive messages about respect and equality:
A whole of school approach ensures a culture among both staff and students where gender stereotypes are challenged, gender-based discrimination is unacceptable, and gender equality is actively promoted, modelled and embedded across the entire school, not only in the curriculum. This is also true of consent education within schools. The messages that young people receive from adults around them influence their attitudes and behaviours. This is why it is important for school staff to consistently role-model consent and positive behaviours, to challenge gender stereotypes and victim‑blaming messages about sexual relationships, and to respond sensitively and appropriately to disclosures of sexual violence.
4.27In evidence, Ms Patty Kinnersly, Chief Executive Officer of Our Watch, said:
Put simply, the understanding of consent is an outcome of comprehensive respectful relationships education. We cannot teach consent without also addressing the societal context in which discussions about consent take place. A whole-of-school approach is one of the most promising primary prevention strategies in preventing gender-based violence, including sexual violence. Comprehensive respectful relationships education—or RRE, as it is often called—provides an opportunity to reach young people early in their development and shape their attitudes, beliefs and behaviour around gender equality, respect and consent.
4.28As part of a whole-of-school approach, Ms Jess Hill, Presenter and Consultant Producer for Northern Pictures and the Special Broadcasting Service, also called on schools to implement a code of conduct for the handling of sexual assault disclosures where the victim-survivor and perpetrator attend the same school:
We had many years of failures on bullying that led to suicides of young people. We've had many failures already in terms of schools responding to sexual assault between students. We need to have harmonisation or even just have some kind of code of conduct started and then harmonised between states as to what happens when the reports are made which are going to result from the consent education.
Professional learning strategy
4.29Ms Kinnersly stated:
Fundamental to successful implementation of consent and respectful relationships education is the development of a professional learning strategy that supports teaching staff to develop their own knowledge and confidence in the delivery of relevant curricula. This should be situated within a broader professional learning strategy on respectful relationships education and primary prevention of violence against women.
4.30Body Safety Australia outlined the types of learning that teachers would need to acquire in order to safely deliver consent education:
…teachers will need a deep understanding of all the complexities of gender equity, queer inclusivity, racial and cultural sensitivities, online spaces, new technological dangers, grooming behaviours, domestic violence, managing disclosures of rape and family violence, responding to young people coming out to them, and all manner of other emotional issues that are not part of the training for teaching health and physical education. Teachers will have to do all of this if they are survivors of sexual or domestic violence themselves…They will even have to do it if they are perpetrators of violence. They will have to do it if they hold misogynistic or queerphobic views, asinevitably some of them will.
4.31Body Safety Australia considered that teachers would require specialised training and education to manage all of the complexities involved.However, it queried whether many teachers would receive this additional training, calling for funding to enable access to quality professional development programs. Itssubmission warned that a lack of training could lead to consent education doing more harm than good.
4.32The National Women’s Safety Alliance and Teach Us Consent suggested that there should be a ‘national qualification program to build the workforce of Respect and Consent Educators’. In addition:
…we would like to pick back up on discussions that Teach Us Consent had with the previous Australian Government and the Department of Education around the Initial Teacher Education Curriculum, and how this nation-wide minimum teacher qualification standard can be utilised to train teachers in how to promote healthy and respectful attitudes and how to address problematic ones.
4.33Ms Heather Clarke, Board Member and Secretary of the National Association of Services Against Sexual Violence, proposed that schools should have dedicated lead teachers:
…sexual violence is a massive issue. A lack of understanding about consent and how to negotiate respectful relationships for young people is also a very big issue. We need to invest in a reasonable and meaningful way and give schools a specialist position. Every other learning area, such as maths, English and science, has a key learning coordinator. We think respectful relationships is significant enough that it needs one as well. We think there would be teachers who are interested in specialist training.
Near-to-peer and third party delivery of consent education
4.34At the Canberra public hearing, some witnesses suggested that, rather than having teachers deliver RRE, it would be more effective to have young people teaching young people. Ms Wan said:
Consent Labs uses a near-to-peer facilitator model in which our facilitators themselves are young people. They are generally around the 20- to 25-year-old age group, so near to high school students or peer to peer in a university setting. We have anecdotally found that to be incredibly successful in conveying our messages around consent, communication and respectful relationships. You are able to garner a level of relatability. We immediately overcome the barriers…around feeling that content was not relevant or relatable...At Consent Labs, we've anecdotally found the near-to-peer model to be incredibly successful as a mode of delivery.
4.35Ms Contos gave evidence that young people actually prefer to get education from an external provider, due to the ‘awkwardness around these sorts of conversations’. However, she argued there is still a need to train teachers due to the need for consistent messaging:
It is very powerful to have these conversations from someone who is consistently in your life who can bring it up throughout multiple classes throughout the term…[T]here is an initial teacher education curriculum which specifies what teachers at university need to learn in order to be qualified as a teacher in Australia. Embedding respectful relationships education or how to deal with disclosures of sexual assault or how to ensure that at least minimum harmful behaviours are not being perpetuated through teaching and through behaviour correction would be quite game changing in making this consistent across the country.
