Drink-Spiking and sexual assault: Innovative approaches to a difficult problem

Abstract

The Sutherland Drink-Spiking Project is a collaborative interagency project initiated by the Southern Sydney Sexual Assault Service. Focusing on selected intervention as well as primary and secondary prevention with drink-spiking and sexual assault in southern Sydney, this project is distinctive due to its primary focus on perpetrators potential perpetrators, and their peers. Beyond this, the project also provided an opportunity for social workers to meaningfully engage with and apply innovative project management practice. This is notable since reform initiatives in public sector agencies in New South Wales are encouraging the use of project management practice and social workers need to engage with these ‘new directions’ or risk becoming marginalised. This paper explores The Sutherland Drink-Spiking Project and demonstrates how applying a project management methodology benefited social work practice.

Keywords:

• drink-spiking
• project management
• sexual assault