SASVic’s impact, 2024-2025
Acknowledgement
SASVic acknowledges Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the traditional and ongoing Custodians of the lands on which we live and work. We pay our respects to Elders past and present. We acknowledge that sovereignty was never ceded and recognise First Nations peoples’ right to self-determination and continuing connection to land, waters, community and culture.
SASVic also acknowledges victim survivors of sexual violence who we work for every day. We acknowledge the pervasive nature of sexual violence, and the impact that it has on survivors and their communities.
On this page:
About SASVic
Reflecting on the last year
Our 2025-2026 Annual Report and Financial Report
Innovating recovery across the sector and beyond
Preventing sexual violence
Upholding survivor rights and driving change
Workforce development and learning from abroad
Our Strategic Directions
Strategic Direction 1. Ensure people affected by sexual violence have access to high-quality, timely specialist therapeutic support.
Strategic Direction 2. Build community capacity to prevent, recognise and respond to sexual violence.
Strategic Direction 3. Drive structural and systemic change.
Strategic Direction 4. Grow and resource the specialist sexual assault and harmful sexual behaviour workforce and peak.
About SASVic
Sexual Assault Services Victoria (SASVic) is the peak body for 19 specialist sexual assault and harmful sexual behaviour services in Victoria. We work to promote rights, recovery and respect for all people impacted by sexual violence, including children and young people engaging in harmful sexual behaviour. We seek to achieve this by working collectively to change the attitudes, systems and structures that enable sexual violence to occur. We know that sexual violence is harmful, pervasive and preventable, and its impacts are felt across the community.
SASVic’s members bring over 30 years of feminist practice and specialist expertise to the task of reforming system responses.
Reflecting on the last year
Message from SASVic’s Chair, Kate Wright
If in our first years we knocked on countless doors advocating for stronger action on sexual violence, this year many doors opened. Our staff, partnerships, training and program scope all grew.
Having successfully campaigned for the introduction of Justice Navigators, we worked with Family Safety Victoria to scope these roles and began a new Victorian Legal Services Board-funded program to improve outcomes for victim survivors seeking compensation. With members, we developed new peer and support worker roles, leveraging the federal '500 workers' funding. Our sold-out Recovery Day – our first mini-conference – brought together practitioners and colleagues from alcohol and other drugs, dentistry, equine assisted learning, media, mental health, and more, plus, as in any women-dominated gathering, survivors. Ghost the miniature pony was a clear favourite.
Our prevention webinar with local and international experts was a nuanced exploration of what works to prevent sexual violence, moving beyond polarised debate. Our training and community education program expanded, including revamped legal training, bespoke clinical supervision training, AIM3 training on harmful sexual behaviour, our yearly Foundations course with Professor Fiona Vera-Gray, tailored Responding to Disclosures of Sexual Abuse training, and new work with the Victorian Liquor Commission.
We made a major submission to the Australian Law Reform Commission’s justice review, campaigned for stronger vicarious liability laws for child sexual abuse, and successfully advocated for stronger, longer funding cycles. Thank you to the Victorian Government - especially Family Safety Victoria and the Centre for Workforce Excellence - for your ongoing support. My heartfelt thanks to our wonderful members, SASVic colleagues who constantly strive for our work to be high-impact, and our committed board. My particular thanks to Chair Kate Wright for her dedication, big vision and inclusiveness.
Demonstrating the sustained and persistent perpetration of sexual violence, this financial year ended with the disturbing news that hundreds of very young children had been exposed to an alleged child sex abuser. SASVic member services were on the front-line responding to affected children and families, and SASVic played a crucial coordination and resourcing role, reinforcing the importance of a responsive sexual assault services peak body. SASVic has grown in many ways this year, including in knowledge, connections, independence and membership. One highlight was our inaugural study tour, which has continued since our return home to both inspire improvements in our sector and ripple out beyond the sexual assault sector. Marking another transition in our development, this year we moved from being auspiced to being fully independent. Thank you to Mallee Sexual Assault Service for supporting us as we found our feet in our initial years. In terms of growth in membership, we ended the financial year by welcoming Windermere Services as our newest, and nineteenth, member.
Message from SASVic’s CEO, Kathleen Maltzahn
SASVic is proud of the work achieved in the 2024-2025 financial year.
Read on for the highlights from the year. Our annual report and financial report are also now available. Click the expand button to read the report full screen.