4.36Ms Kinnersly agreed that teachers have a pivotal role in the delivery of RRE: ‘most of the work needs to be led by the educators who students are seeing across the course of the year and in their education’. Her colleague, MsGenevieve Sheppard, Senior Policy Adviser, agreed:
…teachers are best placed to deliver this. They have the relationships with the students. They're probably more likely to receive the disclosure. Also students, and other people with expertise have spoken about this, won't often come out and make an open disclosure. There might be hints along the way. That's why we need teachers to be doing this work. The other reason we need teachers to be the ones doing this work is that, when we think about the curriculum, we're often thinking about the [Health and Physical Education, HPE] curriculum where relationship sits. If we are thinking about it in that space, that means that only the health and [Physical Education] teachers are getting access to this information and can then teach that to the students. That's problematic in a number of ways in that it loads the HPE teacher with an area. Also, it's not taught through the classroom teacher, who has the ability to reinforce all those messages in the classroom.
4.37Some stakeholders argued that their expertise is critical to informing and delivering consent education in schools. Sexual Assault Services Victoria submitted that the expertise of sexual assault (SA) services is typically under‑recognised and under‑resourced in prevention work, even though these services are a natural fit for the delivery of consent education:
They have strong links to schools and a long history of delivering primary prevention education focused on consent. Further, services’ deep understanding of the context and types of sexual violence commonly used by and against young people, and their ability to recognise trends in sexual violence, places SA services as unique experts in prevention efforts.
4.38Ms Ashleigh Newnham, Director of Advocacy and Development at South‑East Monash Legal Services, similarly argued that there is a role also for community legal services:
Resourcing schools to partner with community legal centres is an effective model for allowing schools to access the legal expertise they need when developing this content and delivering this legal education.
4.39Mr Kevin Bates, Federal Secretary of the Australian Education Union (AEU), stated that the union would not support abrogating the delivery of RSE to third party providers, which is not to say that there would be no role for content experts:
…the role of teachers in making decisions about the delivery of that education is critical. Teachers are the pedagogical experts. We want to be able to make decisions about how to deliver content to the students that we teach but also acknowledge that there are content experts out there…They should be making decisions about the content to ensure that it meets the expectations of the community and, indeed, the legislature in respect of these matters, and then teachers are empowered to deliver the content in a way that's appropriate for the students they teach.
4.40Similarly, the Federation of Community Legal Services (Victoria) and South‑East Monash Legal Service emphasised the need to develop evidence‑based consent education with subject-matter experts ‘based on best practice internationally and adapted to meet local community needs’.
Challenges to delivery of consistent consent education
4.41Some submitters and witnesses raised concerns in relation to other factors that might impede the delivery of consistent consent education. Consent Labs’ MsWan stated that there is a difference between independent and public schools, with the former being better resourced to deliver best practice consent education:
…there absolutely is an inconsistency between the types of education institutions in terms of the resources available to them…The independent schools by far and large are able to come closer to best practice implementation of this education than public schools. By that, I mean they are more likely to be able to implement a year 7 to 12 program, to be able to implement a full and comprehensive educator, professional learning workshop, as well as engage with parents and carers.
4.42Body Safety Australia identified the crowded Australian curriculum as an issue but emphasised the importance of finding time to deliver consent education in the senior years:
…young people aged between 15 and 19 is the most likely age group for both victims and offenders in sexual assault. This is the time when they are most in need of supportive, empathic, trauma-informed, and high-quality consent education. The psychological, mental health, long-term physical health, economic security, and disrupted relationships that research shows will often follow sexual assault provide a strong argument for intensifying, rather than removing consent education in the senior years of schooling.
4.43In response, Mr Bates from the AEU said:
…there are other things that could be jettisoned from a teacher's workload that are of less importance than respectful relationships education…[W]e'd like to see a broader conversation about what else might be removed from the education program to make space for respectful relationships.
Resistance to RRE
4.44Another challenge in the delivery of RSE is the ‘pushback’ or resistance that schools sometimes encounter from students, parents, staff or their communities. Body Safety Australia referenced the ‘backlash’ that it has experienced from parents and, occasionally, teachers:
Backlash we have heard frequently includes anger or fear from parents that “my son will suffer rape claims unless he gets a signed contract” and “my son is too afraid to even date because he’s afraid of raping someone because it’s just too complex these days”. Examples of backlash from teachers includes “I’m not going to teach my students that all boys are rapists” and “why can’t we just teach the girls to get better at saying no”.
4.45Body Safety Australia also referenced the ‘backlash’ from students who have been influenced by events overseas where women’s rights are being eroded and by the polarisation of gender politics:
Most young people in Australia habitually consume social media produced overseas and young people's attitudes have never been so strongly impacted by global commentators. In our professional experience these attitudes are expressed daily in the classroom, often from adolescent boys who need support to understand that the values expressed by the likes of Andrew Tate are substantially different to the values learned in their own homes and communities. The reach and influence of these commentators makes it even more important to engage positively with all young people, but especially boys and young men, so their understanding of affirmative consent is empowering and will enable them to find happiness in safe, loving relationships as young people and as adults.
4.46The AEU acknowledged that there is a challenge and responsibility for each public school to consult and negotiate with its community, to help it to understand the reasons for RRE, the content that's covered in RRE, and to talk to them about the sorts of decisions that professional educators make in the delivery of age-appropriate RRE at all levels.
4.47At the public hearings, several witnesses commented on Welcome to Sex, anage‑appropriate introductory guide to sex and sexuality for teenagers, authored by Dr Melissa Kang and Ms Yumi Stynes. This book was recently removed from the shelves at Big W stores after a backlash from conservative campaigners.
