# Protecting your child from a life-changing event: Brent Sanders Pt. 2

An episode of [I Catch Killers with Gary Jubelin](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1506667049), 28 Sep 2026, 57 min.

Audio: https://p.podderapp.com/2544644999/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/2fb3740d-3436-44af-8cc0-a91900716aa5/5bc8c2ed-b718-4f44-beb3-ac2a005246cc/0c2b6328-08f2-41b3-b0ca-b4d00037cb1f/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=786928c3-10c1-4cef-a7bf-ac2a005246d0

Most sexual assaults aren't committed by strangers. They're committed by someone in the victim-survivor's own social group. Former cop turned safety educator Brent Sanders sits down with Gary Jubelin to go deeper on prevention, how consent actually works under the law when alcohol is involved, why bystander intervention matters, and what workplaces still get wrong about harassment. Drawing on 30 years teaching students across Australia, Brent breaks down his Year 9 to Year 12 approach in plain language: choice and consequence, phones and sexting laws, the legal test for when a drunk person can't consent, and the story of the Year 12 boy who stopped an assault at a party without throwing a punch. In this episode: • Why it's almost always someone in the social group, not a stranger • The legal test for consent and alcohol — explained like RSA at a pub • What happens when both people are drunk, and who the law looks at • How to step in as a bystander without making it a fight • Romeo and Juliet law, sexting, AI images and what Year 10s need to know • From schools to workplaces: harassment, positive duty and Christmas parties. You can watch I Catch Killers on Youtube here. Follow I Catch Killers: Instagram: @icatchkillers Tiktok: @icatchkillerspodcast Facebook: @icatchkillers See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:01] Speaker 1: The public has had a long-held fascination with detectives. Detectives
[0:05] Speaker 1: see a side of life the average person is never
[0:08] Speaker 1: exposed to. I spent 34 years as a cop. For
[0:12] Speaker 1: 25 of those years, I was catching killers. That's what
[0:14] Speaker 1: I did for a living. I was a homicide detective.
[0:17] Speaker 1: I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead, I'm taking
[0:21] Speaker 1: the public into the world in which I operated. The
[0:24] Speaker 1: guests I talk to each week have amazing stories from
[0:26] Speaker 1: all sides of the law. The interviews are raw and honest,
[0:29] Speaker 1: just like the people I talk to. Some of the
[0:31] Speaker 1: content and language might be confronting. That's because no one
[0:34] Speaker 1: who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged. Join
[0:38] Speaker 1: me now as I take you into this world. Welcome
[0:46] Speaker 1: back to part two of my conversation with Brent Sanders.
[0:50] Speaker 1: where he continues to share his extensive knowledge of consent
[0:53] Speaker 1: and sexual assault. In part one, we focus on how
[0:56] Speaker 1: Brent speaks to young women about these issues. In this episode,
[1:01] Speaker 1: we turn to how he engages young men, encouraging them
[1:04] Speaker 1: to reflect not only on their own actions, but also
[1:07] Speaker 1: on the behaviour of their male peers. We also unpack
[1:11] Speaker 1: the terminology around consent, clarifying what it actually means from
[1:15] Speaker 1: a legal perspective, and how that already complex picture becomes
[1:19] Speaker 1: even harder for teenagers to navigate once alcohol and drugs
[1:23] Speaker 1: are added into the mix. Brent Sanders, welcome back to
[1:28] Speaker 1: part two of I Catch Killers. Thanks, Gary. Well, I
[1:31] Speaker 1: found our part one very informative on the type of
[1:35] Speaker 1: messaging you're getting across to... Primarily, we were talking about
[1:39] Speaker 1: young women in schools, about sexual assault and different things.
[1:43] Speaker 1: We didn't really delve into... Young men, the messaging you're
[1:47] Speaker 1: getting across to young men because that's a completely– well,
[1:51] Speaker 1: when I say completely different, it's not completely different because
[1:53] Speaker 1: I think you need to know both sides. But the
[1:56] Speaker 1: messaging to men, I would imagine, or young men, is
[1:59] Speaker 1: different to the messaging you're giving young women just by
[2:03] Speaker 1: the nature of the offences and who are the predominant
[2:05] Speaker 1: offenders profile. How do you differ the lectures or the
[2:10] Speaker 1: education that you give to young women? as distinct from
[2:15] Speaker 1: when you go into a boys' school?
[2:17] Speaker 2: A lot of schools now, like when I do university talks,
[2:20] Speaker 2: they bring them all in together. But when I talk
[2:23] Speaker 2: just specifically to boys and say we've got a, typically
[2:26] Speaker 2: it could be, say, a three-hour time frame, I sort
[2:29] Speaker 2: of break that talk with the boys up into two parts.
[2:32] Speaker 2: And the first part for sort of one of a
[2:34] Speaker 2: title is talking to those young guys about that whole
[2:39] Speaker 2: principle around choice and consequence and what sits behind the
[2:44] Speaker 2: poor choices that we make. And I talk to them
[2:48] Speaker 2: about some of the guys that in my early time,
[2:51] Speaker 2: the police, their age that I arrested and charged and
[2:54] Speaker 2: the impacts that that can have on them. So the
[2:57] Speaker 2: year nine boys, it's that one hour talk about choice,
[3:00] Speaker 2: about consequence, about peer pressure. The year 10 talk, we
[3:04] Speaker 2: get up into discussing that principle around misuse of phones, sexting, imaging,
[3:12] Speaker 2: AI images, deep fake and all that type of thing
[3:14] Speaker 2: and all the laws that are around that. Year 11,
[3:17] Speaker 2: I talked to them about fatal car accidents and it's
[3:22] Speaker 2: the most confronting talk that I do to boys. I
[3:24] Speaker 2: do it to girls as well, but just using that example.
[3:27] Speaker 2: And I talk about being a first responder and what
[3:31] Speaker 2: that's like and how that feels and the impact that
[3:34] Speaker 2: these decisions have on families and loved ones. And I, again,
[3:38] Speaker 2: you know, I relate it back to Experiences I had
[3:42] Speaker 2: as a young copper. I policed in New Zealand where
[3:45] Speaker 2: you got your driver's license when you were 15.
[3:48] Speaker 1: It's young, isn't it?
[3:49] Speaker 2: It's unbelievable. So that's year nine. That's no L plates,
[3:52] Speaker 2: no P plates. That was walking into the equivalent of
[3:55] Speaker 2: the RTA on your 15th birthday and getting a full license.
[3:59] Speaker 2: I was in three serious car accidents in year 10,
[4:02] Speaker 2: one that I created and two others I was a passenger.
[4:05] Speaker 2: And that was just, that wasn't out of the ordinary.
[4:07] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[4:08] Speaker 2: I talked to the boys about, you know, as a
[4:10] Speaker 2: young 19-year-old copper attending these fatals. And I think, you know,
[4:16] Speaker 2: you'd agree, Gary, when I say to the boys, if
[4:17] Speaker 2: you lined up 100 police, you know, behind me, whether
[4:21] Speaker 2: they've been in the job 5, 10, 20, 30 years,
[4:23] Speaker 2: I reckon nearly all of them would tell you the
[4:25] Speaker 2: worst job you can ever do in the police is
[4:27] Speaker 2: death notices.
[4:28] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[4:29] Speaker 2: Walking up that driveway. Oh, it's horrible. At midnight, you know,
[4:32] Speaker 2: porch lights on for a young bloke that's in the
[4:35] Speaker 2: mortuary because you just dragged him out of a car.
[4:37] Speaker 2: And you knock on that door and you've got to
[4:39] Speaker 2: tell the parents. And you know you're going to destroy
[4:41] Speaker 2: someone's life. Oh, you destroy the lives and the kids
[4:43] Speaker 2: coming out. You know, we've been there. And then you
[4:45] Speaker 2: get mum and dad the car to the mortuary to
[4:46] Speaker 2: do the ID. And then you've got to. And I
[4:49] Speaker 2: go through that with the boys. And I say, in
[4:51] Speaker 2: different parts of that talk, I say, boys, this is
[4:56] Speaker 2: all the result of a heartbeat decision made by a
[4:59] Speaker 2: young man in the car. As simple as coming towards
[5:02] Speaker 2: a corner where if he's in the car on his own,
[5:04] Speaker 2: he hits the brakes and goes around the corner. if
[5:07] Speaker 2: he's in the car with his mates, he's thinking, oh,
[5:09] Speaker 2: I better not hit the brakes. Oh, I'll hit the accelerator.
[5:13] Speaker 2: I'll give it a go. And get a laugh from
[5:14] Speaker 2: his mates. Sometimes you get around it. And I say,
[5:17] Speaker 2: sometimes you don't. And when you don't, let me explain
[5:20] Speaker 2: to you. So it's that. It's a heavy talk. But
[5:24] Speaker 2: it's the same theme all the way through. And then
[5:26] Speaker 2: with those year 12 boys, that's when I get into discussion.
[5:29] Speaker 2: I'll do this with younger boys in other schools. But
[5:31] Speaker 2: because they do it tiered like this, that's when I
[5:34] Speaker 2: talk to those boys about, that same principle with regard
[5:37] Speaker 2: to choices that you're making with intimate exchanges with other people,
[5:41] Speaker 2: you know, around consent and around alcohol with consent and
[5:46] Speaker 2: how all that works. Now, there's, of course, there's a
[5:48] Speaker 2: plethora of other things that can be spoken about. You know,
[5:50] Speaker 2: I go into boys' schools where I'll walk in on
[5:53] Speaker 2: the back of someone who goes in to talk about
[5:55] Speaker 2: the impacts of the manosphere and, you know, pornography and
[6:00] Speaker 2: all that type of thing. And that's fantastic. I don't
[6:03] Speaker 2: touch on that, nor do they touch on the stuff
[6:05] Speaker 2: that I do. So most schools now, and some that
[6:10] Speaker 2: get the most criticism, do the most work in this space.
[6:14] Speaker 2: They are constantly presenting to boys at all different age groups,
[6:17] Speaker 2: different levels, different messages. So I'm just sort of a
[6:20] Speaker 2: small part on that. But I feel that if I
[6:22] Speaker 2: can do my job properly in front of young men,
[6:26] Speaker 2: the young men, I'm hoping the reaction they have when
[6:28] Speaker 2: they walk away is not that they've some blokes come
[6:31] Speaker 2: in and hit them over the head with a big stick.
