The cost of making a complaint

Updated

Police forces around Australia have a problem with attitudes of sexism and homophobia. And they don't seem to be going away any time soon.

'It was like a zoo'

Tucked away in a cupboard in her five-year-old son's bedroom, hide the suits of a NSW Police detective who suffered years of sexual harassment at the hands of her colleagues.

Jen* is still technically a serving police officer, but says she'll never go back.

Each coat hanger is a painful reminder of the near-constant sexualised comments and innuendo she endured.

Rifling through the cupboard, Jen holds up a simple white long-sleeved business shirt.

"This one here was when the colleague said that I had massive boobs in them, or am I wearing a push-up bra?" she says through tears.

"It's kind of awkward when you dress reasonably normal and you get stuff like that."

At one point, a supervisor noticed she'd dyed her hair, and asked a nearby group of men, "What do you reckon fellas, would you give it a go?"

Another time, a colleague pointed to his crotch and said, "Hey, suck it".

Jen says no clothes were safe.

"That's how they were in that office, it was like a zoo," she says.

"They talk about victims like that. A sexual assault victim would come in and that particular [superintendent] was like, 'That slut's down there, go get a statement off her'".

The boys club

In the past five years, independent reviews have examined the workplace culture in the Victorian and South Australian police, as well as the Australian Federal Police.

On average, almost half of the staff who participated reported having personally experienced sexual harassment or sex discrimination.

In South Australia, the review called the force a "boys club".

A decade ago, NSW Police was given comprehensive guidelines on how to change their culture and has since introduced a raft of new workplace behaviour guidelines.

The organisation's goal has been to reduce the prevalence of sexual harassment and sex discrimination in the police force, and when someone complains about that behaviour, reduce the chances they will be victimised as a result.

But a number of current and former NSW Police officers subjected to sexual harassment and sex discrimination by their colleagues spoken to by Background Briefing have slammed the organisation's internal complaints handling process as nothing more than an "arse-covering exercise".

Background Briefing has spoken to half a dozen current and former officers who have plans to sue NSW Police for personal damages relating to sexual harassment and sex discrimination they experienced at work.

When asked, NSW Police declined to say how much taxpayers are paying to police who've been sexually harassed by their colleagues.

Lawyer John Cox, who acts for many NSW Police officers who've experienced sexual harassment or who suffer from post-traumatic stress, says the enquiries to his office for legal support haven't slowed down since the review's recommendations were implemented.

"If you're asking me, has that changed the culture? Then what I'm going to say to you is that I have many, many clients with horrific stories of sexual harassment and bullying post-2007," he says.

The price of fitting in

George Torres is a 20-year veteran of the NSW Police Force and has a unique perspective on the organisation's workplace culture.

Just a few years ago he was a decorated officer acting as a Special Senior Constable overseeing security at NSW Parliament House.

He's been decorated for his bravery in disarming a knife-wielding attacker at the Sydney Police Centre by breaking his arm.

Now, that reputation is in tatters after an internal investigation found he sexually harassed female staff by relentlessly talking about anal sex and the practice of inserting ball bearings into the penis for sexual stimulation.

"When I joined the NSW Police, I thought you were allowed to swear," he says.

"You are allowed to call people names and they talk about sexual relationships."

Most of those who brought complaints against Mr Torres were new cops in their early 20s. One of them has now retired on stress leave as a result.

This is the first time Mr Torres has spoken in detail about the workplace culture he still maintains excuses his behaviour.

"I've been unfairly targeted," he says.

Mr Torres says his comments were simply "workplace banter" and he was so convinced he shouldn't have been fired that in 2016, he took NSW Police to the Industrial Relations Commission for unfair dismissal.

The union supported him and ran his legal case. Their defence was the workplace culture itself.

To understand this defence, and how it could realistically be used, it's helpful to hear Mr Torres describe his own introduction to the NSW Police Force.

It doesn't excuse his behaviour, but it does go some way to explaining how he could come to justify it.

Mr Torres came to Australia from the Philippines in 1979. And in those early days as a new migrant, he was desperate to fit in.

He says the price of fitting in when he joined in 1992 was putting up with some vile language and behaviour.

"It's like either you fit in, or you don't. Right?" he says

He says he was called "slopehead, "black c***" and "no habla inglés (does not speak English)".

"I have to fit in on that because if I get upset they might get offended and they won't talk to me anymore. That's what I feel," he says.