4.48Ms Hill considered the ‘furore’ interesting, stating that ‘it shows how little adults know about the sex lives and sex education of young Australians’. Adding to the earlier discussion (see ‘Children and young people’s current understanding’), she noted the influence of pornography in shaping young men’s attitudes to sex:
Almost half of Australians between the ages of nine and 16 years old are being regularly exposed to porn. The material they are viewing is increasingly violent, sexist and racist because literally that's the way you keep getting clicks…The sorts of messages transmitted in violent porn are not just violence, sexism and misogyny; it is that women who are choked, gagged and assaulted actually secretly like what is happening to them. Even though they protest, in the end they look grateful. It is hard to overstate just how damaging that is as a cultural education for young boys and men.
4.49Ms Contos from Teach Us Consent agreed that young people are learning about sex from pornography:
A phrase I always use is that is basically like learning how to drive a car by watching Formula One. It's extremely unsafe. It's extremely dangerous. It'smainly young women who are being subjected to metaphorical car crashes.
4.50Ms Contos cautioned against omitting the subject of pornography from RRE:
We're not taking into account enough how much pornography is shaping the sexual landscape of young people and distorting their understanding of consent. We can have laws, we can have conversations in classrooms and we can have all these things, but the reality is the amount of hours that young Australians spend watching violent and misogynistic depictions of explicit sex will counteract all of that. So porn literacy needs to be included in how we go forward.
4.51Ms Taylah Spirovski, Chief Executive Officer of Voices of Influence Australia, agreed that emerging trends and practices must be addressed:
Right now, breaches of consent occur in an online context with revenge porn, which perhaps wasn't something able to be done with a Nokia brick. Separate to that, there are things like deep-fake porn where computer technology is used to map the faces of celebrities, in many instances, or private citizens or whoever it may be onto explicit sexual material.
4.52Ms Kinnersly speculated that perhaps the backlash is attributable to people genuinely not understanding what comprises age-appropriate content. Legal Aid NSW explained what this content would look like in a primary to high school continuum:
…in primary school consent can be taught with a focus on friendships, respectful relationships and body autonomy. By high school, consent education could shift to focus on romantic relationships, gendered stereotypes, coercion and power imbalances. High school sexual consent education should also cover the legal definition of sexual consent…and the offences associated with non-consensual sexual activity, as well as ethical issues, interpreting verbal and non-verbal communication and negotiation around sex.
4.53Similarly, Ms Sheppard from Our Watch explained:
The age appropriateness comes from the experts within that space. We also talk about it being scaffolded: we build a concept and then we build on it and build on it. The explicit teaching has also been shown to be a really protective factor for young people. We need to give them the skills to be able to speak to and articulate what's happening for them, and to understand it. We build it. Yes, in years 11 and 12, we're talking about gender-based violence and the impacts of gender norms on intimate partner relationships. That's not for five-year-olds; that's for year 11 and 12 students. It's about that explicit teaching in those age-appropriate but scaffolded ways.
4.54Her colleague, Ms Kinnersly, reiterated that age-appropriate and scaffolded information better prepares young people for relationships and to identify non‑consensual interactions:
What we know is that if young people have age-appropriate and scaffolded information shared with them, from when they're very small through to adulthood, they are more likely to be critical of what is important in a relationship, particularly when they're older. They're more likely to understand and challenge when things are not right. They have better skills themselves to know what consent is and when to challenge consent.
4.55As discussed at paragraph 4.7, according to the SSASH, more than one in three young people have experienced unwanted sex. The average age at which young people had first experienced unwanted sex was 14.9 years. When asked about their most recent experience of unwanted sex:
65.2% reported that they had experienced verbal pressure
40.7% agreed to have sex because they were worried about negative outcomes of not having sex
31.9% were physically forced to have sex
28.0% reported that they were too drunk or high at the time to consent to sex.
Content of consent education
4.56Many submitters and witnesses argued that all stakeholders, including children and young people, victim-survivors, sexual violence specialists, teachers and schools, must have a role in the design of the consent curriculum. The National Catholic Education Commission emphasised, for example, that, in its schools, the involvement of school authorities and communities, ensures that core content is underpinned by the Catholic faith and practice:
…sexual consent education is only one part of a broader education that [needs] to be focused on building respectful relationships and family life…To focus on consent alone is to fall short of the full expression of Catholic moral teaching...In Catholic schools, human sexuality, and its part in God’s plan for humanity, is not reduced to solely matters of sexual consent.
4.57Multiple stakeholders agreed that consent education encompasses more than just the legal definition or subject of consent. Our Watch outlined what an evidence-based curriculum would encompass:
…the evidence tells us that the primary focus of consent education should be on building students' understanding of the fundamental principles of bodily autonomy, mutual respect, social and self-awareness, communication, enthusiasm and willingness, rather than only on explaining the legal framework.
4.58Women’s Legal Services Australia (WLSA) submitted that the consent curriculum must include the drivers of gender-based violence, respectful relationships, and ethical sexual practice. WLSA argued that ‘addressing gender stereotypes, male entitlement, rape myths and victim‑blaming attitudes is…critical’, a view with which Body Safety Australia agreed:
Debunking the gender and societal myths that often diminish young people’s ability to communicate freely is an essential component of consent education. This includes myths about:
Boys and young men “proving their manhood” by displays of rampant sexual desire or frequent sexual encounters, which can often place substantial and unfair pressure on boys and young men.