[6:32] Speaker 2: Because we need to be very careful, I think, in
[6:36] Speaker 2: society at some of the blanket labeling that gets applied
[6:40] Speaker 2: to young men. Because some young men do terrible or
[6:43] Speaker 2: bad things. There's a tendency to label then all young
[6:47] Speaker 2: men under that. And that then leaves room for natural
[6:53] Speaker 2: pushback for you know, human beings, pigs of human beings
[6:56] Speaker 2: like the Andrew Taits and stuff of this world, to
[6:58] Speaker 2: get into the ears of those guys and say, hey,
[7:01] Speaker 2: listen to this message, you know, so you get that
[7:04] Speaker 2: other extreme. And so I never stand up in front
[7:09] Speaker 2: of a group of young men assuming that they're all
[7:13] Speaker 2: going to run around and do the stuff that I
[7:14] Speaker 2: talk about.
[7:15] Speaker 1: Peer group pressure.
[7:17] Speaker 2: Yes.
[7:17] Speaker 1: I think that's a big thing as a young male,
[7:20] Speaker 1: that you do stupid things because your mates are egging
[7:23] Speaker 1: you on. Yeah. invariably, I think if we're relating to
[7:28] Speaker 1: sexual assaults in those teenage years, and I think you
[7:31] Speaker 1: identified in part one that the likelihood of a female
[7:37] Speaker 1: being a victim is in those late teenage years or
[7:39] Speaker 1: the teenage years.
[7:40] Speaker 2: That's correct.
[7:41] Speaker 1: And also there's a strong likelihood it'll be a young
[7:44] Speaker 1: male at the same time.
[7:45] Speaker 2: Almost without exception, it's someone in their social group. So,
[7:48] Speaker 2: you know, the I know we spoke about the psychology
[7:53] Speaker 2: of those strange offenders and things. As you and I know,
[7:55] Speaker 2: that's a very rare occurrence, statistically very rare. Overwhelmingly, sexual
[8:01] Speaker 2: crimes committed at that high school age are committed. between
[8:05] Speaker 2: young people of similar age within the same social group.
[8:08] Speaker 1: And often there's alcohol, there's that little bit of freedom
[8:11] Speaker 1: that comes when you become a teenager and you're allowed
[8:15] Speaker 1: out at night and alcohol involved. Consent, to me, seems
[8:19] Speaker 1: to be the most confusing issue for everyone around that time.
[8:23] Speaker 1: Let's break it down for the message for young males,
[8:27] Speaker 1: what consent actually means. Yeah.
[8:29] Speaker 2: So when I talk to young men, and young men,
[8:32] Speaker 2: but young men about consent, I just break it down
[8:34] Speaker 2: into three legal components. We look at age of consent. Now,
[8:38] Speaker 2: age of consent is 16, and they all know that.
[8:39] Speaker 2: But a lot of my audiences are 15 and 16,
[8:42] Speaker 2: year 10 and year 11. So when you've got a
[8:44] Speaker 2: group of, say, 150 year 10 boys, I get a
[8:47] Speaker 2: show of hands. I'll say, boys, what's age of consent?
[8:50] Speaker 2: And they'll say 16. I said, OK, well, we know
[8:52] Speaker 2: what that means, don't we? I said, put your hand
[8:54] Speaker 2: up if you've turned 16. Usually this time of year,
[8:57] Speaker 2: probably about half, three quarters. Put your hand up if
[9:00] Speaker 2: you're still 15. put your hand up if you're going
[9:02] Speaker 2: to turn 16 before the end of the year. Now,
[9:05] Speaker 2: what about the stragglers, year 11? So they're all either 16,
[9:08] Speaker 2: about to turn 16. So suddenly this whole age of
[9:12] Speaker 2: consent thing lands differently for them than just this glib statement, oh,
[9:17] Speaker 2: age of consent is 16. So I say, now boys,
[9:21] Speaker 2: once you turn 16, the law deems that you're now
[9:24] Speaker 2: a sexual adult. Ironically, the day before you were still
[9:27] Speaker 2: a sexual child. It's a strange concept, but You are
[9:30] Speaker 2: now legally entitled to engage intimately with other sexual adults
[9:35] Speaker 2: as long as you have their consent. And they're all nodding.
[9:37] Speaker 2: They all know this. I said, and boys, would it
[9:39] Speaker 2: be fair to say an adult can't engage sexually with
[9:43] Speaker 2: a child? They go, no, absolutely not. Can a child
[9:45] Speaker 2: give consent?
[9:46] Speaker 1: No.
[9:48] Speaker 2: Now, they know that. But then because of the age group,
[9:52] Speaker 2: you can say, okay, what about if we've got, say,
[9:55] Speaker 2: using some age engine, what about if we've got a
[9:57] Speaker 2: young girl who's 15 and she's going out with a
[9:59] Speaker 2: bloke who's 16 or 17? And they are at the
[10:02] Speaker 2: girl's house and they choose to have an intimate exchange.
[10:05] Speaker 2: We run through that. So they've told me the law.
[10:07] Speaker 2: Then you run it through something which is very familiar
[10:10] Speaker 2: for them. And then what you realize is they know
[10:14] Speaker 2: the statutes. but they don't know the common law application
[10:18] Speaker 2: of Romeo and Juliet. So there is no more important
[10:22] Speaker 2: age to talk about that than to students that are
[10:26] Speaker 2: close to. But I tell you, I've had people sitting
[10:30] Speaker 2: on the outsides of my seminars who aren't students say
[10:33] Speaker 2: to me, I was totally against you telling these students
[10:38] Speaker 2: about Romeo and Juliet. I said, why? It's the law.
[10:42] Speaker 2: It's the law. And now, if you don't like the law, okay,
[10:45] Speaker 2: change it. It's like saying, I didn't like you telling
[10:48] Speaker 2: the students what the speed limit was outside the front
[10:50] Speaker 2: of the school. Change it. But while it's still there. So,
[10:54] Speaker 2: you know, Romeo and Juliet is an important component of
[10:57] Speaker 2: consent law when you're talking to students that age. Now,
[10:59] Speaker 2: Romeo and Juliet has slightly different applications, different states in Australia.
[11:02] Speaker 2: But generally, most Western countries, all Western countries have age
[11:06] Speaker 2: of consent. And they pretty much all have that Romeo
[11:09] Speaker 2: and Juliet, that common law. So for the listeners, what
[11:11] Speaker 2: that really means is statute states age of consent, New
[11:15] Speaker 2: South Wales, 16. Common law, and they label it Romeo
[11:19] Speaker 2: and Juliet, allows a bit of flexibility around the edges.
[11:22] Speaker 2: So if two young people in New South Wales engage
[11:25] Speaker 2: intimately and one is just under 16 and one is
[11:28] Speaker 2: just over, if police are called, they'll apply Romeo and Juliet.
[11:32] Speaker 2: How does that apply? Well, there are two checkpoints. We
[11:34] Speaker 2: look at their ages. Are they within two years of
[11:36] Speaker 2: each other's age? So Romeo and Juliet works pretty much
[11:40] Speaker 2: down to age 14. So you could have a 14-year-old
[11:42] Speaker 2: and a 16-year-old, but they're within two years. You could
[11:46] Speaker 2: have 15 and 16. You could have 15 and 17.
[11:49] Speaker 2: Those situations, the law would say, if they're within two
[11:52] Speaker 2: years of each other's age, the next test is, and
[11:55] Speaker 2: it's practical application is, police would just separate the two
[11:59] Speaker 2: young folks in the house, have a chat to them,
[12:02] Speaker 2: to satisfy or confirm that they were both willing participants
[12:05] Speaker 2: to the intimacy. So we don't use the word consent
[12:08] Speaker 2: because it can't be applied to a child under 16,
[12:11] Speaker 2: all that. So you tell the students that and you say,
[12:14] Speaker 2: now this is not society saying we encourage people underage
[12:18] Speaker 2: to run. This is society saying the spirit behind age
[12:23] Speaker 2: of consent is to protect children from adults, to protect
[12:26] Speaker 2: children from sexual predators. So the application of that law
[12:31] Speaker 2: is always going to be different when those ages are
[12:33] Speaker 2: within two years. So Romeo and Juliet is within two
[12:39] Speaker 2: years and willing participants. The police would then step back
[12:42] Speaker 2: and say, this is a parental matter. It's not a
[12:45] Speaker 2: policing matter. And this gets a whole lot of questions
[12:48] Speaker 2: from these kids. Now, yeah, we can then have the
[12:51] Speaker 2: moral ethical discussion.
[12:52] Speaker 1: I'm sure it gets a whole lot of questions because
[12:54] Speaker 1: the kids that would, there'd be a lot of people
[12:57] Speaker 1: caught up in that situation.
[12:58] Speaker 2: For sure. And they're entitled to know what the law is.
[13:01] Speaker 2: So then that's that. Next area that I talk about
[13:04] Speaker 2: a consent is the effects of alcohol and drugs. And
[13:06] Speaker 2: this is quite a big one, particularly when those students
[13:09] Speaker 2: are year 11 and 12. There was a, I think
[13:13] Speaker 2: it might have been Sydney Uni punched out a study
[13:16] Speaker 2: a year or so back. They estimated at a social
[13:18] Speaker 2: function this weekend in Sydney attended by, say, senior high
[13:21] Speaker 2: school students year 11 and year 12-ish. If a sexual
[13:25] Speaker 2: offense is committed, up to 90% of the time, it'll
[13:28] Speaker 2: be committed against somebody who's incapable of consent due to
[13:31] Speaker 2: the effects of alcohol and drugs. So from year 10 up,
[13:36] Speaker 2: students know the mantra, a drunk person can't consent. And
[13:41] Speaker 2: I'll present it to them like that. Even with year 10s,
[13:43] Speaker 2: I'll say, if you're at a party this weekend, there
[13:45] Speaker 2: with your friends, and you look across the lounge room
[13:47] Speaker 2: and you can see someone there is really drunk, can
[13:49] Speaker 2: they consent? And they'll all in chorus go, no, absolutely not.