2024-2025 Annual Report and Financial Report
Recovery Day
In February 2025, SASVic was joined by experts across the state to explore effective recovery after sexual violence at our event Sexual Violence: The Right to Recovery.
We were pleased to be joined by therapeutic practitioners, survivor-advocates, peer-educators, academics and multicultural organisations to celebrate the impact of feminist counselling and call for more non-traditional options for survivors, such as peer-support groups.
Not Alone Pilot Program
The Not Alone pilot program was developed in response to the advocacy of two survivors, Macca and Chris. The two men highlighted, first to government and then to SASVic, that there was a significant gap in group programs for gay men who have experienced child sexual abuse. In collaboration with three of our member services, the SAFV Centre, Eastern CASA and South Eastern CASA, we successfully tested a cross-sector model to provide a safe and inclusive psycho-education group.
“The women hope for a culturally sensitive approach which is more than listening and believing but understanding the complex experiences and the potential backlash they might face from family and community.”
We were delighted to be able to share findings from the REACH Project and the research of Bree Weizenegger on the impact of feminist counselling.
We heard the range of things that can support someone’s recovery after sexual violence, from justice and advocacy to peer-support groups, as well as art, dentistry, writing, boxing and equine-assisted learning.
Staff from the specialist sexual assault sector and beyond came together to explore different approaches, models and frameworks.
It was an energising day and we were so happy to hear from so many from across sector and beyond.
Access to Sexual Assault Services for Refugee Background Women
SASVic partnered with Centre of Advancing Women (COAW), a grassroots women’s organisation that offers culturally sensitive, community-driven support for marginalised women, especially those from African disapora.
As part of our partnership, COAW published a report that provided insight into the barriers that migrant and refugee women face and how making changes, such as moving towards in-person intake appointments can increase cultural safety in the sector.
Improving accessibility
SASVic undertook an audit to increase the accessibility of our organisation using a tool developed in partnership with Women with Disabilities Victoria. As a result, SASVic was pleased to introduce the ReciteMe tool bar and accessibility checker to our website.
SASVic also re-vamped a series of easy read booklets for sexual violence survivors as part of the Making Rights Reality program at South Eastern CASA. Easy read is a communication format specifically designed to make content simple, clear and easily understandable.
Counselling after sexual assault booklet
Crisis care after sexual assault booklet
Innovating recovery across the sector
Preventing sexual violence
Sexual violence is not inevitable and our sector is well placed to work with the community to prevent it. This year, we hosted the Preventing Sexual Violence webinar, bringing together experts Emily Maguire, Professor Michael Salter, Kathleen Maltzahn and Professor Fiona Vera-Gray to explore what works and where the gaps are.
Supporting Young People to Understand Affirmative Consent
Thirteen incredible projects funded by the Victorian Government as part of the Supporting Young People to Understand Affirmative Consent program began to wrap up this year and with it, SASVic’s involvement.
It has been a privilege to support the projects alongside Safe and Equal and YACVic, and to be a part of shaping community education around affirmative consent and health relationships.
We’re excited to see how the projects will continue to empower young people and their key influencers.
Intimate partner sexual violence
In partnership with No to Violence, we developed a resource for practitioners working with people who use family violence to improve understanding, awareness and responses to intimate partner sexual violence (IPSV). IPSV is a high-risk indicator of escalating family violence that often co-occurs with other forms of abuse.
Responding to emerging trends
SASVic and our members have been responding to emerging issues, including the rise of non-fatal strangulation (NFS) and non-consensual deepfakes. As part of this response, SASVic called for stronger regulation of tech companies and support for those harmed, and advocated for recognition of NFS within sexual violence, while raising awareness of the links between NFS, sexual violence and pornography.
We’ve put together fact sheets on non-fatal strangulation and the impacts of pornography, drawing on our previous research.
“It’s about listening to the practice-based knowledge of people on the ground. I think that’s why services are so important as part of this conversation on prevention.”
Upholding survivor rights and driving change
Specialist sexual assault services transform lives and need substantial investment. However, this year, our sector faced a funding cliff that could have resulted in a devastating loss of counselling for survivors and skilled staff.
In response, SASVic launched the Rights. Recovery. Respect. campaign ahead of the 2025 Victorian state budget, calling on the government to invest in upholding survivors’ rights, accessible and flexible recovery and respect for the sector.