Girls and young women being the moral gatekeepers of sex, which can pressure them into feeling shame for natural sexual feelings or displaying rebellion by simulating sexual sophistication.
LGBTIQA+ young people being either promiscuous and sexually adventurous, or irrelevant in any discussion of consent, which can cause significant harm and heightened perception of exclusion and othering.
Consent education needs to explain the history of such myths, demonstrate relatable examples of how they are expressed in young people’s everyday lives, and provide practical tools for overcoming internal and external pressures created and supported by these myths.
4.59Dr Rachael Burgin, Chief Executive Officer of Rape and Sexual Assault Research and Advocacy, stated educational standards should have a ‘higher bar’ than the legal standard:
The criminal law is the lowest common denominator. We're dealing with people who have sexually assaulted another person. We need to look at something more rigorous. We need to look at a comprehensive relationships and sexuality program that doesn't just take into consideration what is a legal definition of consent and make sure you align with that but what a good, healthy, mutual sex life looks like for young people. How can we make sure that everybody is not only there and participating but is there and enjoying themselves and wants to be there? They are not coerced. There is no social pressure. They are not forced. They don't feel scared to say no. They are not worried that if they say no they will get called a prude and if they say yes, they are a slut. Those attitudes are really fundamental. The law doesn't do that. I'm not sure that it's capable of it.
4.60End Rape on Campus Australia (EROC) concurred:
What’s required – both within the education sector and Australian society more broadly – is holistic relationship and sexuality education programs that are applicable to diverse experiences and cover more than what the law says is the minimum requirement for consent. While it’s important that the legal definitions of sexual assault and consent are covered, prevention education programs will continue to be ineffective if they do not also cover topics such as sexual ethics and sexual pleasure, the gendered nature of sexual violence, the root causes of gender inequality, rape myths and bystander intervention. These programs must be trauma informed and they must account for the experiences of members of the LGBTQIA+ community, people with disabilities, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and people from culturally and linguistically diverse communities.
4.61Specifically in relation to sexual consent laws, Body Safety Australia confirmed its support for the teaching of the affirmative consent standard: ‘high quality consent education has always taken an affirmative consent approach’. Similarly, Consent Labs advised that it has always taught ‘what is now recognised as the gold standard of consent education, encouraging students to go beyond their legal obligations and seek affirmative consent’.
Role of the Australian government
4.62The Attorney-General’s Department (AGD) acknowledged that the Australian government has a national leadership role in education. However:
…state and territory curriculum authorities and school authorities are responsible for implementing the Australian Curriculum in their schools. They do this in line with system and jurisdictional policies and requirements. The revised Australian Curriculum is being implemented by states and territories according to their own timelines from 2023 onwards.
Funding for consent education
4.63In the October 2022–23 Federal Budget, the Australian government provided $27.6 billion to support state and territory education services, including $26.8billion in Quality Schools funding and $787.3 million through National Partnership payments (NPP).
4.64One NPP is for the Consent and Respectful Relationships Education measure:
The Government will provide $65.3 million over 4 years from 2022–23 (and$18.2 million over 2 years from 2026–27) to invest in respectful relationships education to help prevent gender-based violence and keep children safe.
4.65The AGD advised that the majority of this funding ($77.6 million) will be provided to the state, territory and non-government school systems for services that support the delivery of RRE:
Implementation of this measure will be delivered in partnership with states, territories and non-government school sectors and informed and guided by:
a national [RRE] expert working group
a rapid review into current delivery approaches in jurisdictions and schools to identify best practice, areas for improvement and gaps
development of a national framework or guide to provide assurance to school communities that they are delivering and receiving high-quality, evidence based, and age-appropriate [RRE] programs.
4.66Our Watch’s Ms Kinnersly chairs the expert working group and she provided an update on implementation of the Consent and Respectful Relationships Education measure, concluding:
The timelines are snappy. The evidence review will be done in the next month or so, the criteria will be developed, and the objective is that the states and territories will be applying for that funding by the end of the year.
4.67At the Canberra public hearing, the Department of Education advised that the first grant round is expected to commence in September 2023, with the delivery of consent education from 2024.
Funding for a consent survey
4.68In the March 2022–23 Federal Budget, the Australian government committed $5million over two years from 2022–23 to the Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC), to undertake a survey of secondary school-age students on attitudes towards consent (the National Consent Survey).
4.69The AGD advised that the National Consent Survey will measure and seek to understand:
secondary students’ experiences of, and attitudes towards, consent education at school
awareness and understanding of concepts related to consent and sexual harassment
the experiences of children and young people of secondary school age of sexual harassment, in order to establish a point in time understanding of these issues and to inform improvements to the national curriculum and development of [RRE] policy.
4.70In November 2022, the AHRC informed the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee that it was ‘waiting on a grant agreement from the Department of Education’, which was expected to commence in 2024.
Consent education in tertiary education settings
4.71Ms Catriona Jackson, Chief Executive Officer of Universities Australia (UA), thepeak body for the university sector, advised that UA takes its responsibility to address sexual harm ‘very seriously’ and ‘we have not shied away from confronting this issue’.
4.72Ms Jackson noted UA’s Respect. Now. Always. initiative, which commenced in 2016 with a view to preventing sexual violence in university communities, and improving how universities respond to and support students who have been affected by that violence.