[13:52] Speaker 2: Drunk person can't consent. It's when you take the next step,
[13:56] Speaker 2: you find that there's a lack of knowledge and you
[13:58] Speaker 2: get real inconsistency. And the next thing I'll ask is, okay,
[14:01] Speaker 2: if a drunk person can't consent, what is the legal
[14:04] Speaker 2: test to determine that? It's crickets. The most common answer
[14:09] Speaker 2: I get right up until university age when you ask
[14:12] Speaker 2: what's the test is, oh, it's the breathalyzer test. And
[14:15] Speaker 2: I mean, you and I would laugh at that, not
[14:18] Speaker 2: to be flippant, but it's like, who's packing a breathalyzer
[14:20] Speaker 2: at a party? And even if you did breathalyze someone,
[14:23] Speaker 2: there's no actual breathalyzer number that correlates to consent, technically.
[14:28] Speaker 2: So it's quite interesting to hear all the different versions.
[14:31] Speaker 2: I've had students say to me, oh, if 11 people
[14:34] Speaker 2: agree that someone's drunk, then they're too drunk to consent.
[14:38] Speaker 2: I had a chap recently say, oh, I'm If I
[14:42] Speaker 2: have an intimate exchange at a party with someone, that's
[14:44] Speaker 2: fine just so long as they haven't had more than
[14:46] Speaker 2: two standard drinks than what I've had. So get all this. Now,
[14:50] Speaker 2: I'm not having a go at them. They're getting that
[14:52] Speaker 2: from somewhere. They're getting it off the internet. They're getting
[14:54] Speaker 2: it from somewhere. They're mates. But that's where you realize
[14:58] Speaker 2: the value of saying, well, let me tell you what
[15:00] Speaker 2: the actual test is. So I tell them. And it's
[15:03] Speaker 2: a very simple test. Under law, and it's pretty much
[15:06] Speaker 2: the same in all states, to consent, the law says
[15:09] Speaker 2: a person must be sober. The law basically says a
[15:12] Speaker 2: person is no longer sober enough to consent once they've
[15:16] Speaker 2: consumed enough alcohol or drugs that they are clearly showing
[15:20] Speaker 2: substantial effects of drugs or alcohol, and those effects could
[15:24] Speaker 2: be observed by a reasonable person. So that reasonable person
[15:28] Speaker 2: test is the cornerstone to legal interpretation. So it's an
[15:32] Speaker 2: observational test, and substantial effects of alcohol or drugs, if
[15:37] Speaker 2: you look at it in, say, a courtroom-type environment, can
[15:40] Speaker 2: be stuff know, physical impairment, verbal, cognitive, all that, all
[15:45] Speaker 2: that stuff. So, so you tell the kids that and
[15:48] Speaker 2: they're going, oh, okay. So it's not the breathalyzer test.
[15:50] Speaker 2: It's not that they've had five drinks, seven drinks.
[15:52] Speaker 1: No.
[15:53] Speaker 2: How do you know how many drinks a person's had?
[15:55] Speaker 2: I said, so you can apply this test. If you're
[15:57] Speaker 2: at a party, look across the room at say midnight
[16:01] Speaker 2: and let's say there's 10 people. Apply this test of
[16:04] Speaker 2: those 10 people who's failed it. So let's say of
[16:08] Speaker 2: those 10 people, they've all been drinking. but to varying degrees.
[16:11] Speaker 2: And eight of them haven't consumed enough alcohol or drugs.
[16:13] Speaker 2: And the test for alcohol and drugs is the same
[16:15] Speaker 2: because it's an observational test. Eight of them haven't consumed
[16:18] Speaker 2: enough alcohol or drugs for it to be affecting them
[16:21] Speaker 2: so that you can't see it. Well, they haven't failed
[16:24] Speaker 2: the test yet. But let's say two out of the 10,
[16:27] Speaker 2: you can look at them and you can see they're
[16:28] Speaker 2: weaving around and anyone who's weaving around, balance is not good,
[16:32] Speaker 2: go and have a chat to them. They'll be slurring speech,
[16:34] Speaker 2: they're cognitively gone. Every courtroom in Australia a judge will
[16:39] Speaker 2: advise a jury. If that has been proven to you
[16:42] Speaker 2: beyond reasonable doubt, well, you must conclude that this person
[16:45] Speaker 2: was incapable of consent. So what that does, it takes
[16:50] Speaker 2: the kids from the statement, a drunk person can't consent,
[16:55] Speaker 2: and having no idea what it means, to having the
[16:58] Speaker 2: actual test in their back pocket so that they can
[17:01] Speaker 2: apply it on Saturday night. And I'd say to them,
[17:05] Speaker 2: I'd tell my son and my daughter this. I'd say
[17:06] Speaker 2: to my son and his mates, you know, when you're
[17:08] Speaker 2: driving them in year 11, year 12 to a party,
[17:11] Speaker 2: just remember, boys, you know, if you want to have
[17:14] Speaker 2: an interaction with someone tonight, that's totally fine. If you
[17:16] Speaker 2: want to initiate, that's none of my business. But just remember,
[17:19] Speaker 2: the later it is at night, you know, you get
[17:22] Speaker 2: to this party at 8 o'clock and you're there and
[17:25] Speaker 2: there's girls there and there's people there that started drinking
[17:27] Speaker 2: pre's at 6 o'clock and you're having a chat to
[17:30] Speaker 2: one of those girls, say, out the back at midnight.
[17:33] Speaker 2: She may well have been drinking pretty solidly for six hours. Now,
[17:36] Speaker 2: if someone's been drinking pretty solidly for six hours, your
[17:39] Speaker 2: size and mine, they're probably going to fail that legal test.
[17:42] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[17:43] Speaker 2: So how could a young woman who weighs 50 kilos
[17:46] Speaker 2: pass it?
[17:47] Speaker 1: And drinking for possibly first time.
[17:49] Speaker 2: Got to be careful. We just got to be careful.
[17:52] Speaker 2: Just another aspect of this, with the older students, and
[17:56] Speaker 2: if I'm doing sort of like orientation talks coming into uni's,
[18:01] Speaker 2: I'll peel that onion one more layer and I'll compare
[18:03] Speaker 2: it to the RSA, the Responsible Service of Alcohol Test,
[18:07] Speaker 2: because it's identical.
[18:08] Speaker 1: Yeah. It's exactly the same. Very similar, isn't it?
[18:10] Speaker 2: And it's a very tangible thing then. I remember chatting to,
[18:13] Speaker 2: I was doing a lecture up at UNE up in
[18:15] Speaker 2: Armidale and a bloke came in and sat down, came up,
[18:17] Speaker 2: had a bit of a yarn to me afterwards. He
[18:18] Speaker 2: was head of the sex crimes unit for New England,
[18:21] Speaker 2: a big geographic. And he was saying, mate, it's so
[18:24] Speaker 2: good to hear someone putting that into context for these kids.
[18:28] Speaker 2: He said, because sadly- every year I have to send
[18:31] Speaker 2: detectives up here to the university to investigate allegations of
[18:34] Speaker 2: sexual crime. He said, almost without exception, they involve high
[18:38] Speaker 2: levels of alcohol, drugs. He said, the last thing these
[18:41] Speaker 2: young detectives will hear when they walk out of my office,
[18:45] Speaker 2: remember if the victim of this offence fails the RSA,
[18:49] Speaker 2: they can't consent. So you say to kids, if you
[18:52] Speaker 2: rock up to a pub in Sydney this weekend, You
[18:57] Speaker 2: know there's two legal tests you have to pass. You've
[18:59] Speaker 2: got to show that you're 18, whether you are or not.
[19:01] Speaker 2: You've got to have ID, show the bloke on the
[19:03] Speaker 2: big unit on the door. He'll have a look at it,
[19:05] Speaker 2: give it back to you. I said, but you're not
[19:06] Speaker 2: in the pub yet. I said, what happens then? Because
[19:09] Speaker 2: the guy, he just starts chatting to you. And I said, yeah, well,
[19:11] Speaker 2: that's called the responsible service of alcohol test. There's a
[19:15] Speaker 2: legal requirement that he has to make sure that you
[19:19] Speaker 2: pass that before you're allowed to go in. And so
[19:22] Speaker 2: he'll say to you, where have you been tonight? Have
[19:24] Speaker 2: you been drinking? How many drinks have you had? I said,
[19:27] Speaker 2: you know how you fail the RSA? You fail the
[19:29] Speaker 2: RSA if through the observation of that person, you are
[19:32] Speaker 2: clearly showing substantial effects of alcohol or drugs.
[19:35] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[19:35] Speaker 2: I said, it is exactly the same as the test
[19:38] Speaker 2: applied by detectives in the sex crimes unit who are
[19:40] Speaker 2: called to a party at midnight because friends have lost
[19:44] Speaker 2: track of a, say, a girl. They find her in
[19:47] Speaker 2: a room. She's really drunk. Guy's doing stuff to her.
[19:49] Speaker 2: He does a run Police are called. That's where it starts.
[19:52] Speaker 2: So it gives that whole thing a real tangible thing
[19:56] Speaker 2: for the kids. Once you can see someone's drunk.
[19:59] Speaker 1: I like using the analogy because they'll know the situation
[20:04] Speaker 1: in licensed premises and getting in there if they're when
[20:08] Speaker 1: they've been turned away or not allowed into the club.
[20:11] Speaker 1: I suppose giving them that something that they can process
[20:15] Speaker 1: in their mind, they're not getting caught up in the
[20:17] Speaker 1: definition of, well, is it 0.02 or 0.05? Exactly. Exactly.
[20:21] Speaker 2: So you've got to keep it simple. And there's a
[20:23] Speaker 2: question that then comes up too, which is a very
[20:25] Speaker 2: valid one. I was over in Bathurst recently and a
[20:27] Speaker 2: young fellow in year 12 said, he said, if say
[20:29] Speaker 2: there's a guy at a party who's had a couple
[20:30] Speaker 2: of beers and he targets a girl that is so drunk,
[20:35] Speaker 2: everyone can see. So he isolates her and You know,
[20:38] Speaker 2: a crime is committed. He said, how does this same
[20:41] Speaker 2: offense or crime work if he said two people at
[20:44] Speaker 2: a party, both really drunk to the same degree?
[20:48] Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a valid question.
