Commercial sexual exploitation of Children
Pathway Map for Victim-Survivors

Communication, relationships, and information sharing

Almost all the organisations surveyed for this project spontaneously volunteered that both communication and relationships are something that are important to the success of existing systems. All government departments consulted reported that the strength of their relationships and quality of communication with each other were factors which improved the outcomes that they were able to deliver for victim-survivors. Similarly, Netsafe and Victim Support responses highlighted that good communication, and agencies having a good understanding of the roles and responsibilities of the other agencies that they work with, was something that they had prioritised putting effort into to streamline referrals.

Information sharing between agencies, for purposes of referrals, needs to be carefully managed to ensure that privacy is maintained and this has meant that some communication has required legislative change. After identifying in 2020 that DIA, New Zealand Customs, the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs were not recognized as Child Protection Welfare Agencies under the Oranga Tamariki Act 1989, an amendment to the Oranga Tamariki Act was made in July 2022, to include recognition of all four agencies. This also exemplifies the need to constantly conduct ‘environmental scans’ to ensure legislation, policy and practice are responsive to the global child protection challenges that we are responding to within NZ borders.

Options for anonymous reporting

The availability of anonymous reporting options, through organisations such as Crime Stoppers was highlighted as being a strength to existing referral pathways because it provides an avenue for gathering intelligence which might otherwise not be disclosed. Anonymous reporting goes beyond confidentiality, which comes with limitations and exceptions, and means that those who wish to disclose information to authorities without ever being identified can do so.  These services are often used by those who don’t want to make a complaint but want to prevent what they endured from happening to anyone else. Similarly, those who have had poor experiences interacting with authorities previously may not feel safe to come forward openly or may initially disclose confidentially and then progress to being comfortable identifying themselves once rapport and confidence is built. For some people, an anonymous service is the only way that they will ever feel safe to speak out.

It is well established that victims of traffickers often become involved with other forms of crime, sometimes through force or coercion by a trafficker. Anonymous reporting can provide a safe avenue for people in this situation to be able to disclose what is happening without fear of being prosecuted for their involvement in criminal activity. This may be particularly true for victim-survivors with insecure immigration status.

Crime Stoppers also identified the importance of the language used for anonymous reporting, suggesting that all such systems should be labelled an enquiry rather than report or complaint process. This labelling does not make a difference in the outcomes being achieved but many people are unsure and distrustful of the system and if it is labelled as a report or complaint, it may put many vulnerable people off engaging.

Services for tamariki in rural areas

Except for Auckland, major concerns were reported about the access that children have to a robust Sexual Assault Assessment and Treatment Service. For children living in remote areas this is even more so, sometimes resulting in the child receiving no service.

One of the key issues identified here was that forensic medical examinations for children are done by Health NZ paediatricians, and the number of paediatricians who will do them is too small. An attempt is being made to address this by offering improved contracts to staff to increase retention, but there are currently insufficient clinicians doing this work. Southland is very stretched, with sometimes only a single doctor in Invercargill to serve the whole region.

In addition to the low prevalence of self-disclosure for children who are victims-survivors of CSEC, those who do disclose often face detectives having to transport them huge distances to access health services. Our informants recounted instances of young people having to be driven up to 5 hours to access a forensic medical assessment. For victim-survivors who have been offended against by someone close to them, explaining an absence of a full day to travel to a service provider may be impossible. This then either becomes a risk to the client’s safety, or a barrier to them being able to attend the service at all.

Such long travel times also add to the length of time that a victim can’t have a shower, contributes to exhaustion, and risks increasing the likelihood of secondary traumatisation. For young people who are in a vulnerable situation, it is often just not viable for them to attend appointments at such large distances, meaning that useful forensic evidence may not be collected for these individuals and health needs may not be met by specialists.

Services for Boys

Multiple informants raised concerns that there are considerable barriers to reporting that result in boys being underrepresented as clients of the child and adolescent sexual assault services and receiving therapeutic support. For the proportion of males who we know are sexually assaulted, boys are not receiving health services at the same rate that girls are. Barriers to boys and men reporting and receiving support need to be addressed, with adolescent boys in particular being reported not to be accessing Sexual Assault Assessment and Treatment Services in any significant numbers nationwide.