We secured state-wide media to raise the alarm about the unacceptable amount of funding leaving the sector and the increase in harmful sexual behaviour in schools that urgently needed attention. The campaign resulted in long-term funding for specialist sexual assault services and funding to expand responses to harmful sexual behaviour in schools.
We’ll be launching a new campaign at the beginning of 2026, so watch this space!
SASVic’s advocacy
SASVic provided submissions to inquiries on range of important issues, including non-disclosure agreements, responses to older people, criminalising non-consensual deepfakes, forced marriages, responses to cults, data on perpetrators and the Australian Law Reform Commission’s inquiry into sexual violence responses.
SASVic used every opportunity to draw on the expertise of our members and to advocate for better support for survivors of sexual violence and strong prevention of sexual violence.
Justice Navigator pilot program
After this year, development of the highly anticipated Justice Navigator pilot program is now underway. The program, co-designed by SASVic and Family Safety Victoria will help survivors to navigate complex systems and exercise their rights.
We have also greatly welcomed funding to look at how the program can be adapted for children and young people.
Thank you to the victim survivors, specialist sexual assault services, other service providers and justice stakeholders who participated in the Justice Navigator consultation phase for their wise advice and input into the design of the pilot.
Civil Justice and Recovery Project
Justice can take many forms, including financial assistance and compensation. Our Civil Justice and Recovery (CJR) project aims to improve access and outcomes for survivors seeking and receiving compensation.
This project also includes training for plaintiff lawyers, financial counsellors and financial advisors, as well as helpful new resources.
Thank you to the victim survivors, specialist sexual assault services, organisations and individual lawyers, financial advisors and financial counsellors who have supported the CJR Project through consultation, advice and participation in CJR training.
Capturing data on family violence perpetrators
SASVic and specialist services are well placed to collect data and conduct research on sexual violence but without dedicated funding for modernised data infrastructure and research roles, we are missing important opportunities. In 2025, we were invited to give evidence to the Inquiry into capturing data on family violence perpetrators in Victoria where we emphasised this strongly. We were pleased that the Inquiry report reinforced our calls for resourcing.
Upholding survivor rights
SASVic continued our advocacy for survivor rights over the last year through our campaign with Fair Agenda for pre-recorded evidence and our calls for an urgent legislative response to the High Court decision of Bird v DP which frees institutions from vicarious liability for the acts of people engaged without a formal employment contract, such as priests. The Victorian Government have committed to change this by the end of 2025.
Workforce development and learning from abroad
Foundations in sexual violence short course
We were joined again this year by international expert Dr Fiona Vera-Gray to deliver our short course. We were also joined by local experts Jackie Bateman, Imogen O’Neil form SAFV Centre, Madeleine Clifford and Professor Michael Salter for a Victorian perspective.
“I cannot tell you the value that it offered both professionally and personally. The training reconnected me to the feminist theoretical constructs I hold true.”
Sector study tour
A delegation of SASVic members and colleagues embarked on a study tour through Europe. We visited inspiring organisations from across the UK, Europe and Scandinavia to find out more about what is working abroad and different approaches to the similar challenges we face.
“One of the themes today – and across our first week – has been how much group work is offered in Ireland and the UK.
They’re much more common than in the Victorian sexual assault sector, and we’re inspired by the range and depth of what is offered. Ruhama, for example, has a group program for survivors who are also grappling with drug and alcohol issues and mental illness that they say participants who have been failed by other approaches love, and One in Four has a wide range of groups for survivors, perpetrators and their families.”
Workforce development
We expanded the workforce development program with our first independent training on clinical supervision. We also ran a new series of Member Services Forums, facilitating deep dives into topics like older people’s experiences of sexual violence, promoting healthier relationships for trans people and the increase in non-fatal strangulation.
Accessing sexual violence support
If you or someone you know has experienced sexual assault, there are specialist sexual assault services across Victoria that provide free and confidential counselling and advocacy support for people of all ages.
You can find your local service by using the Specialist Sexual Assault Service Map.
If you have experienced a recent sexual assault, you can call the Sexual Assault Crisis Line (SACL) on 1800 806 292.
SACL operates between 5pm - 9am on weeknights and throughout weekends and public holidays. During office hours, the line will divert to your local specialist sexual assault service.