[20:50] Speaker 2: And they do stuff intimately and each person's initiating stuff
[20:56] Speaker 2: against the other and everything else. So there's this equality
[20:58] Speaker 2: going through. He said, what if one of those two
[21:00] Speaker 2: people goes to the police the following day and says, hey, look,
[21:04] Speaker 2: I was at this party, got really drunk. Somebody... had
[21:07] Speaker 2: an intimate exchange with me, I want them charged. I said, well,
[21:09] Speaker 2: that's a valid question. I said, and I'll be as
[21:11] Speaker 2: honest as I can when I answer it. If you're
[21:13] Speaker 2: in a position to investigate something like that, and that's
[21:16] Speaker 2: the evidence that you're working with, I said, the first
[21:19] Speaker 2: step in a police investigation is to ask, can we
[21:23] Speaker 2: clearly identify an offender and a victim? So in your
[21:26] Speaker 2: earlier example, guys had two or three drinks, targets a
[21:29] Speaker 2: girl who everyone at the party can see is drunk
[21:31] Speaker 2: off her face, isolates her. I said, we can see that,
[21:34] Speaker 2: can't we? Offend a victim.
[21:35] Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.
[21:36] Speaker 2: I said, when two people are drunk or drug affected
[21:38] Speaker 2: to the same degree and they're interacting with each other, initiating,
[21:44] Speaker 2: having an issue, I said, can you see it is
[21:46] Speaker 2: almost impossible in that, given that, to identify a fin
[21:51] Speaker 2: of victim? I said, so it would be extremely unlikely
[21:53] Speaker 2: under those circumstances for an investigation to be able to proceed.
[21:57] Speaker 2: I said, it's a little bit like if two people
[22:01] Speaker 2: are fighting in a pub. Is that just two people
[22:04] Speaker 2: fighting in a pub or did one assault and the
[22:06] Speaker 2: other one's defending themselves in the absence of being able to, well,
[22:10] Speaker 2: we can't charge both. It's a little bit like that.
[22:12] Speaker 1: They both bumped into each other. All that.
[22:14] Speaker 2: I said the law is not perfect. It's far from it.
[22:17] Speaker 2: And yes, there are ingredients that when you put them
[22:20] Speaker 2: into the context make what is a very high-level investigation
[22:24] Speaker 2: with many, many steps to it if you can't take
[22:26] Speaker 2: the first step. Who's the offender? Who's the victim? Very
[22:28] Speaker 2: difficult to take the others.
[22:30] Speaker 1: You're breaking it down from a legalistic point of view
[22:33] Speaker 1: and understanding the issues that come in this. Yeah, we'll
[22:38] Speaker 1: call them the teenage parties, which we've all been there,
[22:41] Speaker 1: done that when we know potentially what can happen. Is
[22:45] Speaker 1: there any part of what you're telling the young men,
[22:49] Speaker 1: and does this fly with them? If you do, call
[22:51] Speaker 1: them on about doing the right thing.
[22:53] Speaker 2: Yeah, 100%. It is a component.
[22:54] Speaker 1: Do you push that aspect of it? I do.
[22:57] Speaker 2: And I really, often it focuses around that whole party
[22:59] Speaker 2: thing with drinks. And I say, fellas, here's the analogy
[23:02] Speaker 2: that I'll use.
[23:03] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[23:03] Speaker 2: I say, boys, I'm not saying that I think you're
[23:06] Speaker 2: going to go out and target girls who are drunk.
[23:09] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[23:10] Speaker 2: I can't recall a sexual offense given these ingredients being
[23:13] Speaker 2: committed where it's not male to female.
[23:15] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[23:15] Speaker 2: And I said, you know, when university studies tell us
[23:17] Speaker 2: up to 90% of sex crimes committed at parties, you know,
[23:20] Speaker 2: in this age group are committed against people who are
[23:23] Speaker 2: clearly affected by alcohol or drugs. I said, what those
[23:25] Speaker 2: studies are actually presenting to you is a selection process
[23:28] Speaker 2: of the offender. You could have 50 people at a
[23:31] Speaker 2: party and 49 of them could look at a girl
[23:34] Speaker 2: who's drunk and it never, ever enters their mind that
[23:37] Speaker 2: I'm going to do something to her. But you only
[23:39] Speaker 2: need one. And I said, you know, that guy is
[23:42] Speaker 2: the guy walking around at midnight, looking around. sees that girl.
[23:46] Speaker 2: She's clearly drunk. She's staggering around. If his intention is
[23:50] Speaker 2: to do what we're talking about, in my experience, he
[23:53] Speaker 2: will be drawn to that girl like a moth to
[23:55] Speaker 2: a light bulb. Yeah, that's reasonable. So he'll keep an
[23:58] Speaker 2: eye on her. Now, the next stage of the process
[24:00] Speaker 2: is he has to isolate that girl either from friends
[24:03] Speaker 2: or wait till she isolates herself. I said, because if
[24:07] Speaker 2: we break these type of crimes down, they are committed
[24:10] Speaker 2: at parties, but they're not committed at a populated location
[24:13] Speaker 2: within the parties. So these crimes are committed in rooms
[24:16] Speaker 2: off the hallway, upstairs, down the back of a garden,
[24:19] Speaker 2: in a garage, when the kids are older and cars
[24:21] Speaker 2: out the front. I said, boys, I don't think you
[24:24] Speaker 2: have to be a frigging detective in the sex crimes
[24:27] Speaker 2: unit to look at that and know it's got spiders
[24:30] Speaker 2: all over it. I said, we can see where that's heading.
[24:33] Speaker 2: I said, so what I would expect of my son
[24:37] Speaker 2: is what I would expect of you. You get in
[24:40] Speaker 2: touch with your better self. You put your drink down,
[24:43] Speaker 2: you walk over there, and you get him to pull
[24:45] Speaker 2: his head in. I said, that intervention is fairly low level.
[24:51] Speaker 2: Even just walking up, go, mate, mate, mate, come here,
[24:52] Speaker 2: come here. She's shit-faced, mate. Come over here. I've got
[24:54] Speaker 2: a beer for you. Whatever, whatever it is.
[24:55] Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be confrontational.
[24:56] Speaker 2: It doesn't have to be confrontational. Bring him over. I said,
[25:01] Speaker 2: you have potentially saved that young girl going through a
[25:05] Speaker 2: horrendous sexual confrontation that will be with her for the
[25:08] Speaker 2: rest of her life. I had a young guy, mate.
[25:11] Speaker 2: He came up to me at the end of year
[25:12] Speaker 2: 12 talk, just quietly. He said, mate, he said, I
[25:14] Speaker 2: always remembered you spoke about that stuff at parties and things.
[25:17] Speaker 2: He said, I was at a party earlier in the year.
[25:20] Speaker 2: And he said, I saw this really drunk girl walk
[25:23] Speaker 2: through the lounge room. And she was sort of bumping
[25:25] Speaker 2: into people and stuff. And she walked up a hallway
[25:27] Speaker 2: to go to a bathroom. He said, I saw her
[25:30] Speaker 2: go up. He said, I didn't pay too much attention
[25:32] Speaker 2: to it. He said, I knew her, but not that well.
[25:33] Speaker 2: And then he said, I saw a bloke from the
[25:35] Speaker 2: other side of the room put his drink down. make
[25:38] Speaker 2: his way through and follow up the hallway, sort of
[25:40] Speaker 2: looking over his shoulder like this. And he said, he
[25:42] Speaker 2: was a big unit, big footy boy. He said, I'm
[25:45] Speaker 2: not even a little fella. And he said, I, I,
[25:48] Speaker 2: I won't lie to you. He said, I was a
[25:50] Speaker 2: bit scared. He said, but I couldn't stand there and
[25:53] Speaker 2: not do anything. He said, so I put my drink down.
[25:56] Speaker 2: He said, I walked up. He said, I didn't confront
[25:58] Speaker 2: the guy at all. I actually walked around him and
[26:00] Speaker 2: I put my arm around the girl. And I said
[26:03] Speaker 2: to the guy, mate, thanks so much for looking out
[26:05] Speaker 2: for her. She's, she's a mate, sister. I was trying
[26:09] Speaker 2: to find her. She's really drunk. Mate, you're a good man.
[26:11] Speaker 2: Thanks so much. The guy was so like, oh, okay, mate.
[26:15] Speaker 2: He said, mate, I had it back in the lounge room.
[26:17] Speaker 2: He said, my heart's going like this. He said, because
[26:19] Speaker 2: that bloke could have broken me in two. He said,
[26:21] Speaker 2: I didn't confront him, but I did step in. And
[26:24] Speaker 2: he said, I'm not wanting any medals or anything for it.
[26:27] Speaker 2: He said, but I just wanted to tell you I
[26:28] Speaker 2: did it and it worked.
[26:29] Speaker 1: So I think that's gold, little things like that.
[26:33] Speaker 2: And that's all it takes, mate, isn't it?
[26:34] Speaker 1: Because you're so ignorant at that age and what you're
[26:37] Speaker 1: going through with all the testosterone, everything happening, you throw
[26:41] Speaker 1: the alcohol, drugs into the mix.
[26:44] Speaker 2: It's a hell of a mix. You've just got to stop,
[26:46] Speaker 2: just take a breath, just look, just think, okay, what
[26:48] Speaker 2: can I do here?
[26:49] Speaker 1: And the scenarios you're painting perhaps would appear in virtually
[26:53] Speaker 1: every teenager's party.
[26:55] Speaker 2: At some point.
[26:55] Speaker 1: That type of situation going on. So that messaging that
[27:00] Speaker 1: comes across to the young men, you think it's sinking in?
[27:04] Speaker 2: You'd like to think so, mate. I mean, you know,
[27:06] Speaker 2: we're constantly hearing about, you know, in the media just
[27:11] Speaker 2: in the last month or so, we've had the allegations
[27:14] Speaker 2: against the young boys at Scots, the allegations against the
[27:16] Speaker 2: slightly older but still young boys at Gregory's. We've got
[27:19] Speaker 2: the Sydney Swans stuff rolling around. So nobody can sit
[27:22] Speaker 2: in my position and say, oh, look at me, I'm
[27:24] Speaker 2: a knight in shining armor. I've eliminated everything. And people
[27:27] Speaker 2: say to me, Well, if what you do is so great,
[27:29] Speaker 2: why is it still happening? And the only somewhat glib
[27:32] Speaker 2: response I can give is, well, imagine how much worse
[27:35] Speaker 2: it would be if people like me hadn't spent the
[27:37] Speaker 2: last 30 years.
