THE HUNTING GROUND AUSTRALIA PROJECT THE HUNTING GROUND AUSTRALIA PROJECT PROGRESS REPORT – JULY 2017 1 Progress Report | The Hunting Ground Australia Project | July 2017 THE HUNTING GROUND AUSTRALIA PROJECT The topic of sexual violence can trigger traumatic If you want to make a complaint in relation memories for survivors. Survivors have the right to to an incident: talk about their experiences on their own terms. If you sense that a survivor needs additional AUSTRALIAN HUMAN RIGHTS support, contact the national hotlines: COMMISSION (AHRC) The AHRC can investigate complaints regarding 1800 RESPECT sexual harassment and discrimination at Free and confidential 24/7 National Sexual universities, and attempts to resolve Assault, Domestic and Family Violence complaints through conciliation. Counselling Service. www.humanrights.gov.au/complaint- information Call 1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732) and ask to speak to a trauma counsellor. STATE & TERRITORY www.1800respect.org.au ANTI-DISCRIMINATION BODIES For a comprehensive list of local services in Sexual harassment complaints can also be made your State or Territory, please visit: to local state/territory anti-discriminatory bodies. www.1800respect.org.au/service-support/ www.ag.gov.au/RightsAndProtections/ HumanRights/Pages/Australias-Anti- LIFELINE – CRISIS SUPPORT Discrimination-Law.aspx 24/7 crisis support and suicide OMBUDSMAN’S OFFICES prevention services. Where a survivor believes that a university 13 11 44 has acted unfairly or otherwise mismanaged a www.lifeline.org.au sexual violence case, they may be able to make complaints to an Ombudsman office. Complaints MENSLINE about public universities and higher education Free and confidential 24/7 professional providers can be made to the relevant state/ telephone and online support and information territory Ombudsman. service for Australian men. www.ombudsman.gov.au/about/related- 1300 789 978 sites#state-ombudsman www.mensline.org.au International students can make complaints regarding private higher education providers to EMERGENCY SERVICES the Overseas Students Ombudsman. Emergency Services: 000 www.ombudsman.gov.au/making-a- Police Assistance (non-emergency): 131 444 complaint/overseas-students TERTIARY EDUCATION QUALITY If you are a survivor and would like to reach out AND STANDARDS AGENCY (TEQSA) to other university students and supporters: TEQSA is Australia’s independent national regulator of the higher education sector. There may END RAPE ON CAMPUS (EROC) be circumstances in which a survivor, university AUSTRALIA womens officer or other student representative EROC Australia works to end sexual violence at can make a complaint about their university to universities and residential colleges through direct TEQSA, who monitors higher education providers’ support for survivors and their communities; compliance with the Tertiary Education Quality and prevention through education; and policy reform Standards Agency Act 2011 and a set of quality at the campus, state, and federal levels. standards, known as the Threshold Standards. www.endrapeoncampusau.org/about/ www.teqsa.gov.au/complaints 2 Progress Report | The Hunting Ground Australia Project | July 2017 THE HUNTING GROUND AUSTRALIA PROJECT THE HUNTING GROUND From the outset, the objective of the impact The Hunting Ground (103 minutes, 2015) campaign around The Hunting Ground was to is a critically acclaimed US feature-length use the documentary as a catalyst to involve the documentary which chronicles the personal whole Australian university sector – both staff and stories of students who have reported sexual students – in taking a positive leadership role in assault on campuses, and the failure of a number the creation of a collaborative, comprehensive and of American universities to respond effectively unified campaign, around the incidence of, and and appropriately to these reports. responses to, sexual violence within Australian university communities. It is the latest film by Oscar-nominated filmmakers Kirby Dick and Amy Ziering who At the Good Pitch event, in conversation about made The Invisible War – a film directly the possibilities that The Hunting Ground responsible for influencing government policy presented, were: and laws on how the US armed forces • Elizabeth Broderick (Former Sex responded to and prevented sexual assault. Discrimination Commissioner, Australian Human Rights Commission) GOOD PITCH2 AUSTRALIA BACKGROUND • Dr. Michael Spence (Vice-Chancellor & Principal, University of Sydney) The Hunting Ground was acquired for distribution in Australia by Madman Entertainment after • Dr. Damian Powell (Principal, Janet Clarke premiering at the Sundance Film Festival 2015 Hall, University of Melbourne) and was one of six documentary films selected • Hannah Smith (2015 