Defence does not have a reliable data system for sexual misconduct and cannot understand the scale of the issue without one, a senior official has told an inquiry.
The Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide continued on Tuesday in Sydney, where counsel assisting the commission Fiona Batten probed whether the department still did not have a reliable and integrated data set for sexual misconduct.
Associate secretary of Defence Matt Yannopoulos replied that was his understanding of the current situation.
He agreed that without reliable data sets, the Australian Defence Force could not effectively understand the extent of the issue within its ranks.
Yannopoulos also accepted that policies aimed at responding to and preventing sexual offences couldn’t be properly assessed.
“It is made much more difficult without having the datasets integrated,” he said.
Asked why measures and initiatives that were being developed had not yet been delivered, director of mental health and wellbeing Brigadier Caitlin Langford said the urgency was understood by the branch.
“We have a problem and we need to address it,” she said.
“We don’t have the luxury of time but also … it can’t afford to fail and do more harm.”
The royal commission’s final report was originally due in mid-June, but a three-month extension was granted.
It will now be handed down in early September.
An interim report released in August 2022 made 13 urgent recommendations for the government, including clearing a massive backlog of compensation claims by this month.
Public hearings will continue on Wednesday, with the first witness to give evidence, the brother of a veteran who died by suicide.
The hearings will finish at the end of March.
In opening remarks on Monday, chair Nick Kaldas said the royal commission was not the cause of the Australian military’s troubles.
The “greatest enemy lies within the ADF itself” in its resistance to change, he added.
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