[27:38] Speaker 1: Exactly. That's not a reason not to try.
[27:41] Speaker 2: You've got to keep doing it. And even if the
[27:45] Speaker 2: evidence I get back is of these occasional things of
[27:48] Speaker 2: people telling me through something they heard, well, there's one
[27:52] Speaker 2: that we've avoided.
[27:53] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[27:53] Speaker 2: There's one that didn't happen. Now, you know, I've put
[27:55] Speaker 2: a million students through. They've all got the same information.
[27:58] Speaker 2: You'd like to think as they go out and impart
[28:00] Speaker 2: that to others, you're having some sort of positive influence
[28:04] Speaker 2: over these choices, these outcomes. But yeah.
[28:07] Speaker 1: Just finishing up on the young adults, the consequences of
[28:11] Speaker 1: their actions too. Do you explain that? I do. Because
[28:14] Speaker 1: when you look at the penalties for these offences. Yeah.
[28:18] Speaker 2: I can't remember a seminar I've presented to young women
[28:22] Speaker 2: in over 30 years on sexual crime where I don't
[28:23] Speaker 2: get disclosures. I can't remember one. And in behind all
[28:27] Speaker 2: of those stories are the actions of generally young men
[28:30] Speaker 2: of similar age. So it's a constant, it's like a bushfire.
[28:34] Speaker 2: You're just trying to contain it, trying to contain it,
[28:36] Speaker 2: you know. And the boys, I say to the guys,
[28:39] Speaker 2: I say, as men, we need to take ownership of this.
[28:43] Speaker 2: You know, when we hear allegations, and that's all they
[28:46] Speaker 2: are at this stage of, the highest level of sexual
[28:50] Speaker 2: crime you can commit under New South Wales Crimes Act,
[28:53] Speaker 2: being leveled against two 14-year-olds and a 13-year-old. I said,
[28:58] Speaker 2: as males, we need to stop, we need to pause,
[29:02] Speaker 2: and we need to think, goodness, what role do we
[29:07] Speaker 2: play in this? The comments that we make, the examples
[29:12] Speaker 2: that we set as older men and What small part
[29:15] Speaker 2: can that play? Because then on top of that, we
[29:21] Speaker 2: get the allegation from the boys at St. Gregory's, and
[29:24] Speaker 2: here we are again. And I then say to boys, boys,
[29:28] Speaker 2: we've got to hear about this. We've got to confront this,
[29:32] Speaker 2: and we've got to take ownership of this. We're not
[29:34] Speaker 2: responsible for the actions of those individuals or those alleged actions,
[29:39] Speaker 2: but we're part of that group. We're part of that team.
[29:42] Speaker 2: And so for me in my role, I try to
[29:47] Speaker 2: represent males to males and say, guys, we've got to
[29:51] Speaker 2: have this discussion. We're going to talk about this because
[29:54] Speaker 2: this stuff Those high-level things, that doesn't start there. Nothing
[29:59] Speaker 2: starts up there.
[29:59] Speaker 1: And these things happen when men, the responsibility we have,
[30:04] Speaker 1: we've got to stand up to other men that are
[30:07] Speaker 1: committing these type of offences and make sure that it's
[30:11] Speaker 1: not dismissed or ignored. We take a stand. I also
[30:16] Speaker 1: like what your little mate said at the party. He
[30:19] Speaker 1: went down and put his arm around the girl to
[30:22] Speaker 1: get her away from the bloke. He said the bloke's
[30:26] Speaker 1: twice his size. Those type of things. I think they're
[30:30] Speaker 1: good messages.
[30:31] Speaker 2: Most men are good. Most young blokes are good young fellas.
[30:34] Speaker 1: 100%. 100%. And we know it can have the opposite
[30:38] Speaker 1: effect by criticising or bucketing all men in the same group.
[30:42] Speaker 2: But awareness of consequence is really important because one really
[30:47] Speaker 2: good area to discuss that, well, you know, I talk
[30:50] Speaker 2: about sexual assault, what it is and what the penalty is.
[30:54] Speaker 1: I think that's another thing that the message comes out.
[30:56] Speaker 1: The penalties are very high. The courts look at it
[31:00] Speaker 1: and you've sentenced accordingly if you are convicted of these crimes.
[31:04] Speaker 1: But you will do time. And when you do time,
[31:07] Speaker 1: you're not very well received in prison as a sex offender.
[31:10] Speaker 2: A hundred percent. And with older boys, that's a message.
[31:13] Speaker 2: I say, you know, boys, you know, if you choose
[31:16] Speaker 2: to cross this line, that's your choice. There are consequences.
[31:20] Speaker 2: And you have no idea, no idea of how grave
[31:25] Speaker 2: those consequences are.
[31:27] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[31:29] Speaker 2: And, you know, I go into some– I go into
[31:31] Speaker 2: the toughest schools in the state. I go into the
[31:33] Speaker 2: top private schools. I go to Catholic schools. I go to–
[31:35] Speaker 2: I can do the whole lot, mate. And if you've
[31:37] Speaker 2: got a bit of a tough old audience, you know,
[31:39] Speaker 2: and they're having a bit of a go, it's like, fellas,
[31:43] Speaker 2: you might think you're a bit of a hard man.
[31:44] Speaker 2: You knock a few blokes over playing under-15s footy in
[31:47] Speaker 2: the weekend. You're strut around school. You cross this line,
[31:52] Speaker 2: you'll go to prison. And you will get an imprisonment
[31:55] Speaker 2: term that will have you transported to an adult prison.
[31:59] Speaker 2: When you turn 18. Yeah. And if you think this
[32:02] Speaker 2: is being melodramatic, it's not. This is called consequence.
[32:05] Speaker 1: That's the reality of it.
[32:06] Speaker 2: Every choice has consequence.
[32:10] Speaker 1: Let's talk just briefly about date rape and on the
[32:14] Speaker 1: basis that– There's a perception that most sexual assaults occur
[32:19] Speaker 1: from people that the victim doesn't know, but that's not
[32:22] Speaker 1: the case. No, that's an absolute urban myth. And what's
[32:27] Speaker 1: your take on it? The danger, we were all educated
[32:31] Speaker 1: about stranger danger as children, and that's a good message
[32:35] Speaker 1: to get out, but the reality of it is most
[32:37] Speaker 1: times people are sexually assaulted. It's by people that they know.
[32:40] Speaker 2: Oh, look, 100%. And you know from your policing background, Gary,
[32:43] Speaker 2: that's the case, I think.
[32:44] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[32:46] Speaker 2: The most at-risk age for folks to be subjected to
[32:53] Speaker 2: stranger danger is when they're at primary school, right? And
[32:55] Speaker 2: that's why we get the primary school message. And I'm
[32:57] Speaker 2: not having a go at the message at all. But
[32:59] Speaker 2: if you actually look at the statistical breakdown of how many,
[33:03] Speaker 2: let's say, sexual crimes committed against primary school-aged kids are
[33:06] Speaker 2: committed against them by strangers, mate, I'd be surprised if
[33:09] Speaker 2: it's even 2%.
[33:10] Speaker 1: Yeah. I'd be surprised. I would think it would be
[33:13] Speaker 1: at that level. Yeah.
[33:15] Speaker 2: Let's be generous. Let's say it's 5%. Okay. So 5%
[33:19] Speaker 2: of sexual offences committed against kids at primary school who
[33:23] Speaker 2: are indoctrinated into the stranger danger message, 5% of those
[33:28] Speaker 2: offences are committed against them by the people they're being
[33:30] Speaker 2: informed about in the stranger danger program. So then we're
[33:33] Speaker 2: entitled to ask, okay, who's committing the other 95%? That's parents,
[33:38] Speaker 2: family members, extended family, adults in positions of care and control,
[33:43] Speaker 2: adults who the kids think they can trust. So, you know,
[33:46] Speaker 2: when we educate kids at primary school in stranger danger,
[33:51] Speaker 2: then those kids get a bit older and they turn
[33:53] Speaker 2: on TV, Netflix, Stan, Prime, Paramount, and 99% of depictions
[33:59] Speaker 2: of sex offenders have them as strangers. It's no wonder
[34:03] Speaker 2: that society thinks sexual crime is committed by this shadowy
[34:07] Speaker 2: figure with a balaclava on who jumps out of a
[34:10] Speaker 2: white van. Made us exceedingly real. Now, strangers can commit
[34:13] Speaker 2: sex crimes. No argument. They can, they do. You know,
[34:17] Speaker 2: I wrote a book 25 years ago that looks into
[34:19] Speaker 2: the psychology of that particular form of sexual crime. The
[34:22] Speaker 2: age group that I present to, it is exceedingly rare
[34:26] Speaker 2: for me to get disclosures from high school students relating
[34:31] Speaker 2: to recent, you know, if we're talking about historical stuff, yeah,
[34:35] Speaker 2: it can be strange. If it's a recent event that's
[34:37] Speaker 2: happened within the last 12 months, hardly ever is the
[34:41] Speaker 2: offender a stranger.
[34:42] Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
[34:44] Speaker 2: That's a tough pill to swallow because I think it's
[34:47] Speaker 2: easier as a society to think that sexual crime is
[34:50] Speaker 2: committed by people who we don't sort of know, connect with.
[34:55] Speaker 2: It's these evil sort of characters that I'd never meet. They're,
[34:59] Speaker 2: you know, head to toe, covered in tattoos and all. No,
[35:02] Speaker 2: it doesn't work like that.
[35:03] Speaker 1: So I think it's an important message to get. And
[35:06] Speaker 1: when we fall into past children, even adults, that quite
[35:12] Speaker 1: often the sex offender is someone you know, and then
[35:15] Speaker 1: we fall into that category of date rape and all that.
[35:18] Speaker 1: So you're vulnerable in that situation too.