4.73As part of the initiative, UA commissioned two nationwide surveys on university students’ experiences with sexual violence. The first survey reported in 2017 and the second survey in 2021.
4.74In 2017, the AHRC published its survey report titled Change the course, National Report on Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment at Australian Universities (theChange the Course report), which revealed that 1.6 per cent of university students had been sexually assaulted in a university setting on at least one occasion in 2015–2016. Over 85 per cent of these students did not make a formal report or complaint to their university.
4.75Four years later, the Social Research Centre reported its survey findings on the scale and nature of university student experiences of sexual harassment and sexual assault. The 2021 National Student Safety Survey (NSSS) reported that one in 20 students (4.5 per cent) had been sexually assaulted since starting university. Only 5.6 per cent of students made a formal complaint to the university.
4.76UA has not decided whether to commission a third survey, although Ms Jackson advised the matter has been discussed with its members. Subsequently, UA suggested that there will be a third survey in 2024.
Staff and student perspectives
4.77Staff and student representative bodies questioned the university sector’s commitment to ensuring safety and support for people on campus. The National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) submitted that sexual consent is an ongoing issue in higher education settings.
4.78The National Union of Students (NUS) commented that the release of the NSSS made the public aware of ‘the shocking rates of sexual assault & sexual harm being inflicted on some of the most vulnerable groups in our society’.
4.79Ms Bailey Riley, President of the NUS, remarked that survey findings from 2017 to 2021 are similar, revealing that universities are failing to protect students:
Our universities are not getting safer and the universities themselves are doing very little to make students safe. Earlier this week, we read the news that Universities Australia has dropped a consent education scheme because a few vice-chancellors thought it was too risque…It is abundantly clear to the National Union of Students that universities, and in particular Universities Australia, cannot be trusted to protect students in this space.
4.80Dr Allison Henry, a legal and research expert on sexual violence, agreed that ‘substantive progress…[has] stalled, in part, due to an overreliance on the self‑regulating university sector to lead the reform effort and deficiencies in [the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency, TEQSA] regulatory approach’.
4.81Ms Sharna Bremner, Founder and Director of EROC, contended that the 2021 survey findings do not paint an accurate picture of what is actually happening on campuses throughout Australia:
…the National Student Safety Survey was done at a time when the majority of students were actually not on campus and in those communities because of the pandemic and related lockdowns. We would expect the figures that came out of that survey would likely be much higher now that students havearrived back on campus full time.
4.82Ms Riley agreed with this assessment:
I very much…expect that [survey] would be worse if done again today. What the NUS hears on the ground at campuses across the country, at every women's collective, from every student union and from every student is that there is not enough being done and also that there is a complete lack of education and knowledge of how to work through these processes on campus for a student. Reporting and even something as simple as accessing a consent module varies from campus to campus and the structures are not in place at this point in time.
Consent training modules
4.83The NUS advised that there are clear differences in how universities provide RRE to students. Ms Riley said: ‘some are approaching it with much more care and there's a want for change…and then there are some just doing the bare minimum’.
4.84The NUS and EROC supported mandatory consent training modules in universities, as a preventative measure. EROC noted, however, that these modules have been the subject of ongoing criticisms, including one-off programs, programs that have not been rigorously and systematically evaluated, and programs that are not appropriately targeted towards their audience.
4.85EROC highlighted particularly the lack of alternate options for students who may be distressed or retraumatised by the content of the consent training module. In some instances, students were being threatened with academic sanctions, if they did not complete the module.
4.86UA’s Ms Jackson was not aware of such instances, however, Dr Mary Russell, Acting Chief Executive Officer of the TEQSA, decried such a practice:
We recognise and understand at a deeper level than we used to as a regulator that, for students having to move through formal procedures, particularly those that require them to be exposed again or tell their stories again, that can be deeply traumatising. We would expect that, for all vulnerable groups, higher education providers, universities and others should put in place programs and responses that, not only deal with the general, but also deal with the specific needs, concerns, and issues of those students. That would include trauma that might arise from a standard form of consent training as well as other measures.
4.87In addition to content concerns, Ms Bremner advised that only six of UA’s 39 members currently require compulsory prevention education modules:
…when we say 'compulsory', it seems to be a little bit limited in that it's compulsory for select groups, not for all students…[R]arely is there a whole‑population approach, which is what we need.
4.88WA Consent representative Ms Abigail Gregorio provided the following assessment of the consent education she received when starting university:
There were some introductory modules that you had to complete online; they were very quick, but they did touch on subjects briefly. There were also some posters in bathroom stalls. Some of the residences in similar places had some form of education, but I am not sure I could say that it was sufficient.
Funding for a tertiary campaign
4.89The Department of Social Services (DSS) advised that the 2019–20 Federal Budget committed funding for UA to develop ‘a campaign specifically around raising awareness of sexual assault on campus’.
4.90According to Ms Jackson, the DSS awarded UA a grant in 2021 and UA proceeded to develop and test the materials, through a series of stakeholder consultations, focus group testing, concept revisions and a final round of concept testing.
4.91In answer to a question on notice, the DSS provided a copy of the materials delivered by Quantum Market Research to UA. Inparticular, the Headline Findings From Concept Testing, dated September 2021, states:
The primary elements required from any successful campaign are addressed by both concepts. Both concepts successfully communicate the overarching message concerning the importance of respect in sexual relationships, are broadly attention grabbing, interesting and comprehensible.