It was thought that public education was required addressing myths around gender, particularly the understanding that only males are offenders and only women are victims, which is harmful for many reasons. These myths prevent males from understanding their unwanted sexual experiences as being sexual assault, particularly when the offender is a female, which may decrease the likelihood of them seeking justice. These understandings also pervade the public consciousness such that they may be a barrier to juries delivering just outcomes in instances of female on male exploitation.

Male survivors were also thought to have distinct support requirements, and it was highlighted that most of the support services in Aotearoa have been designed with female service users in mind. Support systems for boys were said to need to be designed specifically for them and informed by the experiences of male survivors. One suggestion here was the use of the peer support model, which has been used successfully with male survivors to progress their recovery in a way in which individualised intervention models may not.

Strengths in services for Māori

Members of the Ngā Kaitiaki Māori provider group identified several things that were working well within the work that they are doing. Iwi Māori liaison with police are very impactful and can facilitate outcomes for victim-survivors without having to go through police. The relationship with police is still unfortunately fraught on some occasions, so having iwi Māori liaison who can operate outside of this is very helpful. Both iwi Māori liaison and Kaupapa Māori services being staffed by great people was also considered to be a strength.

Additionally, having Māori on the spot who can assist, such as kaiwhakahaere for whānau Māori, was identified as being highly beneficial. Hospitals are starting to ask Māori whanau if someone would like to stay inhouse to support during admissions and this is working well. There is still work to be done in educating other agencies to recognise that the first port of call for Māori needs to be Kaupapa Māori services, to understand who Māori victim-survivors are and connect them to that immediately.

In working with taitamariki who have been affected by mahi tūkino, Māori services know they need to work with the adults and extended whānau in those tamariki’s lives. Service providers need to know what whanau understand about whakapapa and their link to that, and traditional understandings, from the beginning to now, to best support that whanau and tamariki. Working with babies requires working with the collective whānau around them to ensure a secure base.

Limitations to services for tamariki Māori

Information on the way that tamariki Māori are being served by current systems has at this stage been sought solely through the member organisations of Poutakawaenga – Ngā Kaitiaki Māori Provider Group.

It is hoped that as this project continues a broader range of perspectives will be able to be sought, specifically those of marae-based healthcare providers, and iwi liaison within NZ Police.

Referrals were identified as flowing into Kaupapa Māori services through a variety of sources. Referrals are received from Oranga Tamariki, GP’s, doctors who visit different marae, Stop Demand, school counsellors, district nurses, particularly in remote areas, school nurses and social workers, and a range of other adults who may be working with tamariki. Police are not always involved in the referrals that are received. Police and the DIA also make referrals, although principally for young people who have been perpetrators of commercial sexual exploitation.

Unfortunately, the people working within these services were also identified as being one of the barriers to referral pathways operating the way they should, with victim blaming attitudes meaning that young people are sometimes treated like offenders, both by service providers and within their families.

Young people being churned through referral pathways, with an overload of information but little consideration given to the needs of the victim-survivor or who they are as people was also raised as an issue with current systems. This was exemplified in a range of ways, from an over-reliance on psychiatric nurses acting as counsellors, and the concomitant implication that young people are treated unnecessarily with psychiatric medications, to providers who think they have enough knowledge to work with Māori children, but who can’t contextualise their understanding of Māori children as Māori. This is exacerbated by people in agencies who are unfamiliar with the communities within which they work and don’t know who to refer to. Similarly, those who are only able to see one aspect of a young person’s life, e.g., their relationship to pornography, may fail to contextualise this more broadly, with issues like structural vulnerabilities, past trauma and what is happening at home.

It was also felt that there was a lack of recognition of Kaupapa Māori providers, and that often the default was to refer all victim-survivors to a Tauiwi provider. Kaupapa Māori providers are skilled in crisis management should be the default providers for Māori clients. They can then choose if they feel more comfortable in a Te Ao Pakeha setting and request for a referral there. Referral processes that prioritise Kaupapa Māori approaches are vital for ensuring that tamariki Māori receive safe, effective, and accessible supports, that centre cultural factors and are appropriate to navigate the complexities of sexual harm and reconnection with whanau.