[35:22] Speaker 2: Certainly, yeah. And one of the reasons when I'm talking
[35:24] Speaker 2: to students that I start by giving that sort of
[35:27] Speaker 2: gender risk profile thing is to say to them that
[35:31] Speaker 2: I want you to hear this so you've got a
[35:33] Speaker 2: foundation and a platform to what we're going to go
[35:35] Speaker 2: on and talk about. You're entitled to hear this because
[35:39] Speaker 2: a lot of conditioning is exactly as you said, or
[35:41] Speaker 2: the stuff that this guy's coming in to talk about
[35:43] Speaker 2: is stuff that strangers do. No, the stuff I'm talking
[35:46] Speaker 2: about is done in social environments. Now, I've never stopped.
[35:51] Speaker 2: When my son and my daughter were going through, I
[35:53] Speaker 2: never stopped my son and my daughter going to parties,
[35:55] Speaker 2: going out. They went to uni. They went to schoolies,
[35:59] Speaker 2: and they did the whole thing. It's not a question
[36:01] Speaker 2: of stopping kids doing it. It's like when kids are
[36:04] Speaker 2: very little, we don't just let them cross the road
[36:07] Speaker 2: on their own because they have no concept of, the danger.
[36:10] Speaker 2: So we go with them. We teach them, look left,
[36:13] Speaker 2: we do all that. I take that same principle that
[36:16] Speaker 2: I do. There's risk in everything that we do. Getting
[36:19] Speaker 2: in the car, driving for me out, well, there's a
[36:21] Speaker 2: risk attached, but how do you reduce the risk? Well,
[36:24] Speaker 2: you drive responsibly. That doesn't guarantee that you're not going
[36:27] Speaker 2: to have somebody drive up your ass in the car,
[36:29] Speaker 2: but you reduce the risk as much as you can.
[36:33] Speaker 2: Young people going to parties, is there a risk attached?
[36:35] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[36:36] Speaker 2: But if you know what the risk is, if you
[36:38] Speaker 2: understand it, if you're educated around it, you can reduce it.
[36:42] Speaker 1: Sexual harassment. You do a lot of training in regards
[36:46] Speaker 1: to that. You take on the sexual harassment. What are
[36:49] Speaker 1: we talking about? How would you define it? Good question.
[36:52] Speaker 1: How do we deal with it?
[36:53] Speaker 2: So to peel it back, sexual harassment is a policy
[36:57] Speaker 2: in place in every employer in Australia. It's linked, in essence,
[37:02] Speaker 2: I guess, to two pieces of legislation. So Workplace harassment
[37:07] Speaker 2: is basically behavior in a workplace that's uninvited, unwelcomed, unreciprocated,
[37:12] Speaker 2: and it leaves someone feeling intimidated, offended, or humiliated. And
[37:16] Speaker 2: there's one other step in that process. For that behavior
[37:19] Speaker 2: to be classified as harassment, that offense has to sort
[37:23] Speaker 2: of impede upon a protected attribute. So it's comments that
[37:27] Speaker 2: are racist, sexist, homophobic. So then alongside that, we have bullying,
[37:31] Speaker 2: which dropped into the workplace in policies 2014. And it's
[37:36] Speaker 2: really just a legislative filler between where harassment definition finishes
[37:42] Speaker 2: and then we're criminal. Because technically harassment is harassment because
[37:47] Speaker 2: it impedes upon anti-discrimination legislation. So then it's like, well, okay,
[37:52] Speaker 2: what do we call stuff that doesn't? What do we
[37:54] Speaker 2: call behavior in a workplace where I'm yelling and screaming,
[37:57] Speaker 2: being abusive, using foul language? Well, that's what we call bullying.
[38:03] Speaker 2: Then We have this third component of sexual harassment. Sexual
[38:06] Speaker 2: harassment's generally now most workplaces displayed as a standalone policy,
[38:12] Speaker 2: which is fine. I'm fine with that. Technically, it comes
[38:15] Speaker 2: under workplace harassment definition. It's uninvited, unwelcome behavior of a
[38:19] Speaker 2: sexual nature that intimidates, offends, humiliates. And it generally offends
[38:23] Speaker 2: on the basis of gender. So it meets all that criteria.
[38:26] Speaker 2: Sexual harassment also impedes upon sex discrimination legislation.
[38:31] Speaker 1: Right.
[38:32] Speaker 2: So when we look at its definition, it really refers to,
[38:35] Speaker 2: in a workplace setting, and universities and schools, of course,
[38:38] Speaker 2: still apply, but basically in a workplace setting, any behavior
[38:43] Speaker 2: of a sexual nature, verbal stuff, physical stuff, comment, yeah, anything,
[38:47] Speaker 2: that to the recipient is uninvited and unwelcomed, and that
[38:51] Speaker 2: causes some degree of offense and what have you. Interestingly
[38:56] Speaker 2: around this, mate, my first step into the corporate environment
[39:02] Speaker 2: came after I wrote that book, which was about 25
[39:04] Speaker 2: years ago.
[39:05] Speaker 1: You're talking about how dangerous men think.
[39:08] Speaker 2: And one of the talks I did was for a
[39:10] Speaker 2: group called Women in Finance, the Macquarie Street Weep Monks.
[39:13] Speaker 2: It's all these big hitters from all the big banks.
[39:15] Speaker 2: So I'm up there banging on about my book and stuff.
[39:17] Speaker 2: And there was a woman at that talk from Commonwealth Bank.
[39:22] Speaker 2: She read my book. She was head of HR, contacted
[39:24] Speaker 2: me afterwards, said, look, I know this is a bit
[39:26] Speaker 2: out of sync with your book, she said, but I'd
[39:28] Speaker 2: love for you to come in and have a chat.
[39:29] Speaker 2: to you about maybe doing some programs around sexual harassment
[39:32] Speaker 2: for the bank. So they were my first corporate client, 1999.
[39:36] Speaker 2: And what's interesting is if you'd sat in that first
[39:40] Speaker 2: talk that I did as an employer at Commonwealth Bank,
[39:42] Speaker 2: you'd have been in Martin Place in the city. If
[39:45] Speaker 2: you'd said to me, 1999, what's the number one most
[39:48] Speaker 2: common form of inappropriate workplace conduct that rears its head
[39:51] Speaker 2: in Australia?
[39:52] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[39:52] Speaker 2: Every study in 1999, sexual harassment.
[39:55] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[39:56] Speaker 2: If you asked me the same question today, same answer.
[39:59] Speaker 1: Right.
[39:59] Speaker 2: Still number one. Now, There's not as much of it
[40:03] Speaker 2: now as there was, and I think that's pretty much indisputable.
[40:06] Speaker 2: The level of inappropriate behavior in the modern workplace today
[40:10] Speaker 2: is far less than.
[40:11] Speaker 1: What it used to be. Well, back in 1999, we
[40:14] Speaker 1: hardly had a word for it.
[40:16] Speaker 2: Mate, exactly.
[40:17] Speaker 1: Now everyone's aware of it.
[40:19] Speaker 2: There's a greater awareness. There's greater consequence. There's a greater
[40:22] Speaker 2: expectation as young people come through. So the pile is less,
[40:27] Speaker 2: but sitting at the top of the pile in 99
[40:30] Speaker 2: was sexually based stuff, same as today. So the way
[40:33] Speaker 2: I look at it is, as I say that, just
[40:37] Speaker 2: one other interesting thing, sexual harassment behavior of a sexual nature,
[40:41] Speaker 2: which is upsetting, offensive, it doesn't have to be male
[40:46] Speaker 2: to female. There's no mention of gender in workplace policies,
[40:50] Speaker 2: but the most common form, Of sexual harassment, according to
[40:55] Speaker 2: all studies. It is usually, but not exclusively, it's male
[40:59] Speaker 2: to female conduct.
[41:00] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[41:01] Speaker 2: So the most common ingredient in male to female sexual harassment,
[41:04] Speaker 2: according to all research, is it is most likely to
[41:07] Speaker 2: be males in their 40s and 50s making unwanted, uninvited
[41:13] Speaker 2: sexual comments and advances towards female colleagues who will most
[41:18] Speaker 2: likely be under the age of 30. So if we
[41:21] Speaker 2: let that sort of sink in, That's pretty ordinary.
[41:25] Speaker 1: Very ordinary.
[41:26] Speaker 2: It's not great. And as recently as yesterday, I said,
[41:29] Speaker 2: so the human face of the most common form of
[41:33] Speaker 2: sexual harassment, which is still the most common form of
[41:36] Speaker 2: inappropriate workplace, is blokes of my age, of my vintage,
[41:39] Speaker 2: of my experience in the workplace, targeting young women for
[41:44] Speaker 2: sexual advances, sexual comments, who will most likely be about
[41:48] Speaker 2: the age of my daughter, who's 28. Yeah.
[41:51] Speaker 1: Well, it's creepy.
[41:52] Speaker 2: It's pretty dodgy. Now, the other thing here, the other
[41:54] Speaker 2: connection I make is I'm talking to 150 Year 11
[42:00] Speaker 2: girls at a girls' school after this chat here today. Yeah. 25%
[42:06] Speaker 2: of them, according to all independent studies, between 15 and
[42:09] Speaker 2: 21 will experience some form of sexual crime. So these
[42:13] Speaker 2: girls I talk to today, this time next year, they'll
[42:17] Speaker 2: be in their last one or two weeks of school
[42:18] Speaker 2: before they finish, do the HSC, and then they're off.
[42:21] Speaker 2: they're off to university, off to TAFE, into the workplace.
[42:25] Speaker 2: All of those young women, when they work into the
[42:27] Speaker 2: Australian workplace, when they walk in, 25% of them have
[42:31] Speaker 2: had some type of sexual offence committed against them because
[42:33] Speaker 2: Australia has amongst the highest statistics of sexual crime of
[42:36] Speaker 2: any surveyed country in the Western world. The number one
[42:39] Speaker 2: most common form of inappropriate workplace behaviour that awaits them
[42:43] Speaker 2: is blokes our age having a go at them sexually
[42:47] Speaker 2: in the workplace. And the reason I bring that together
[42:51] Speaker 2: is these two things aren't siloed. It's not a coincidence
[42:55] Speaker 2: that a country with a comparatively high sexual crime rate
[43:00] Speaker 2: is a country that for close to 30 years of
[43:03] Speaker 2: me doing this work, also sexually based conduct is the
[43:06] Speaker 2: most common form of inappropriate behavior in the world. It's
[43:10] Speaker 2: a cultural thing. It's a call it what you like.
[43:12] Speaker 2: It's just you can't separate the two.
