My first post on the higher education gender-based violence bill and its draft code looked at how gender-based violence is defined and the broad obligations placed on higher education providers and their staff and students.

This post examines procedures for student victims of gender-based violence and for the accused perpetrators. The rules also apply to staff, but as there are existing laws on these matters for workplaces I will focus on students. There is a 2024 summary of university policies and practices on responding to sexual violence, but I have not attempted to compare them to the code.

The code includes reasonable measures to support student victims and, to a lesser extent, accused respondents. I am not convinced, however, that the latter will face a fair process in more serious cases if universities rely on the code alone to guide their policies.

Update 20/10/2025: The enacted legislation is here. The enacted code is here.

Student victims/disclosers

A common criticism of universities has been inadequate responses to student complaints regarding sexual misconduct. In a 2021 student survey on sexual harassment and assault most victims did not report their experience to the university, but of those who did over 40% were dissatisfied. The code includes an extensive list of things that providers must do in these cases: code section 4 (all legal references unless otherwise stated are to the draft code).

These required provider actions include implementing measures to ensure the safety of the discloser, prioritising urgent access to support services, minimising how often the discloser must repeat their story, providing translation and interpretation services where necessary, implementing academic adjustments, and where necessary discussing the investigation and disciplinary processes: code section 4.6.

The discloser must have the opportunity for a support person to be present: code section 5.11.

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