NSW to amend concealment laws which can deter sexual assault survivors from seeking help

The New South Wales government is moving to amend laws that compel counsellors to report cases of sexual assault to the police because they can deter some survivors, who do not want the authorities involved, from seeking help.

The government is this week acting to reform the laws that carry a two to five-year jail sentence for failing to notify the police of a serious indictable offence. The push follows warnings from frontline rape and family violence services that the laws could be wrongly applied to their staff, or workers in companies or institutions, who receive complaints of sexual assault.

The Rape & Domestic Violence Services Australia executive officer, Karen Willis, said the law as it stands could force support workers to ignore the wishes of survivors and pass on their complaints to police.

That not only robbed women of the agency to determine how their complaint was treated, Willis said, but also risked deterring women from seeking support or alerting institutions to wrongdoing.

“We know that less than 20% of those who experience sexual violence will report it to police, so overwhelmingly, unfortunately, people don’t [report],” Willis told the Guardian. “That is their choice and we must respect that.”

The NSW attorney general, Mark Speakman, said an amendment would be introduced into parliament on Wednesday to exempt adult cases of sexual violence and family violence where the individual does not want the matter reported to the police.

Related: Australian women in their late teens more likely to be victims of sexual assault

The reforms will create a new “reasonable excuse” for not passing on information where the survivor is an adult, the offence is one of sexual violence or family violence, and where the person with knowledge of the crime has a reasonable belief that the “alleged victim does not wish to have the information reported to authorities”.

Speakman said the current law put support workers in a “terrible predicament” and created a barrier between those who needed help and those trying to help them.

“We want to ensure that victims receive the support they need without fearing that the person helping them may act against their wishes or face criminal prosecution,” Speakman said. “Worst of all, it may even deter victims from seeking support if they fear their confidentiality may be broken when they share their story.”

Willis praised the NSW government’s reforms and said the concealment offence was never intended to be applied to sexual assault or family violence offences as it had been. She said the change would remove any doubt and ensure women retained complete agency over how their complaint was handled.

“All of the evidence around trauma tells us that empowerment is critical to recovery, and part of empowerment is having control of your story,” she said.