There are calls for urgent changes to modernise our laws to better protect victims of sexual violence.
A new Helen Clark Foundation report identifies several gaps in our laws that need to be closed and changes to our justice system to reduce under-reporting.
Ministry of Justice data estimate that about 209,000 incidents of sexual assault occur every year, affecting about 82,000 victims.
Nearly one in four adults report having experienced sexual assault in their lifetime.
This report identifies four areas where there is potential for practical, meaningful and lasting change.
It includes changes to the justice system to reduce under-reporting of sexual violence, updating the definition of consent in law, addressing the harm caused by sexually explicit deepfakes, and eradicating the practice of “virginity testing” in New Zealand.
Senior researcher Sarah Bell told The Front Page that generally consent follows the “no means no” model.
“Things have been moving in society and in educational settings towards more of a ‘yes means yes’ model, which means you can’t assume that someone is consenting to sex just because they don’t say no,” she said.
“Our law at the moment is a sort of ‘partial affirmative’ consent model. So you can’t assume that someone’s consenting just because they don’t say no. But the Supreme Court has said that there are some situations where, if there’s another factor in play, you can assume consent.
“One of the examples they’ve given for when that might be the case is relationship expectations. So, if the person has consented or not resisted before, maybe you can assume that they are consenting on this occasion.
“Now, that can be really problematic. We know that a ‘freeze’ response is not uncommon when people are sexually assaulted. We also know that people in abusive relationships have real trouble communicating about consent.”
The report also calls for an end to “virginity testing” – a practice that has no scientific basis and is considered a violation of human rights by the World Health Organisation and other United Nations agencies.
“Virginity testing relates to the myth that you can tell from an examination whether someone has had sex before. Not, that’s not actually true,” Bell said.
“The UN and medical practitioners in New Zealand all agree that virginity is a social construct. A construct that’s really important to some people, obviously, but you can’t establish via an examination whether someone’s a so-called virgin.
“That practice is occurring in New Zealand. We don’t know how much it’s occurring or in which communities because it’s not something that people talk about. But we think that’s enough information to move ahead with banning it legally and supporting community-led campaigns to educate people around the harms and the inaccuracy of the practice.
“When you look at what we did with female genital mutilation some years ago, likewise, that’s a practice that’s not widely practised in New Zealand, and we didn’t have good information about when and how it was being practised. But the fact that it shouldn’t be practised at all was sufficient for us to go ahead with a legal ban.”
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The Front Page is a daily news podcast from the New Zealand Herald, available to listen to every weekday from 5am. The podcast is presented by Chelsea Daniels, an Auckland-based journalist with a background in world news and crime/justice reporting who joined NZME in 2016.
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