[43:14] Speaker 1: It is a cultural thing. And I think it's disgraceful.
[43:19] Speaker 1: If you're a police officer, I was a police officer,
[43:22] Speaker 1: I saw the misogynistic world in which I operated in,
[43:26] Speaker 1: that they're starting to wake up to it. But yeah,
[43:29] Speaker 1: female police officers, Had a hell of a time.
[43:32] Speaker 2: Oh, man. It's unbelievable what it used to be like.
[43:35] Speaker 1: Yeah. I'd like to say it's no longer occurring. It's
[43:40] Speaker 1: better than it was. It's better than it was, but
[43:42] Speaker 1: it still is occurring.
[43:44] Speaker 2: The point that I make about that too, Gary, and
[43:46] Speaker 2: you're so right. I don't think anyone who has– you're
[43:50] Speaker 2: in the job for a long time. It's a lot better.
[43:53] Speaker 2: When I went through the job, they had a cap.
[43:55] Speaker 2: For every 100 that went through the academy, it was
[43:57] Speaker 2: capped at two females.
[43:59] Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
[43:59] Speaker 2: So it's 2%. Um, so those girls, they were girls,
[44:03] Speaker 2: they were 19. I mean, they had to live in
[44:05] Speaker 2: a police academy with, with 98, 19 year old blokes.
[44:08] Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
[44:09] Speaker 2: You know, then they're sent out on section. They're always
[44:12] Speaker 2: the only women on section.
[44:14] Speaker 1: Well, I, when I, I came in, into the police,
[44:16] Speaker 1: that was, I think it was the first time they
[44:19] Speaker 1: started introducing the affirmative action with the number of police women.
[44:22] Speaker 1: I think it was a third in each academy, academy
[44:26] Speaker 1: class around that time. And really we landed in an
[44:29] Speaker 1: environment that, uh, People just did not know how to
[44:32] Speaker 1: behave or deal with.
[44:34] Speaker 2: No, it's better now than it was.
[44:35] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[44:36] Speaker 2: But here's one thing I take from that also. And
[44:38] Speaker 2: I mentioned this yesterday. I said, there is no argument
[44:42] Speaker 2: that sexual harassment in the Australian workplace is less prevalent
[44:46] Speaker 2: today than it once was. But what we can't lose
[44:48] Speaker 2: sight of is if a young woman, the age of
[44:52] Speaker 2: my daughter, let's say, in a workplace in Sydney today
[44:54] Speaker 2: is subjected to that appalling type of conduct and behavior
[44:57] Speaker 2: from a bloke who's the age of a dad, The
[45:01] Speaker 2: impact that it has on that young woman is no
[45:04] Speaker 2: less today than it was happening 30 years ago simply
[45:09] Speaker 2: because it doesn't happen so often.
[45:11] Speaker 1: How would you advise or what are the appropriate practices?
[45:15] Speaker 1: Because I think back during my career that if I
[45:19] Speaker 1: saw that type of thing going on, I'd get the
[45:21] Speaker 1: bloke and pull his nose and pull him in the line.
[45:25] Speaker 1: It's not on. Whether that was the best way of
[45:27] Speaker 1: dealing with it, I don't know, but that's the way
[45:30] Speaker 1: I dealt with it. What structures are in place now
[45:32] Speaker 1: for sexual? Yeah, look, it's a very good question.
[45:34] Speaker 2: And one of the things that workplaces are really focused
[45:37] Speaker 2: on now, there's this term that's sort of dropped into
[45:40] Speaker 2: the workplace lexicon over the last few years of positive duty,
[45:43] Speaker 2: positive duty, which is sort of like saying, let's not
[45:47] Speaker 2: just focus on how we respond to an appropriate workplace conduct.
[45:51] Speaker 2: Let's also focus on what reasonable steps are we taking
[45:55] Speaker 2: to reduce it from happening in the first place. And
[45:58] Speaker 2: that has actually become a legal test. So if hypothetically
[46:01] Speaker 2: something happened in a place of employment in Australia today,
[46:04] Speaker 2: it ended up going outside of the workplace, Fair Work
[46:07] Speaker 2: Commission come and they step in. One of the questions
[46:09] Speaker 2: they're going to ask is what has this employer, this
[46:13] Speaker 2: place of employment done to reasonably take steps to reduce
[46:17] Speaker 2: this stuff from happening? So there's that application at the
[46:19] Speaker 2: top and all the way down. Now, when we start
[46:21] Speaker 2: talking about staff and things like that, one area, it's
[46:24] Speaker 2: not the only part, but one area that I think
[46:27] Speaker 2: we can get some work done is A lot of
[46:30] Speaker 2: people may not know the definition of things like harassment
[46:34] Speaker 2: or bullying or even sexual harassment, even the thing we
[46:36] Speaker 2: call the workplace. A lot of people think, oh, it's
[46:38] Speaker 2: just the four walls on which you work.
[46:40] Speaker 1: Well, quite often in big organisations, it's part of the
[46:42] Speaker 1: mandatory training that you get a PowerPoint presentation or an
[46:46] Speaker 1: online training. It doesn't really sink in.
[46:49] Speaker 2: And, mate, I tell you what, if they're doing that
[46:51] Speaker 2: to try and protect themselves for something down the track, well,
[46:53] Speaker 2: they're kidding themselves. There is no online training on workplace
[46:58] Speaker 2: harassment that would stand up. to any scrutiny in a
[47:01] Speaker 2: courtroom environment. It just doesn't happen. And I can say that, mate,
[47:03] Speaker 2: because I used to put those together for corporations. I
[47:06] Speaker 2: used to go and do it. Now the legal basis
[47:09] Speaker 2: is now that's all you've done, you haven't done enough.
[47:11] Speaker 2: It has to be some form of communicated, you know,
[47:16] Speaker 2: presentation where there's a list of, you know, what has
[47:20] Speaker 2: gone through, who attended and all the rest of it. So, yeah, it's–
[47:25] Speaker 2: I think there's also, for mine– You've got to start
[47:29] Speaker 2: by informing people of these terms and what they mean
[47:32] Speaker 2: and then empowering them to call it out if it
[47:35] Speaker 2: happens to them or whether they see it. Because this
[47:36] Speaker 2: whole positive duty thing is saying we want to hear
[47:39] Speaker 2: about this stuff at the lowest possible level. We don't
[47:42] Speaker 2: want to hear about it when it's a 9 out
[47:43] Speaker 2: of 10 because every 9 out of 10 starts out
[47:46] Speaker 2: as a 1.
[47:47] Speaker 1: You make a valid point there because quite often that's
[47:50] Speaker 1: when it could be stopped. At the early stages.
[47:52] Speaker 2: Oh, 100%.
[47:52] Speaker 1: Just, hey, this is not appropriate. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[47:55] Speaker 2: Now, that doesn't mean the person has to do that themselves,
[47:58] Speaker 2: but it means that they then can say, well, okay,
[48:01] Speaker 2: the way that I'm feeling about what's been said or done,
[48:03] Speaker 2: I'm not comfortable with that. That's in line with what
[48:06] Speaker 2: I heard in that training or whatever it was. I'm
[48:09] Speaker 2: going to have a chat to my boss. Yeah. So
[48:12] Speaker 2: I come to you. You're my manager now. As a manager,
[48:13] Speaker 2: you have a moral, ethical, legal obligation under corporate law
[48:16] Speaker 2: to take action to address that. And we want to
[48:19] Speaker 2: hear about this stuff as early as we can. What's
[48:21] Speaker 2: interesting too, mate, is we do a bit of a
[48:24] Speaker 2: deep dive on this, is even things like the workplace,
[48:29] Speaker 2: quite a high percentage of inappropriate workplace conduct, sexual harassment
[48:32] Speaker 2: and other things, happen in an environment that people don't
[48:35] Speaker 2: actually even classify as the workplace. It's when they're socializing.
[48:38] Speaker 2: It's after hours. So the definition of the workplace extends
[48:41] Speaker 2: to anywhere you are with those who work.
[48:43] Speaker 1: That's an important message.
[48:44] Speaker 2: It's a really important message. Yeah. All the big organizations
[48:48] Speaker 2: I work in still to this day get a spike
[48:50] Speaker 2: of complaints of inappropriate workplace conduct early November, mid-December.
[48:54] Speaker 1: Why?
[48:54] Speaker 2: It's Christmas parties. You and I have been around the
[48:58] Speaker 2: block a few times. There's quite a few corporations that
[49:01] Speaker 2: use me in different roles. One of the roles is
[49:03] Speaker 2: to come in when someone has been alleged of inappropriate conduct.
[49:07] Speaker 2: It's been investigated and substantiated. They're on a first and
[49:10] Speaker 2: final warning. And they want to bring someone like me in,
[49:14] Speaker 2: because I work for that company, to sit down and
[49:16] Speaker 2: really read the riot act a bit to them. And
[49:18] Speaker 2: I can tell you. you what's 27 years every one
[49:22] Speaker 2: of those I've done pretty much is blokes about our
[49:24] Speaker 2: age their behaviour is always sexually based behaviour usually alcohol
[49:29] Speaker 2: fuelled and the targets are usually women in their 20s
[49:32] Speaker 2: and I still to this day think why are we
[49:36] Speaker 2: still having to have this discussion.
[49:37] Speaker 1: You know I say it like it's almost a cultural
[49:43] Speaker 1: thing where people condone it or just– Yeah.
[49:45] Speaker 2: In some places, it's more condoned than others. Of course,
[49:47] Speaker 2: some places are better at dealing with it than others.
[49:50] Speaker 1: Sadly, the people that you're describing as the perpetrators tend
[49:53] Speaker 1: to be the people that are in power in the organizations.
[49:56] Speaker 2: They can be. They can be, yeah.
[49:58] Speaker 1: So it's self-serving that they don't blow it up.
[50:01] Speaker 2: And I think generally, you know, you've got kids, so
[50:04] Speaker 2: have I. And I think generally the younger folks coming
[50:06] Speaker 2: through are the ones that are Less tolerant, more demanding of–
[50:11] Speaker 2: it's like my daughter's age group. Here's an example. She's
[50:15] Speaker 2: a corporate lawyer.
[50:16] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[50:17] Speaker 2: I mean, law as an industry had a pretty ordinary
[50:22] Speaker 2: reputation to how they treated women for a long, long time.