Justice System

Aotearoa has an adversarial justice system, wherein victim-survivors are constructed as complainant witnesses. The implication of this is that the focus is on the alleged offender receiving appropriate justice, but in the process victim-survivors commonly experience revictimisation, and their needs are not held as central to the process.

Informants raised concerns about opportunities for revictimisation that currently exist at almost every stage of the justice process. From the way that police are trained to pursue evidence collection, conceptualising the victim-survivor as a witness as soon as a crime is reported, to the way that defense lawyers are permitted to behave, exploiting the symptoms of the trauma their clients have caused to undermine victim-survivor reliability. The time delays that victim-survivors experience in having their cases brought before the courts were also raised as leading to adverse outcomes, leaving victim-survivors dealing with uncertainty, unable to move on with their lives, seeing whanau impacted over long timeframes, and having the upset of ongoing delays and last-minute changes. Costs to the taxpayer were also mentioned as a consequence of these long delays, as well as concerns about the degradation of evidence quality over time. Finally, concerns were raised that a lack of education about trauma within the judiciary negatively impact the experience of victim-survivors. This lack of understanding results in an inability to interpret victim’s behaviour through a trauma-informed lens, and inhibits the inclination to intervene with lawyers on behalf of traumatised victims and curtail their examination to what is appropriate for victim-survivors.  These remarks echo what has been evinced in recent research on the experiences within the justice system of sexual harm victim-survivors more broadly (17, 18, 19, 20)

The consequences of these failings are ultimately not just that victim-survivors are retraumatised by the court process, but that traumatised victims produce a lower quality of evidence (18), which results in a lower quality of justice for everyone (17)

Far from justice issues being merely the retributive – rehabilitative dichotomy that they are often simplified down to in public debate, there are things that can be put in place which improve the experience of victim-survivors, without directly impacting the outcomes of their alleged abusers. Access to procedural justice is one of these things. Procedural justice relates to the perception of fairness within the justice system and is founded on a system that is perceived to be unbiased, trustworthy, respectful and provides citizens with an opportunity to have a voice in the decisions that impact them (21). At present the access that victim-survivors have to procedural justice following experiences of sexual harm are significantly curtailed. This contributes to unfavourable experiences such as some of those evidenced within reports on victims’ experiences of the justice system (22)

Some participants opined that a complete redesign of the justice system to be victim-centric was required. And there is some indication, particularly with the 2022 Budget allocating $45.7 million to the implementation of a Victim Operating Model (23), that this is increasingly on the government’s radar. However, in the interim, there are some tangible changes could be made to immediately improve outcomes for victim-survivors. Drastically reducing the time that it takes victims of sexual harm to get to court would have a huge impact on victim outcomes. Mandatory training for both detectives and the judiciary, on the trauma-informed collection of evidence and a trauma-informed interpretation of victim needs and behaviours respectively, could be implemented with relative ease and would be hugely impactful. Finally, changes within police could also be made to ensure that no one rotates into roles within the Child and Youth, or Adult Sexual Assault Teams who did not want to be there. This change would likely have positive implications for Police as well as victim-survivors experience of Police.

Support from Work and Income NZ

One of the issues raised by members of the CSEC Community of Practice was that to access any financial support from Te Hiranga Tangata (Work and Income NZ) rangatahi are required to have their parents sign a form saying that they’re not financially supporting them. This form was understood by our members to be a key contributor to youth homelessness in Aotearoa, and thus something which increases a known risk factor for CSEC.

Parental reticence to sign this form was understood to be underpinned by a range of complex factors. Some parents do not want the young person to be living away from them and believe living at home to be in their best interests. Sometimes the issue might be that the parent is receiving welfare, and if they sign off they lose a portion of that because their child is not being supported by them. Some rangatahi may not feel that they are in the position to even approach their parents about signing this form, and the introduction of the form can contribute further to the breakdown of relationships in a range of instances. Members observed that it can be very challenging for young people to access the funding that they need, if they’re not being supported by a family and are underage for Work and Income support.