Reputational damage control

The Industrial Relations Commissioner found Mr Torres's behaviour was extreme and went beyond the behaviour of his male workmates. His claim was rejected.

But echoes of the culture Mr Torres describes can be found in every review into police culture that's been published in Australia since 2007.

Queensland University of Technology Professor Paula McDonald has been studying sexual harassment and sex discrimination in the workplace for more than a decade.

Most recently she advised Victoria Police on their own internal review into sexual harassment.

She says that in order to fit in, "people conform to the dominant ways of being and doing things in an organisation, [and] in policing it has a long, historical trajectory".

Each year, NSW Police officers lodge about 200 harassment complaints against their own colleagues.

About a quarter of those are for sex-based harassment.

What's impossible to say is how many were taunted, ostracised or had to watch their careers flatline as a result of their complaints.

In 2007, when the review into sexual harassment in the NSW Police was made public, it showed one in four people who complained were victimised.

Now, a State Parliament inquiry is looking into that workplace culture again … and when we asked NSW Police for an update, they declined to say.

In a statement, a NSW Police spokesperson said: "The NSWPF has a sound framework in place to support and reinforce appropriate standards of behaviour in the workplace which includes systems, policy, programs and education and training."

The spokesperson reinforced the Police Commissioner's message, "that sexual harassment and other forms of inappropriate workplace behaviour will not be tolerated".

'Change feels a long way off'

Just three months after starting at the detectives unit, Jen told a colleague about the harassment she was experiencing at work.

She says the way this was handled completely undermined the organisation's own procedures and her own right to privacy.

"I disclosed certain things to him," she says. "And he told an inspector."

Eventually Jen was called into a meeting with her bosses and was told that now they knew about the harassment, an official complaint would have to be made and investigated.

Her superiors tried to assure her that the complaint would be handled confidentially, but it was soon obvious that word of the complaint had travelled.

"Everyone knew what was in the complaint," she says.

That internal investigation upheld the details of Jen's complaints and the officer who told her to "suck it" was sent a notice that asked him to justify why he shouldn't be fired.

When that officer tried to get his workmates to give him character references, he sent the entire complaint file around Jen's office.

It made public every detail of her once confidential complaint.

"I'm angry because I feel like I never did anything wrong. I stuck up for myself and I dealt with those things, and I just wish I didn't complain because I basically ultimately have lost my job," she says.

Background Briefing has seen the internal emails from that time that show how senior police in Jen's office tried to address the situation.

Among these were all-staff directives about the respectful workplace behaviour protocols, and how there was a zero tolerance approach to sexual harassment.

They were cold comfort for Jen.

"I truly believe it's like a cover arse exercise," she says.

Professor McDonald has studied the way organisations try to ensure they not only follow their own complaints processes, but that they're seen to follow them.

She says at times the complaints handling process can be more about protecting the individual than the organisation itself.

"Because if an organisation ends up in court, they are required to prove that they took adequate steps to both prevent the harassment in the first place, to redress it where it did occur, and where they became aware of the problem," she says.

A new case every day

John Cox is a lawyer with 21 years' experience representing current and former police officers with psychological injuries and says he's approached to represent new clients every day.

Mr Cox says sexual harassment is a common thread in lots of his PTSD cases.

"So many of our female, and a certain number of our male clients I must say as well, it's part of their story," he says.

"Part of the reason that they've become psychologically unwell is the harassment that they've suffered."

After the 2007 public inquiry into sex discrimination and harassment in the NSW Police Force, a raft of new guidelines were brought in.

There's the Respectful Workplace Behaviours Guidelines, the Sexuality, Diversity and Intersex Policy, the Workplace Relations and Equity Unit, and many more.

But Mr Cox says the inquiries from traumatised police aren't slowing down.

"I think one of the challenges is changing the culture of such a vast organisation that polices the whole state," he says.

Mr Cox says while he's convinced the NSW Police Force has a genuine desire for change, that change has been slow to come.

"There are local, current local area commands, some of them have serious reputations as being poor places to work [with] poor management places, systemic bullying. Things like that," he says.

"And we know that because we act for clusters of people within those commands.

"The same people, the same bullies' names, harassers' names keep coming up. So there are certainly pockets where change is needed or change hasn't occurred."



Credits

Reporter: Alex Mann

Alex Mann Executive producer: Alice Brennan

Alice Brennan Digital producers: Laura Brierley Newton and Tom Joyner

Topics: police, discrimination, australia

First posted