Dr. Jennifer Brennan:

To follow up on that, I referenced our promoting consent and preventing sexual violence, PROPEL, project in the opening statement, which we did last year. As part of that we had a steering committee of people from all across higher education, we had a representative from the USI, Clare Austick, who is now its president, and a representative from the National Women's Council of Ireland. Therefore, it was quite inclusive.

In terms of sharing, this is a very collaborative space. We work very closely with our colleagues in the IUA on this. In addition to the Speak Out working group, there is a Higher Education Authority, HEA-led, led advisory group on ending sexual violence and harassment, on which we are all represented. It is very much a collaborative effort. We are all keen to share our best practice in working with each other to improve our understanding. It is a new area for us. We are trying to understand what works and does not work and making sure we share those lessons across the whole higher education sector. Although there has been a very strong focus on this consent framework within higher education, it is clear this is a wider societal issue. It is not just about what happens within higher education. Education and consent must happen at the very earliest stage in a child’s development and we should not wait until a young person reaches the age of 18, goes to college and suddenly learns about this thing called consent.