Oranga Tamariki

Several areas for improvement for Oranga Tamariki staff were identified by participants in this project. Firstly, it was felt that some staff at Oranga Tamariki needed a better understanding of what they were qualified to make decisions about and what they need to consult on. This was particularly noted in reference to sexual health issues where it was felt not only that Oranga Tamariki staff were making decisions they should not be, but that they often did not know who they should be consulting about medical concerns. Where staff were seeking medical opinions, this was often done by taking children to General Practitioners, who do not receive adequate training on issues of sexual harm and abuse to be able to usefully advise on these issues. Oranga Tamariki staff need to be trained on who the appropriate medical advisors are for them in cases of suspected abuse.

Concerns were also raised about the timeframes for response from Oranga Tamariki, which was understood largely to be a resource issue. Instances of child abuse, including those where children may be being commercially sexually exploited need to be followed up in a timely fashion, as there may be a finite opportunity to intervene. It was felt that the current timeframes meant that these opportunities were sometimes missed.

It was also felt that a lack of understanding amongst Oranga Tamariki staff about the consequences of some forms of sexual exploitation means that they don’t always take it seriously enough. Referrals for digital harm were felt to be poorly understood and to not garner as much attention as those for more physical forms of harm. It was identified that specialist team within Oranga Tamariki who had a comprehensive understanding of the issues associated with both online grooming and concomitant forms of harms would be useful in addressing these issues.

A challenge was also identified by Oranga Tamariki themselves, in that their current case management system is not designed to facilitate insight into where the specific referrals for CSEC and CSEM come from, how many cases are received and whether these are referred onto other agencies or services.

Education of Professionals working with tamariki

As was identified by the CSEC Community of Practice, awareness about how to recognise indicators of CSEC is a major factor underpinning the success of our systems. Organisations such as Police and Oranga Tamariki are largely reliant on people in the community reporting their concerns before they can offer any support. For this to happen community members must know what they are looking for. Multiple times throughout the project, frontline workers with experience working in the United Kingdom commented that they had been struck by the lack of public education/discourse around exploitation in Aotearoa compared to what they had experienced internationally, where public awareness raising campaigns were commonplace.

It was also identified that in Aotearoa, no group of professionals working with children have child protection training of any significance mandated in their undergraduate program. It was reported that doctors get the most, with about one day of training, while nurses, teachers and early childhood educators may enter their roles with no child protection training at all. Given that most children will encounter either an educator or a health care professional at some point in their life, it is vital that when they do that professional has received sufficient education to recognise and respond effectively to the signs of abuse, including commercial sexual exploitation. There is currently a petition circulating which proposes that the Children’s Act 2014 be amended and that mandatory child protection training for those working with children be required.

Specific concerns were also raised about the quality of screening that occurs via Health NZ. The Violence Intervention Program, through which victims–survivors of CSEC may be identified when they enter a healthcare setting was said to be badly out of date, expensive, inflexible, and not fit for purpose. It was recounted that many doctors refuse to attend it due to its low quality. The program is also only mandated in five areas of health despite interactions with any healthcare provided being an opportunity for identification of and intervention to support victims of violence.

Schools

Several informants raised concerns about the fact that some schools seemed to care very little about the impacts of some forms of CSEC, particularly image-based harm. This was thought to be rooted in a lack of understanding about the ongoing psychological and physical health implications of image-based exploitation such as non-consensual sharing of self-created content, or sextortion featuring self-created content. Such understandings are also underpinned by victim blaming attitudes which justify inaction.

It was also observed that schools still often view disruptive behaviour as problematic, blaming the child without asking deeper questions about cause. Oftentimes, when schools choose to bury their heads in the sand about issues of sexual harm, educational outcomes of victim-survivors suffer, with some being reported as having to move schools to avoid those who have offended against them without consequence from the school.

With regard to prevention education being offered by schools, this is hugely varied across Aotearoa, and to some extent seems to be reliant on the teaching priorities of individual schools. At time of writing, the ACC funded Mates and Dates program was in the process of being disbanded, with a replacement product due in 2023.

ACC Support

Several issues were identified in relation to the support offered for victim-survivors by ACC, including wait-times, limitations to cover for mental injuries caused by online harm, and a lack of specific knowledge about trafficking within the providers available for support.

