Poll reveals festival sexual assault figures

Official record of incidents taking place at music events a wake-up call for organisers

One in five British festival goers have experienced sexual assault or harassment at an event, according to new research.

Campaigners said the figures, believed to be the first of their kind, should be a wake-up call for the industry to start treating sexual violence as seriously as other crimes at festivals.

The poll showed 22% of all Britons who have been to a festival faced some kind of unwanted sexual behaviour, rising to almost one in three of women (30%) and almost half (43%) of women under 40.

The most common forms of unwanted sexual behaviour experienced by respondents were unwelcome and forceful dancing and sexualised verbal harassment.

Eleven per cent of women had experienced sexual assault while they were conscious, compared to three per cent of men, and four per cent of women said they were sexually assaulted while unconscious or asleep, compared to two percent of men.

Only two per cent of festival goers who were assaulted or harassed reported the incident to the police suggesting the issue is significantly under-reported.

The poll, in which You Gov surveyed 1,188 festival goers, also revealed:

- Seventy per cent of those who experienced sexual assault or harassment at a festival said the perpetrator was a stranger.

- Only 1% of women reported sexual assault or harassment to a member of festival staff although 19% of men reported their experience.

- When people were asked how satisfied they were with how festivals they attended handled the issue, 45% said they did not know and 24% said they were neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, suggesting a lack of awareness around festival policies and safeguards.

Tracey Wise, founder of campaign group Safe Gigs For Women, said: “We have struggled to find anyone with any definite statistics on this before now.

“It gives us something to show to festival organisers so we can say ‘you need to take this on board’.”

Jen Calleja, a co-director of the Good Night Out Campaign, called the research “shocking but not surprising”.

She said: “We know that the vast amount of harassment and sexual assault is not reported and we know this comes down to stigma, fear of not being believed and a minimisation of what harassment is.”

Paul Reed, chief executive of the Association of Independent Festivals, said festivals “have a duty to make their events as safe and secure and enjoyable” as possible, but that some responsibility also lies with festival goers to report problems.

“If people don’t intervene, then this behaviour becomes normalised,” he said.

Hundreds of thousands of people flock to UK festivals every year but organisers of some of the UK’s biggest festivals – including Glastonbury, Creamfields and the Reading and Leeds festivals – declined to comment on the new figures.

Showed 22% of all Britons who have been to a festival faced some kind of unwanted sexual behaviour

A new report has highlighted the number of festival goers who have experienced – yet failed to report – unwanted sexual behaviour and harassment at events they have attended