ACC halts rollout of second stage of sexual violence prevention plan

Wednesday, 16 July 2025

ACC has decided not to expand its sexual violence programme.

A decision by ACC to scrap the extension for a sexual violence prevention programme this year is short sighted, disappointing and frustrating, say critics. .

In September 2024, ACC launched a sexual violence prevention programme called “Hikitia! For Our Future”. Budgeted at just under $45 million over four years, experts would visit locations such as schools and workplaces to give information and advice on preventing abuse. Five community partners were initially announced.

ACC’s website, marked in September last year, still says it will announce the next regions (Phase 2) in early 2025.

“These first five partners are just the start,” it says. “By 2026, we hope to have around 80 kaimahi across 16 organisations and 16 rohe (regions) as part of this community-led prevention network.”

That did not happen.

Former Green MP Jan Logie is board chair of sexual harm prevention organisation RespectEd Aotearoa, which had intended to apply for the tender of phase 2.

ACC has confirmed its expansion of phase 2 during the 2025/26 financial year would not go ahead, and would only be reviewed at some point the following financial year in 2026/27.

Former Green MP Jan Logie, who is also board chair of sexual harm prevention organisation RespectEd Aotearoa, which had intended to apply for the tender of phase 2, said “one of the reasons given to the sector for pausing the rollout of the country’s only sexual violence prevention programme was cost”.

Jake Searell, Kaihautū Mahi | Manager, Strategy and Operations, RespectEd Aotearoa. says ACC has broken its promise.

“It’s exceptionally short sighted … We have to at some point actually do the work to prevent the violence in the first place.”

Logie said a plan for the rollout was on ACC’s website. “There was an understanding politically that this was the replacement for healthy relationships programme ‘Mate and Dates’.”

Jake Searell, operations manager of RespectEd Aotearoa, said a promise of prevention funding “was made to the New Zealand public and the organisations that serve them in the form of Te Aorerekura (the national strategy to eliminate family violence) and subsequently through Hikitia! - ACC have broken that promise”.

“Ultimately, as advocates for the prevention of sexual violence in Aotearoa, we want to see a substantial financial commitment to addressing this issue. Anything less is unacceptable given our shocking rates of harm.”

ACC head of injury prevention Renee Graham said the agency looked at “how our funding and outputs are delivering on our sexual violence prevention programme”.

“As a result, we decided not to expand Hikitia! this financial year. We continue to work with our five existing lead providers in the five regions, and we want to learn from their experience to ensure we have the right mechanisms in place before expanding it further.

“Prevention of sexual violence remains a focus area for ACC and we expect to spend approximately $8 million on prevention of sexual violence this financial year.”

Graham said ACC’s sexual violence prevention approach “complements healing and response services”.

Labour ACC spokesperson Camilla Belich said the halt was “extremely disappointing to hear, and extremely concerning for the whole of the country”.

Pausing the rollout, even for a year was “a big deal, because a victim of sexual violence lives with the consequences of that for the rest of their lives, and that's exactly what we see through ACC again and again”.

“Any delay in prevention is likely to lead to increase in harm, and that harm can sometimes change people's lives irreparably.”

ACC Minister Scott Simpson says ACC wants to ensure it has the right mechanisms in place.

Hadley Taylor of Rape Prevention Education said in a country “that already has some of the worst rates of sexual violence within the developed world, and already it's costing our economy and also hurting our people to unspoken degrees, it is baffling that any prevention efforts would be stopped”.

ACC’s 2021 commissioned report estimated the total cost of sexual violence in New Zealand in 2020 was $6.9 billion.

ACC Minister Scott Simpson said in a statement that “ACC wants to ensure it has the right mechanisms in place to deliver in this area for future years”.

“ACC’s sexual violence prevention approach complements healing and response services, including ACC’s Sensitive Claims services, by strengthening communities to prevent violence and creating supportive environments for disclosures and support.”