It was uniformly reported and has been the case for a considerable number of years, that the wait-times expected of victim-survivors seeking support under the Integrated Services for Sensitive Claims are completely untenable. Throughout the country wait-times of 6 months are not uncommon, and even in areas where MSD funded crisis response support is available, these six sessions are often insufficient to support those waiting for longer term support.

There are also some forms of sexual exploitation which fall outside of what is currently covered as mental injury under ACC, specifically those types of harm relating to online abuse. The cover criteria for a mental injury caused by sexual violence are outlined in the Accident Compensation Act 2001 and linked to a list of offences which come from the Crimes Act 1961. Young people who have had intimate images shared online without their consent are currently excluded from receiving support from ACC, despite research showing that having intimate images shared online can have significant and long-lasting impact on young people including psychological harm such as anxiety, depression and PTSD and worsening physical health (24).

A lack of practitioners with specialised knowledge about trafficking was also identified as an issue for victim-survivors seeking support from ACC. One survivor reported that this shifts the burden of educating service providers onto the victim-survivor in a way that should not be required. Increased training for providers working with trafficking survivors was recommended.

Services for Ethnic minorities

Informants from services which support ethnic minorities reported several different types of challenges for addressing the needs of their communities. Social service providers having a low level of culturally specific knowledge was a theme underpinning several of these challenges, and the example was given that many police do understand or appear confident discussing, the nuances of arranged marriages sufficiently to be able to distinguish these from forced marriages. Similarly, many school staff lack the understanding that forced marriages occur in Aotearoa and may overlook some of the warning signs that young students are being prepared for this to occur. There is a lack of understanding that religious ceremonies may act as weddings, some even taking place over Zoom during lockdowns, which although they are not accompanied by a registration of a marriage, serve to transition young girls into the role of a wife.

The challenges presented by mandatory reporting obligations was also discussed by informants from services supporting ethnic minorities, and it was felt that these sometimes created more danger for young people, when not supported by adequate safety planning. There was often advocacy by services for parents not to be informed, but it was said to be rare that this was taken into consideration.

Several recommendations were made by those in ethic services, including that documents aimed at those from ethnic minority populations were translated for meaning and not just having the words translated. They also advised that any prevention education needed to be targeted both for migrant youth and for older migrants, as these two groups often had very different perspectives and understandings, and resources need to be specific to the needs of each. They felt optimistically that youth tended to know what they wanted but needed to have professionals working with them who understand their needs and can empower them to achieve these.

Services for Refugees

Refugees come to Aotearoa through two main pathways, and people utilising both pathways may have experienced CSEC in their home countries or in any of the countries they have transitioned through. The first pathway is through the UNHCR, and for some refugees, disclosures about CSEC may be part of what qualifies them for resettlement. This information is not available through the UNHCR process however, so it is not clear the extent to which this is occurring. Refugees coming through the UNHCR pathways may also not be disclosing CSEC as part of their application, but may disclose at some point after resettlement, or have experienced CSEC and never disclose.

The other pathway for refugee status to be applied for on arrival in New Zealand. Similarly, these people may choose to disclose CSEC experiences as part of their application or not.

Once in NZ refugees are also at increased vulnerability to CSEC. There are different organisations operating in different resettlement areas to support the psycho-social needs of refugees, organisations such as the Muslim Mental Health service run by Kāhui Tū Kaha, Umma Trust, The Red Cross, and the Multicultural Resource Centre in Hamilton. These organisations can support victim-survivors into referral pathways more broadly, however considerable barriers to disclosure exist for this group.

Further research is required to ascertain how referral pathways specific to refugees are operating.

The decentralised nature of referral pathways

As mentioned above, referral pathways are complex, non-linear, and to some extent dependent on the knowledge of the individual making the referral. Each organisation receiving a referral should check that appropriate referrals have been made to meet all other support needs of the victim-survivor. Concerns were raised by informants however that in some instances where something is the responsibility of everyone it is done by no one. Determining whether the cultural needs of victim-survivors were being met was one example of this, as was supporting victim-survivors to apply for the Victims Assistance Scheme. Some organisations, or local branches of organisations, are very proactive about networking with the other organisations in their locale and educating each other on what services they provide for victim-survivors. It appears however that this may vary geographically and that access for victim-survivors to comprehensive support may be impacted by this in some instances.