Australian National University sexual prevention violence toolkit lacks action items, student representatives say

ANU Students Association women's officer Avan Daruwalla said she was "distressed and concerned" that the student union was not invited to collaborate on the document and the first she was aware of it was through an invitation the launch event.

When the lack of consultation was raised at a meeting, the student representatives were told there was a lack of trust because of their history of activism on the subject of sexual violence.

"I understand feeling on guard with students who had a history of activism but I think that keeping documentation from us and excluding us from consultation, it could have no positive impact for students," she said.

"And if you're only consulting with people who are going to agree with you then I don't see how that's productive at all."

A spokesman for the ANU said a diverse student reference group was established from the outset. It included the women's officer from the postgraduate students association, which recently lost funding support from the university.

He said the toolkit was part of the university's wider sexual violence prevention strategy.

"Ultimately, the toolkit aims to help equip staff and students across the university with knowledge and skills to enhance cultural action plans or gender equity strategies," the spokesman said.

"It provides knowledge, founded in leading and current research, and meaningful, practical examples of how our community can collectively prevent sexual violence and harassment."

The document provides a series of "important questions to unpack" to guide people involved in the ANU's schools, colleges, social clubs and societies.

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Ms Daruwalla said the new document lacked actionable items and there didn't appear to be any onus on the various areas of the university to follow it.

"It's fitting with the same pattern of documents and policies and things being produced by the university that aren't actionable," she said.

"One of our main advocacy points consistently is we just want to see things produced that are actionable and have timelines and can be funded rather than abstract references."

She said it was positive to see more case managers and a new sexual health nurse recruited, but more needed to be done to promote the services of the student safety and wellbeing team to the student population.

The ANU spokesman the wellbeing team had been promoted to students and would build its reputation over coming years as it works more closely with student groups, residences and colleges.

A report earlier this year found students at the ANU suffered sexual violence at much higher rates compared to the national average.

More than a quarter of ANU students (26.1 per cent) had been sexually harassed and 12.3 per cent had been sexually assaulted since starting their studies.

University management has put this down to the fact that more students live on campus compared to other universities.

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