A sexual abuse support service is calling for compulsory consent education for first year university students as data reveals the extent of complaints.

Three hundred and thirty three sexual violence incidents on and off campus have been reported to universities around the motu over the past five years, according to figures released under the Official Information Act.

The HELP foundation says the figures demonstrate New Zealand's tertiary institutions need a universal process to report sexual violence in a way which protected survivors.

The figure on sexual violence reports is heavily skewed by the University of Otago, which had 173.

One fifth year student told RNZ she's not surprised.

"There's a lot of stuff that happens at Otago for example the flat initiations, yeah, a lot of like drinking and drug use, and honestly [I] think it's the culture and that it's just like enabling people to do things because, like, it's acceptable.

"I don't think enough is being done, they've got posters and stuff about sexual violence and that around campus, but yeah, it would be good to see, like, a proper review being done."

Another student says the increase could be a sign students felt comfortable to come forward.

"I wonder if it's an increase in confidence in the support systems and being able to step up and share what happened, or if it's an increase in the actual activity."

Some of her friends were cared for by campus watch after a man was following them one night, she says.

"They got a little worried and ran into some random building, campus watch came into the building, because they saw the whole thing happen and asked if they were okay, asked if they needed to be walked home, and that was pretty cool, they felt really good about that."

Massey University had 62 reports from 2018 to 2023 - over half of them were from this year alone.

Victoria University had 54 reports, while Auckland University of Technology, the University of Canterbury, Lincoln and Waikato all had less than 20 reports. The University of Auckland did not provide data.

But HELP clinical psychologist Kathryn McPhillips says those figures are likely just a fraction of the reality.

"We have a fairly good idea [of] the rates that are going on and they are way higher than that, universities have high rates. There's surveys showing as high as one in five females having experienced unwanted sexual activity."

High and low reporting rates could point to how much trust students had in the system.

"Things like expecting that they'll be blamed or not believed, that the process will just take so much of them, or that they'll be traumatised by being asked these questions, often it's about not seeing a safe way forward," says Kathryn.

There is currently no standardised reporting process for sexual violence at universities.

The Ministry of Education was meant to begin working on one with Universities New Zealand back in 2019, but that was put on hold due to the pandemic and work resumed again at the start of this year.    

'The lived experience that students have is just invaluable'

Kate Schellekenn from Thursdays In Black, a national student group aimed at preventing and responding to sexual violence in tertiary spaces, says it's disappointing students have not been included in the working group.

"The lived experience that students have is just invaluable and to essentially say and dismiss that, essentially by not involving students in that conversation, is really disappointing, because nobody's going to know as well as students."

Each university has its own processes, and that can also depend on whether the student halls are owned or managed by different companies, says Kate.

"What we end up with is that inconsistency of how things are being dealt between halls, and it did create situations where someone who had caused harm in one hall was able to just go to a different hall."

Since 2019, Thursdays in Black has been calling for compulsory consent education to be rolled out to first-year tertiary students.

"It's being asked for by so many people, we have a right to be safe."

But Kathryn says this education needs to come far earlier.

Earlier this year, HELP's We Can Keep Safe programme for pre-schoolers lost funding as ACC moves to a new nationwide approach.

And ACC's consent and healthy relationships programme for high schoolers, Mates and Dates, was also discontinued in December last year, with the Ministry of Education now the lead agency for health relationships and consent education in schools.

Kathryn says that will leave gaps in the meantime.

"They withdrew that funding because they're planning to do other kinds of prevention, but we're in that middle place where those other kinds of prevention are not really on the table yet."

'The university has progressed a number of initiatives'

In a statement, the Ministry of Education says tertiary institutions have a high degree of autonomy from government, but the pastoral care code of practice guidelines sets out expectations.

"Staff must be provided with ongoing training and resources for physical and sexual violence prevention and response, including how to support a culture of disclosure and reporting.

"It also requires universities to have practices for protecting learners and staff who 'experience harm from other learners and/or staff, including sexual assault'."

In a statement, University of Otago student services director Calire Gallop says the university is committed to creating a no-tolerance environment on sexual misconduct, and having processes in place to reduce chances of it happening in the first place.

"The university has progressed a number of initiatives in support of this and this is likely a key factor in having a high level of disclosures."

In 2018, the University established a sexual violence support and prevention centre, Te Whare Tāwharau.

The Centre provides a range of educative initiatives to help reduce incidences of sexual violence, as well as sexual violence related support for students who are dealing with incidents of sexual violence that are recent or historical.

"We have put a lot of resource into both making this service visible and student-centred. To the best of our knowledge this is the only stand-alone centre of its kind among New Zealand Universities."

-Louise Ternouth/RNZ.