4.92In November 2021, Our Watch, a member of the campaign’s expert advisory group, was informed that ‘the campaign was placed on hold for review’. About the same time, UA verbally advised the DSS of the Vice-Chancellors’ views on the campaign.
4.93The DSS also provided a copy of the Concept Testing Round 2, Topline findings, dated June 2022, which presented findings on the two concepts that had been then been revised:
In principle, both [these] campaign directions have the potential to achieve the communication objectives…Both campaigns have their merits. However, the merits of Concept Q are more conducive to promoting a journey from engagement to attitudinal and ultimately behaviour change.
4.94In June 2022, UA advised the DSS that ‘the campaign as developed was not viable to be rolled out’. Ms Jackson explained:
…neither of the two concepts tested would reliably drive attitudinal or behavioural change. A broad, homogenous campaign for the entire sector would be unlikely to have the cut-through required to be effective in shifting behaviours and attitudes regarding consent and respectful relationships… One of the big challenges for us is working across a sector that has 1.4 million students in it…Producing useful and compelling materials that can change attitudes across the entire breadth of students studying in the bush, students studying in the city and students of different religious and ethnic backgrounds is a challenging task.
4.95The DSS and UA then decided:
…to move from a campaign targeting students to a good practice guide, which is focused on empowering and supporting prevention practitioners within universities to develop prevention work on campus.
4.96The DSS advised that UA had proposed to cancel the contract but the department ‘wanted to work with what we had to make sure that we could develop and deliver a different product that still contributes to prevention efforts on campuses’.
4.97Ms Jackson gave evidence that, in developing the good practice guide:
UA convened a working group of leading experts in the field of prevention of sexual harm from across 10 universities. Over 2,000 students were consulted during the development of the guide and their feedback has played a central role in shaping the final product.
4.98The Primary Prevention of Sexual Harm in the University Sector—Good Practice Guide was launched in mid-July 2023. Ms Jackson advised:
Our universities, my 39 members across the entire country, have a strong understanding of the unique demographics of their campuses and their students, which is why they are best placed to continue building on the extensive work undertaken to date. This guide will help to foster and bolster those ongoing efforts to address sexual harm in university settings...I'm very proud of the work that UA and my member institutions have done to try to reduce sexual harm. This doesn't mean that we've done everything right, but it does mean that we are determined to continue our efforts.
4.99Ms Jackson acknowledged that UA drew on Our Watch’s ‘best-in-class theoretical information’ but asserted that ‘our guide is fundamentally different’ in that it is ‘a really practical, hands-on resource’:
What the hands-on practitioners in our sector were telling us was that they really needed examples. They needed examples of what was being done, what was working in other universities, so that they could adapt them to their circumstances. We have provided a really detailed, very practical, very hands-on guide that builds on the very good work done by Our Watch but is not in any sense identical to it.
4.100EROC suggested that the guidelines are ‘a lovely piece of work’ with some useful case studies but ‘the bulk of the material is nothing new’. The NUS agreed, adding:
It's a bit worrying that's where $1.5 million goes, to basically recreate an old document and give it in a new light as opposed to having anything new or relevant in it to the times we're living in. Especially after the National Student Safety Survey came out, I think it just shows how University Australia has a complete lack of any will at all to engage with students in this sector and also to actually change anything or bring anything new to consent education or sexual assault or violence on campus.
Reporting sexual assaults
4.101EROC typically supports students after they have reported a sexual assault to their university. Ms Bremner outlined the common features of students’ experiences, as follows:
A really common theme among the students we've supported over the last eight-nine years now is, 'My rape was bad, but the way my university responded was worse.' We hear very often the effects of re-traumatisation once students have reported. They feel incredibly unsupported, even if they can find where to report in the first place…
When they are reporting, we are still seeing extensive delays in responses by universities, oftentimes of up to three, four or five months, sometimes even longer. Students might file a complaint with a department and not get a reply or an acknowledgement for weeks or days...
Once that process starts, students are still finding that simple requests for extensions, because they're dealing with trauma, are being denied or that they have to provide material from a psychologist proving the functional impact of the trauma on them and their ability to complete their studies, which then requires them to get documentation from a psychologist…
If they make it through all of that, if they get to a point where they file a complaint and the university decides to look into it, they're then told that they can't tell anyone they filed a complaint. They have to keep it to themselves or they can tell one other person, which obviously limits the amount of support they can get. It limits their ability to share that information with their tutors and with their professors to get that academic assistance.
Then if they somehow manage to still forge ahead and get through all of it they're often told they can't get an outcome to their complaint because of privacy reasons. They can go through a process that takes sometimes six months or more to not know what happened, to not know if the person who assaulted them has been allowed to remain on campus until they maybe walk into the library and that person is sitting there.
4.102Ms Nina Funnell, Director at EROC, argued that universities need to act in a trauma informed manner:
…we can do simple things to help students stay engaged with their education, such as allowing them to move tutorials so they don't have to sit with the offender; allowing them to have flexibility in their timetabling and their exams; not making them disclose afresh to every single one of their lecturers and every single one of their tutors; not having to produce medical documentation over and over again; and also allowing them to move bedrooms in residences so they don't have to sleep in the room where the rape happened...If we make these changes and we act in a trauma informed way…the differences that can have for that student in terms of their likelihood of staying engaged with their education, seeing it through to completion and going on to have better life outcomes are immense.
