Speech at the release of Ministry of Women's Affairs' sexual violence research project

A speech by Pansy Wong from the National Party

Good evening everyone, it is a pleasure to be here as we gather to acknowledge the release of this significant research project.
First of all, I would like to thank the Ministry of Women's Affairs who led the two-year project, ‘Strong and Safe Communities - Effective Interventions for Adult Victim/Survivors of Sexual Violence', and to your project partners, the Ministry of Justice and the New Zealand Police.
Thank you also to the researchers from the Crime and Justice Research Centre at Victoria University for your skill, dedication, and absolute professionalism.
Above all, we must express our deep gratitude to the survivors who participated in the research. Without their strength and courage we would not be here tonight.
Thank you to all of you who had involvement in this research. The result is an outstanding example of a collaborative effort across many sectors.
This research is the result of a lot of hard work on the part of community agencies, researchers, service providers, and government agencies.
It is the first comprehensive piece of research to be conducted on adult sexual violation in New Zealand in the past three decades and it reaffirms our nation's international reputation of being a fair, caring and innovative country.
Through face-to-face interviews with survivors and surveys completed by them, we have gained a real insight into how the system caters to people who have been through the harrowing ordeal of a violent sexual attack.
Professionals like yourselves and decision makers like myself have long understood that many of the thoughts and perceptions surrounding sexual violence are myths.
For example, there is a common misconception that most attacks are committed by strangers.
Now, for the first time, this comprehensive two-year research project is able to dispel such myths with authority and provide us with a platform to change attitudes.
In fact, the research revealed that sexual violence cases involving a stranger have the highest success rate for prosecution, and that the victims of such incidents are more likely to report them to police.
The majority of sexual attacks involve someone the victim knows. The first hurdle is to convince these victims to report the crime and then comes the hurdle for them to jump over the justice bar.
The Minister of Justice has introduced a raft of legislative changes to lower the hurdles in the justice system for the victims of sexual violence, such as the removal of provocation as defence and launching a Law Commission review to consider alternative justice procedures for the victims of sexual violence.
This review includes looking at changing our approach from being an adversarial system to an inquisitorial system, which would see the judge becoming involved in collecting and determining the facts of the case.
Sexual violation is the most costly crime in New Zealand, with the social cost estimated to be at about $1.2 billion per year, but it is also the most significantly under-reported crimes.
The research has highlighted many reasons for this under-reporting, including shame, self-blame and the fear of not being believed.
This shows that one of the most useful tools we can have as a nation is to have the people around victims understand the importance of giving support and showing trust.
Unfortunately the research tells us this is not always the case, with some survivors saying their disclosures were met with disbelief, blame, and ostracism for bringing shame on the family.
Hence, it is important for us to work towards providing an environment that nurtures and caters for victims to come forward to report these dreadful crimes.
Often, a victim's first cry for help is through medical, mental health and social services - with them often seeking help for related issues such as drink or drug addiction, gambling or other problems that have arisen from their ordeal.
This is expected since specialist services for the victims of sexual violence are still in their development stages. Therefore it is important these frontline services are equipped to detect signs of sexual violence and refer the victims to other agencies to receive the specialised help they need.
Tomorrow, Hon Power will be releasing the Sexual Violence Taskforce report. The Government's responses to this report will be forthcoming.
Your good work has helped us to debunk the myths surrounding sexual violence and has armed us with facts and evidence to change society's attitude towards sexual violence.
This research has provided a good base from which we can look at the services available and determine how we can help victims and how the justice system can better cater to their needs.
This Government is committed to utilising this significant piece of research to reduce the impact sexual violence has on the victims - with one interviewee describing the feeling as having her soul stolen.
As Minister of Women's Affairs, I will do my best to restore the many souls that have been stolen through sexual violence.

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