[50:25] Speaker 2: Things have changed. They're not perfect, but it's a whole
[50:28] Speaker 2: lot better. So the world that the young women like
[50:31] Speaker 2: my daughter are going into, the workplace, is a better
[50:34] Speaker 2: place now than it was, say, for my wife's generation.
[50:37] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[50:38] Speaker 2: But it doesn't mean we take our eye off the ball.
[50:40] Speaker 2: We can still keep improving that, you know.
[50:42] Speaker 1: Well, I think in my humble opinion, if you take
[50:46] Speaker 1: your eye off the ball, we just slip back into
[50:48] Speaker 1: old practices. Yeah. And it will be occurring again. So
[50:53] Speaker 1: we've got to be proactive about it. It's so true.
[50:56] Speaker 2: That's such a valid comment. Some years ago, a lot
[50:59] Speaker 2: of the talks I did in the corporate environment was
[51:01] Speaker 2: based around sexual harassment. And then a lot of those folks,
[51:05] Speaker 2: and it was just indicative of the time, a lot
[51:08] Speaker 2: of the decision makers around that came to me and said, look,
[51:11] Speaker 2: we've sort of done this whole sexual harassment thing to
[51:13] Speaker 2: death a bit. Everyone's aware of it. So can we
[51:16] Speaker 2: start to change the content of your presentations a little
[51:20] Speaker 2: bit more around bullying?
[51:20] Speaker 1: Yeah, sure.
[51:21] Speaker 2: I'll do whatever. They're the client. So we went from
[51:25] Speaker 2: talking about it quite a lot to suddenly pulling back.
[51:27] Speaker 2: And here we are today. It's still the most common.
[51:31] Speaker 2: So yeah, I do talk about it in my talks.
[51:34] Speaker 2: I unapologetically align it with the work that I do
[51:38] Speaker 2: in schools and things like that. And I say, to
[51:40] Speaker 2: those in the room. We've got to have a zero
[51:42] Speaker 2: tolerance for this.
[51:43] Speaker 1: I think so because I saw how hard policing was
[51:46] Speaker 1: and that's from a male's point of view and I
[51:49] Speaker 1: saw the police women coming through and we had a
[51:53] Speaker 1: reunion from our original class a year or so ago
[51:58] Speaker 1: and I was speaking to some of the girls that
[51:59] Speaker 1: we went through the class with and we were talking
[52:01] Speaker 1: about the podcast. but saying you had no idea what
[52:05] Speaker 1: we were confronted with when we graduated and went out
[52:08] Speaker 1: into the, because you're spread out into all different stations. Yes, yes.
[52:11] Speaker 1: And some of the stories and some of the things
[52:13] Speaker 1: we had to put up with, and these are, Hard, tough,
[52:16] Speaker 1: capable ladies. They spent over three decades in the police. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[52:21] Speaker 1: And they're still saying you'd be horrified by what we
[52:23] Speaker 1: had to.
[52:23] Speaker 2: Put up with. And no avenue for them to raise it.
[52:27] Speaker 2: They put their hand up to raise that. Well, they're gone.
[52:28] Speaker 2: They're out the door.
[52:30] Speaker 1: Exactly. So I'm glad you're getting that message.
[52:33] Speaker 2: It's better now. And you know what, mate? As ex-coppers,
[52:35] Speaker 2: I live over the eastern suburbs there, and I still
[52:38] Speaker 2: to this day, if I'm out and about and I
[52:40] Speaker 2: see an I-car go past and there's two young men
[52:43] Speaker 2: A policewoman, and it brings a smile to my face.
[52:45] Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
[52:46] Speaker 2: It's because that would never happen in my day. You know,
[52:48] Speaker 2: New Zealand police, when I was policing in the 80s
[52:51] Speaker 2: through the 90s, probably the highest ranked officer I ever
[52:55] Speaker 2: met who was female was probably a senior sergeant. Yeah, yeah.
[52:57] Speaker 2: That would have been about it because two out of
[53:00] Speaker 2: every hundred, most of them left.
[53:04] Speaker 1: It's a hard job, as I said. It's tough for blokes. Yeah,
[53:07] Speaker 1: when there's that harassment or discrimination. But I certainly thought
[53:12] Speaker 1: within policing, especially like from criminal investigation side of things,
[53:17] Speaker 1: I always look for having a balanced team because I
[53:21] Speaker 1: think they can bring in different perspectives.
[53:23] Speaker 2: Oh, totally.
[53:25] Speaker 1: Yeah, 100%. Different energy into the team. But they should
[53:28] Speaker 1: be protected. So I think, yeah, sexual harassment is something that–
[53:32] Speaker 1: needs to be out there and talked about.
[53:33] Speaker 2: Yeah, and, you know, most corporations, you know, probably 30,
[53:36] Speaker 2: 35 groups that I work with get me in every
[53:38] Speaker 2: couple of years, and they're all right behind this. And,
[53:41] Speaker 2: you know, the days of companies sort of sweeping their
[53:44] Speaker 2: son on the carpet, that's probably a rarity. It's an
[53:46] Speaker 2: exception now where.
[53:48] Speaker 1: It once was the rule.
[53:49] Speaker 2: It can still happen, but not to the same degree.
[53:51] Speaker 1: Everywhere, you can't just, oh, it was just a Christmas party.
[53:53] Speaker 1: We'll behave next year, and that's gone by the wayside.
[53:56] Speaker 2: And we talk about consequence, don't we? And sadly, it's probably–
[54:02] Speaker 2: due to the fact that the consequence of not dealing
[54:06] Speaker 2: with stuff fiscally is more damaging than if you deal
[54:11] Speaker 2: with it.
[54:11] Speaker 1: Yeah, well, we are trying to get better, I think,
[54:13] Speaker 1: and I'm saying that in a general sense, but there's
[54:16] Speaker 1: always room for improvement. I hope the conversations that we've had,
[54:22] Speaker 1: especially about young adults, resonate with whether it's parents or
[54:27] Speaker 1: young adults themselves. I think it's some important messaging. And
[54:32] Speaker 1: I had your book, How Dangerous Men Think and How
[54:36] Speaker 1: to Stay Safe for Life. It's an old book, but
[54:39] Speaker 1: there's still a lot in there that resonate.
[54:42] Speaker 2: And it's now, it's so old, mate, that it's no,
[54:45] Speaker 2: I think you get about five or six rotations of
[54:48] Speaker 2: print in a book. And that was published around 2001,
[54:52] Speaker 2: I think, but it's accessible online. It's on Amazon. You
[54:55] Speaker 2: can download it as an e-book for, I think, $ 10, $ 11.
[54:58] Speaker 1: I found it as an e-book and an interesting read.
[55:01] Speaker 1: Lots of things to learn from there.
[55:03] Speaker 2: I sharpened up a little bit a few years ago
[55:04] Speaker 2: when it transitioned from being sort of in print across
[55:07] Speaker 2: to an e-book, if you like. I went through it
[55:12] Speaker 2: to say, well, okay, what changed? And I did make some,
[55:14] Speaker 2: but what was interesting is, you know, we've said this before,
[55:17] Speaker 2: the stuff that we're talking about, that the guts of
[55:20] Speaker 2: it hasn't changed all that much. Now, look, of course,
[55:23] Speaker 2: now we could include in all of that the online stuff,
[55:25] Speaker 2: and there's a whole book just in that. But as
[55:28] Speaker 2: I went through all of that, I thought, well, you know,
[55:29] Speaker 2: there's probably not a lot that needs changing here. The
[55:32] Speaker 2: laws are pretty much the same, a few tweaks. So
[55:34] Speaker 2: it seems to be the book is as well received
[55:37] Speaker 2: today as it was when it first came out many
[55:39] Speaker 2: years ago. And I think it was one of those
[55:42] Speaker 2: times where it was the first book that put a
[55:46] Speaker 2: lot of that profiling and psychology behind crime. It put
[55:51] Speaker 2: it into sort of a package that people could.
[55:54] Speaker 1: What I liked about it, Brent, was the fact that
[55:58] Speaker 1: a lot of stuff that you were saying or said
[56:00] Speaker 1: in the book, I understood and knew it, but didn't
[56:04] Speaker 1: have the research in support of it. It was my instinct,
[56:07] Speaker 1: my experiences. Yeah, that makes sense. But you brought in
[56:10] Speaker 1: a lot of the research that sort of backs up.
[56:12] Speaker 2: Yeah, well, that gives, like you said before, Gary, that
[56:15] Speaker 2: gives some depth to, it's not just an opinion.
[56:18] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[56:19] Speaker 2: I'm saying this because of this, this, and this. And
[56:21] Speaker 2: you may have a different view, and that's totally fine.
[56:24] Speaker 2: And if your different view can be backed up with
[56:26] Speaker 2: more research, well, then you stick to it. But I'm
[56:29] Speaker 2: comfortable telling you this because I can back it.
[56:32] Speaker 1: Up with you. Well, I reckon the fact that you've
[56:34] Speaker 1: been talking about this for so long in the schools
[56:37] Speaker 1: and for over 30 years says something about the messaging
[56:42] Speaker 1: you're delivering. So I want to thank you for coming
[56:45] Speaker 1: on the podcast. Thanks for your time as a cop.
[56:47] Speaker 1: I know that has its ups and downs, the highs
[56:50] Speaker 1: and lows in policing. But more importantly, the messaging you're
[56:54] Speaker 1: getting across. I think it's important because, you know, young people,
[56:57] Speaker 1: life's hard enough. And if we can give them a
[56:59] Speaker 1: head start or point them in the right direction, give
[57:02] Speaker 1: them sound advice, I think you're doing some good stuff.
[57:05] Speaker 1: So I hope you keep up the energy and keep
[57:07] Speaker 1: doing it. Thanks, mate.
[57:08] Speaker 2: It's been an absolute pleasure to chat to you. And,
[57:10] Speaker 2: you know, folks listening in can take something out of
[57:12] Speaker 2: this and, well, then that's all worthwhile.
[57:15] Speaker 1: Excellent. Cheers, sir.
[57:18] Speaker 2: Thank you.

Shows are listed from Apple Podcasts' charts and directory, and Podcast Index where it is used. Every show and episode belongs to its publisher and plays from the publisher's own feed; this site hosts none of them.