4.103Ms Jackson advised that, in 2016, ‘one of the first things we did was to roll out training for staff and students across the whole range of university campuses so they could appropriately deal with [a] first disclosure’.
4.104However, the NTEU’s Dr Barnes indicated that, regardless of training, services are simply inadequate to support students who have been sexually assaulted on campus:
In my experience of teaching large first-year units for many years you would often have students come to see you who suffered fairly traumatic events. Iam not trained in how to provide support. But even finding ways to provide students with access to those support services is very difficult. Universities are bureaucratic and things are difficult to access. Those support services are appallingly under-resourced, and it leaves both staff and students in very difficult positions where things are not accessible or accessible in a timely or sometimes appropriate fashion.
4.105Dr Barnes added:
Students and staff can't access the support they need because the support is simply not there. It's ticking a box as opposed to often providing real support…I think it's a fundamental problem. Universities can have all of the great policies in the world, but unless they put their money where their mouth is, the policies are essentially not worth the paper upon which they're written.
4.106Ms Gregorio’s experience illustrated this point:
[After being assaulted] despite being provided with some form of response, some kind of sounding board, by some services at the university, the most support I ever got was from a tutor who was doing it from the kindness of his own heart.
Tracking and oversight
4.107From EROC’s perspective, a third survey on university students’ experiences of sexual violence is important as a means of tracking what is actually happening at universities:
A big problem that we see across the sector as a whole is a lack of transparency. We don't see anybody reporting or monitoring properly what universities are doing in response to the reports they're receiving. We don't see universities publicly reporting their annual prevalence data across-the-board in a consistent manner, and we think that without a survey right now we actually don't have any ability to keep an eye on what's going on.
4.108NUS’s Ms Bailey agreed that transparency is a problem:
It's…extremely difficult to see what universities are doing unless you speak to every individual university because…they don't publish it. They don't really talk about what they're actually doing. It's very clear that universities themselves are not held to any standard, not held to any level of accountability, because they can just do what they want and say, 'Yes, we've done something', but never point to any information or actual data. Students on campus as well are very aware of this.
4.109Ms Funnell referred to an FOI request made by Channel 7 in 2017, where the broadcaster sought information from all 39 public universities on the number and outcome of sexual assault complaints. She described some universities’ responses as ‘highly obstructive’:
We eventually found out that across the 39 universities there had been approximately 565 sexual assault and harassment complaints. Of those 565 formal complaints...that had resulted in six expulsions in total. Some of the other punishments, including in incidents where people had actually admitted guilt, were things like a $55 fine. That was at a university where the cost of a parking ticket was more than a $55 fine for an offender…Inothers, there were things like people who had admitted committing a sexual offence and their punishment was to write an apology letter not to the victim but to the university.
4.110In late 2017, the AHRC wrote to Australia’s 39 Vice-Chancellors, requesting information about any actions undertaken in response to the Change the Course report. Ms Jackson agreed that there were 800 actions identified by the AHRC, however, she was unaware of who, other than the university concerned, would now be tracking these actions.
4.111Dr Henry questioned the number of actions noted above, as well as its attribution to the AHRC: ‘none of [the AHRC materials] refer to 800 initiatives, though [a] 47-page document includes a long list of self-reported actions taken by universities following Change the Course’.
4.112In addition, Dr Henry reported that, while some universities and residential colleges proactively report their efforts and management of sexual violence, they are in the minority:
…most have not been forthcoming, and assessing whether universities and colleges have actually delivered on their commitments can be incredibly difficult. My research indicates, for example, that less than a quarter of Australia’s universities have collated and published information on their websites about sexual violence reports and disclosures or subsequent disciplinary actions.
4.113Dr Henry continued:
Universities have claimed that they have overhauled their approach to campus sexual violence but there are currently no measures in place to ensure that universities are implementing the changes that they have committed to, or to assess whether measures that have been adopted are good practice and are constructively contributing to student safety and wellbeing. While TEQSA, relying on self-reporting by universities, superficially compiled some of this information about universities following the Change the Course report, there have been no effective and systemic oversight efforts of universities since mid-2020.
Taskforce
4.114In July 2023, the Department of Education released the Australian Universities Accord, Interim Report in which the Review Panel recognised:
Despite the best efforts of many institutions to address them, systemic issues persist across the higher education sector…suggesting governance arrangements could be improved. Sexual assault and harassment on campus is affecting the wellbeing of students and staff, and their ability to succeed.
4.115The Minister for Education, the Hon Jason Clare MP, has announced that the Australian government will work with state and territory governments, through the National Cabinet, to improve university governance.
4.116While some witnesses welcomed this announcement, EROC called for more immediate action, primarily through the establishment of a taskforce:
We have been advocating for a taskforce at a federal level to address how universities have been preventing and responding to sexual violence…[W]hat we've seen is that the regulator is not regulating on this issue. The higher education standards do require that universities foster a safe learning environment…[T]hat not happening, even where TEQSA can apply sanctions where they can actually do things. End Rape on Campus, on behalf of a number of students, actually filed complaints with TEQSA about their experiences….Our experiences with TEQSA over several years were so bad that we had to stop recommending that as an option to students, because we found that TEQSA's processes were so harmful without any outcome that it would be incredibly unethical of our organisation to keep recommending that as an option.
