1. What is Report and Support?
Queen Mary has a duty of care towards all members of its community to prevent and respond to incidents of harassment, sexual violence and/or hate crime. Report and Support allows any student, employee or visitor to Queen Mary to discreetly and securely report any incident that they have experienced or witnessed. Reports may be made anonymously, or you can give your contact details if you would like university services to follow-up with you and discuss your options for support and/or taking further action. You do not have to make a report via Report and Support to access our services; you can still contact services directly if you prefer to.
Support information about internal support and specialist external support is available, even if you do not wish to make a report.
Report and Support is not intended for emergencies. If you require urgent help, please call 999.
1.1 Is Report and Support for individuals at an overseas campus?
Yes, but please be aware that we are limited in the services we can offer from our London base. Such reports will be handled on a case by case basis. If our London-based teams cannot help you, we can assist you to liaise with services that are local to you. If you are a student at our Malta campus and request support services, you will be referred to the Academic And Pastoral Support (Malta). Please be aware that time differences may affect when you receive a response from us, if you are based outside the UK.
1.2 Can I report on behalf of someone else?
Yes, if you have witnessed and incident or if you are worried about someone else, you can make a report on their behalf. Please note that if you report on behalf of someone else, we will not be able to discuss any of their personal details or their case with you.
2. What happens once I make a report?
Queen Mary will take any report in good faith whilst also recognising that this is not the determination of guilt and that any alleged perpetrator(s) must be treated fairly up to and during any investigation that may take place. All people involved have a right to access support services and representation.
2.1 Who manages my report?
A Triage Team will review all incoming reports made on Report and Support on a daily basis (Monday to Friday). The Triage Team is made up of:
- Policy and Campaigns Manager: Tackling Sexual Violence, Harassment and Hate Crime
- Head of Student Wellbeing
- Head of Student Life
Reports that require further risk assessment or precautionary action will be reviewed by the Director of Student Experience with the Triage Team. This review may involve consultation with other relevant departments (e.g. Head of School, Residential Services) for the issue to be dealt with locally (i.e. at School level), or may involve taking action centrally and referring to formal investigation. Any action taken will be proportionate to the behaviour reported and the impact of the behaviour. Action taken will depend on the circumstances of each individual case.
Please see our process flowchart for a summary of how your report is processed.
2.2 Who will respond to my report?
Please see our process flowchart for a summary of how your report is processed.
2.2 Who will respond to my report?
The Triage Team will review cases and assign them to the relevant internal services (where a reporting party has requested this).
For students:
- If you request ‘To make a formal complaint for investigation by Queen Mary’ your report will be assigned to the Appeals, Complaints and Conduct Office, who will contact you to discuss your report. They will explain the process to you and decide whether a case should be dealt with at School/Institute/Directorate level, or within their office at Institutional level, under the Code of Student Discipline.
- Where support has been requested, reports will be assigned to Advice and Counselling, where current students may access support.
- Cases relating to the Malta campus will be assigned to Academic and Pastoral Support (Malta).
For employees:
- If you request ‘To be referred to support services’, your report will be sent to the Employee Relations team in HR who will contact you and outline the support that is available.
- If you request ‘To make a formal complaint for investigation by Queen Mary’ your report will be sent to the Employee Relations team who will contact you to discuss your report and how this will be progressed.
- Employees may use Report + Support to raise either as a concern or complaint, as an alternative to the informal route of the grievance process (i.e. informal resolution, not formal investigation or hearing).
- A report may also lead to a formal grievance investigation being instigated, following a recommendation from the ER team and the employee’s agreement. If such a recommendation is not made, then employees retain the right to raise a formal grievance, as outlined in the grievance policy.
These services will contact the reporting party within 5 working days of their report submission.
Data trends will be monitored by the Policy and Campaigns Manager (Tackling Sexual Violence, Harassment and Hate Crime) and reports on anonymised data sets will be published annually. The data will inform future targeted intervention and prevention work.
2.3 Anonymous reports
Making an anonymous report informs the University that something has happened. This will not instigate any part of a formal process or complaint, as we do not act on anonymous reports. Instead, anonymous reports provide statistical information, which allows us to better understand the prevalence of issues within our community. We will use this to inform wider preventative work to tackle prevalent issues.
If you choose to report anonymously we will not ask you for any personally identifiable details, therefore will not be able to contact you to offer you any advice or support. If you would like action to be taken on your report, you should instead report with your contact details and request to speak to someone about the support and resolutions available.
2.4 Reports with contact details
When a member of staff or a student is named and/or identifiable within the report, the University will seek to take appropriate safeguarding action if required. We will not inform someone that they have been named in a report as part of the Report and Support process. If you have requested for the matter to be investigated and the case progresses to investigation stage, the reported party would be contacted by the Appeals, Complaints and Conduct Office if they are a student, or by HR if the reported party is a staff member. To understand more about our process please see our flowchart.
2.4 Reports with contact details
When a member of staff or a student is named and/or identifiable within the report, the University will seek to take appropriate safeguarding action if required. We will not inform someone that they have been named in a report as part of the Report and Support process. If you have requested for the matter to be investigated and the case progresses to investigation stage, the reported party would be contacted by the Appeals, Complaints and Conduct Office if they are a student, or by HR if the reported party is a staff member. To understand more about our process please see our flowchart.
2.5 Investigations
Reports which are referred for internal investigation will be subject to the processes detailed in the relevant Queen Mary employment policies or policies for students, as appropriate.
There may be incidents which are reported to Queen Mary that also constitute a criminal offence. Queen Mary can make no determination with regard to offences under criminal law. Any internal investigation is focused exclusively on whether there has been a breach of Queen Mary’s policies, based on the civil law burden of proof on the balance of probabilities. Internal investigation processes cannot be considered a substitute for a police investigation or criminal prosecution, which has a higher burden of proof (namely beyond reasonable doubt). An internal investigation can take place even if a reporting party has not disclosed to the police.
Where criminal investigation or judicial proceedings are ongoing or likely to commence in relation to a report, Queen Mary will not normally begin internal formal investigations/may elect to suspend any ongoing investigation until the criminal investigation has concluded. This may not be required in all cases and at all times Queen Mary should liaise with the relevant authorities to determine whether internal investigations can continue. Queen Mary reserves the right to take any necessary precautionary action to protect members of the Queen Mary community. Disciplinary cases based on facts and matters which are different to those being dealt with under the criminal process can still be undertaken by Queen Mary.
For information about how criminal convictions, cautions or acquittals relate to Queen Mary disciplinary processes, please see the Code of Student Discipline (for students) or Discipline Policy and Procedure (for employees).
In some circumstances, it may be appropriate to inform external authorities of the outcome of any disciplinary investigation, such as a professional body.
Queen Mary is not able to act and take direct action on anonymous reports.
3. How is my data used?
Monitoring and trend data (anonymised) will be reported on annually and used for improving Queen Mary’s prevention and response to sexual violence, harassment and hate crime.