National Education for the 2015 philanthropic Good Pitch2 Australia Officer, National Union of Students) initiative held at the Sydney Opera House on 16 September 2015. • Anne-Marie Lansdown (then Deputy Chief Executive Officer, Universities Australia) Good Pitch brings together filmmakers with foundations, not-for-profits, campaigners, • Professor Andrea Durbach (Director, philanthropists, policy-makers, brands, educators, Australian Human Rights Centre at UNSW) broadcasters and media to forge powerful • Adair Donaldson (Shine Lawyers and alliances around ground breaking films that will Consent Trainer) have a significant impact in relation to issues of social importance – and benefit the partners, the • Anna Kaplan (Madman Entertainment, development of the films and society as a whole. distributor) Impact Producer Allison Henry and Producer Amy Zeiring pitch THGAP at the Sydney Opera House on 16 September 2015 3 Progress Report | The Hunting Ground Australia Project | July 2017 THE HUNTING GROUND AUSTRALIA PROJECT APPROACH TO THE CAMPAIGN at the Australian Defence Force Academy had The Hunting Ground Australia Project (THGAP) determined that ADFA was “not alone” in facing has used the documentary as a tool to engage challenges around the incidence of sexual Australian universities, and the broader violence and that “other tertiary institutions and 2 community, in a conversation around issues residential colleges have similar concerns.” concerning sexual assault and harassment, We understood the damning mainstream consent, disclosure and reporting statistics around sexual violence in the 3 in Australian universities. Australian community. THGAP has always acknowledged that there We were aware of decades of advocacy efforts are significant cultural, financial and structural by students, women’s groups and sexual assault differences between American and Australian services to bring attention to the incidence of, and universities and student life. However, our early responses to, sexual violence within Australian research and discussion with experts in gendered university communities – without much success. violence in 2015 indicated that there were many And we knew that universities were not particularly issues raised by The Hunting Ground that were interested in proactively dealing with these issues relevant in an Australian context. – as evidenced by the Group of Eight’s shelving of the ADFA Review’s recommendations4 and We were alarmed by the National Union of the complete absence of any reference to Student’s Talk About it Survey Findings.1 We knew addressing sexual violence in Universities 5 that the 2011 Review into the Treatment of Women Australia’s 2014-2016 Strategic Plan. 1. Courtney Sloane assisted by Keelia Fitzpatrick, National Union of Students Women’s Department, Talk About It Survey: Results and Recommendations, 2011, NUS Women’s Department, Talk About It 2015 survey, released 2 February 2016. 2. Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC), Report on the Review into the Treatment of Women at the Australian Defence Force Academy: Phase 1 of the Review into the Treatment of Women in the Australian Defence Force (Phase 1 Report), 2011, p.xxv. http://defencereview.humanrights.gov.au/sites/default/files/ADFA_2011.pdf 3. For example, the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ 2012 Personal Safety Survey (PSS), ABS cat. no. 4906.0, Introduction, www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/[email protected]/Lookup/4906.0Chapter1002012 4. Kate Stanton, ‘Survey of sex assaults on university campuses shelved’, Sydney Morning Herald, 16 November 2014, www.smh.com.au/national/survey-of-sex-assaults-on-university-campuses-shelved-20141114-11na07.html 5. Universities Australia, Universities Australia’s 2014-2016 Strategic Plan, https://www.universitiesaustralia.edu.au/About-Us/our-role/strategic-plan 4 Progress Report | The Hunting Ground Australia Project | July 2017 THE HUNTING GROUND AUSTRALIA PROJECT The Hunting Ground THE IMPACT CAMPAIGN The strategy underpinning THGAP was devised between May and September 2015 and was Significant philanthropic grants and in-kind premised on the documentary providing an pledges made at the Good Pitch event provided opportunity to initiate conversations and drive support for the formation of a campaign team to progress around issues including but not drive and implement the impact campaign. limited to: THGAP is run by Allison Henry (Campaign Director • the effectiveness of existing procedures, THGAP), Mary Macrae (Producer THGAP), Anna protocols and institutional responses; Kaplan (Madman Entertainment – THGAP Campus • the issue of victim blaming; Screenings Producer) and Isabella Wright • the impact of alcohol; and Tamar Simons (Madman Entertainment – • interpretations of consent; THGAP Campus