4.117Dr Henry submitted that many stakeholders whom she had interviewed considered TEQSA a poor choice as the agency appointed to oversee the university sector’s response to the Change the Course report. In particular, DrHenry agreed with EROC that the regulator does not effectively enforce the Threshold Standards (the basic requirements for registration as a higher education provider), which include issues relating to Wellbeing and Safety (Standard 2.3), and Student Grievances and Complaints (Standard 2.4):
…between September 2017 and 30 November 2022 TEQSA has undertaken more than 60 individual assessments of universities’ sexual violence policies and procedures…TEQSA has not judged a single university to be non‑compliant with the Threshold Standards regarding Wellbeing and Safety, even on the four occasions when universities had themselves notified TEQSA in relation to a matter of concern around their handling of sexual assault or sexual harassment. The strongest sanction applied by TEQSA in relation to sexual violence in the past five years has been monitoring and annual reporting of several universities.
Community education and awareness
4.118As discussed throughout this report, stakeholders called for an holistic approach to addressing sexual violence throughout Australia. Many argued that consent education in primary and secondary schools, and in tertiary education settings, would not fully address the scourge of sexual violence. In addition, they called for community education and awareness to combat the entrenched culture towards sex and consent.
4.119Sexual Assault Services Victoria expressed its view that the lack of understanding of consent by many Australians, as illustrated in the NCAS, highlights the need for increased community awareness and education:
Such campaigns must be designed by experts and members of diverse communities, including children and young people. Resources must also be accessible and available in plain English and multiple languages to ensure broadest reach within the community. As experts in prevention, response, education, and training, SA services are uniquely placed to design, develop and deliver a community education and awareness campaign.
4.120TheFederation of Community Legal Services (Victoria) and South-East Monash Legal Service submitted:
There should be comprehensive and evidence-based community education about gender-based violence, respectful relationships and sexual consent (including consent laws) which challenges common misconceptions about sexual violence. This involves using mass media, community-level strategies and peers and leaders to champion positive messages.
4.121ANROWS pointed out that public service campaigns have been successful in improving the community’s understanding of the nature and prevalence of violence against women, and increasing the rejection of attitudes that condone violence and gender inequality (for example, the ‘Stop It At The Start’ campaign.
4.122As discussed in Chapter 3, rape myths and misconceptions affect beliefs and attitudes about victim-survivors, sexual assault and related prosecutions. TheVictorian Law Reform Commission has previously identified the benefits in correcting such beliefs and attitudes:
A society that understands sexual violence is better able to support people who experience it. It creates an environment where they can speak up and seek justice. We know that if victim survivors receive a supportive response when they first disclose sexual violence, they are more likely to take the next step to seek support or report to police.
If the community has a good understanding of sexual violence, that will also improve the justice system’s response to sexual offences. Jurors in sexual offence trials and people involved in criminal and other justice processes are all members of the community.
Funding for a consent campaign
4.123Some submitters urged the Australian government to invest in community education and awareness, to improve Australians’ understanding of sexual violence. TheFederation of Community Legal Services (Victoria) and South‑East Monash Legal Service argued:
It is imperative that the Commonwealth Government works with State and Territory Governments to ensure that community education about sexual violence is ongoing and well-resourced.
4.124The Youth Affairs Council of South Australia added:
…without significant investment in prevention the problematic views held by society and individuals regarding consent and sexual assault will continue to affect the criminal justice system and the prevalence of sexual violence in Australia.
4.125In 2021, the DSS commissioned consultancy firm Kantar Public to undertake research to inform the development of a public consent campaign. Its research report found that, while sexual consent is ‘on the radar’, it is not well understood:
4.126 Sexual violence and consent are not ‘new’ issues, however, over the last five years the topics of domestic violence and sexual consent have increased in their societal prominence. Seven in ten (70%) Australian adults believe the way people broadly think and talk about sexual consent is different now compared to a few years ago.
However, aside from recognising things have generally changed, many are unable to identify the changes and perceive a considerable ‘grey area’ in the way consent is defined, can struggle to identify and empathise with the experience of non-consensual activity, and can default to victim blaming because of the lack of clarity relating to accountability.
As a result, half (48%) of Australians are in a state of ‘flux’ when it comes to sexual consent – they are conflicted in their understanding of the problem, have low confidence in their ability to define it, and perceive high risks of getting involved. Positively, however, this state of flux is met by equal desire for clarity and leadership on the conversation – three quarters (77%) agree the topic is personally important and 86% agree adults should talk to young people more about it.
4.127The AGD advised that the Australian government is providing $40 million over five years to develop a new campaign about consent and respectful relationships, to help keep young people safe from sexual violence (the National Consent Campaign):
The campaign aims to reduce the incidence of sexual violence by targeting adult influencers of young people, and encouraging them to have a conversation about consent. It will include a mix of national mass media advertising and public relations activities for mainstream, First Nations and [culturally and linguistically diverse] audiences.
4.128The National Consent Campaign is currently in the development stage, with the 2023–24 Federal Budget committing $12.1 million over four years to develop and distribute social media resources for young people on consent with advice from an expert advisory group (Teach Us Consent), and to support community-led sexual violence prevention pilots.
4.129The AGD advised that the campaign is necessary to complement existing initiatives that directly target young people and to improve community awareness and understanding of the issue.