Your rights when making a complaint

Everyone has the right to feel safe and included in sport.  People’s age, ability, religion, culture, gender and sexuality should be respected and celebrated. There is no place for racism, homophobia, sexism, ableism or any other kind of discrimination. No form of abuse is acceptable, including verbal, psychological or physical. There are rules in place to ensure the conduct of people involved in sport does not create a risk of harm to anyone, including children and young people.

This page provides information on what to expect if you make a complaint about inappropriate or harmful behaviour you or someone else has experienced. Anyone can make a complaint, it doesn’t matter if you are the affected person, their parent or carer, or you simply heard or witnessed something that wasn’t right.

Clubs and associations have a range of options available to deal with complaints, including:

• Informally dealing with ‘lower level’ complaints through education, conciliation and supportive actions
• Addressing complaints made under Safeguarding Children & Young People and Participant or Member Protection Policies – with the help of Sport Integrity Australia and the relevant state or national sporting organisation
• Referring serious matters to external authorities like police
• Disciplining members and handling grievances through club constitution processes.

What to expect in a complaints process

Generally, you have a choice about how you would like your complaint dealt with. In some cases, the club may have a duty of care and be required to act, irrespective of how you would like the complaint handled (e.g. if a child is believed at risk of harm it must be reported to relevant authorities).

Your options include: 

• Trying to sort the matter out yourself by discussing it with the other party
• Asking the club to facilitate an informal conciliation – e.g. a quick apology and assurances the behaviour won’t happen again
• Lodging a formal written complaint with your club’s governing body or Sport Integrity Australia. They may refer it elsewhere depending on the nature of your complaint
• Appealing decisions you regard as unfair (depending on the specific of your club or association’s policy)
• You might be able to appeal decisions relating to provisional action against the perpetrator or the sanction imposed
• Referring or lodging a complaint with an external authority (e.g. police, child protection or an anti-discrimination agency)

Note that if your complaint is vexatious (clearly untrue) or frivolous, it will be judged as such.

Everyone in sport has the right to:

• Be in a safe, fair and inclusive environment
• Have complaints taken seriously, no matter to whom they are communicated
• Be treated with dignity and respect
• Tell their story if they the person named in a complaint (procedural fairness)
• Not be victimised for making a complaint
• Participate, volunteer, coach or officiate in a safe environment.

Clubs and associations should therefore:

• Take all complaints seriously and act promptly
• Listen to both sides of the story
• Treat people fairly (e.g. not take sides)
• Focus on the facts
• Keep everyone informed
• Maintain confidentiality (unless information must be shared by law)
• Collaborate with external organisations, like Sport Integrity Australia, who might lead investigations 
• Take disciplinary action appropriate to the breach of policy
• Make sure the person complaining is not victimised

If you decide to make a complaint you can generally expect to be:

• Identified (but only to the person against whom you are making the complaint, the rest of the club should not be told)
• Requested to support your complaint by providing information about the incident (e.g. what, where and when the behaviour occurred and what you did at the time, the contact details of any witnesses, any evidence or documents such as emails, text messages)
• Protected from victimisation (e.g. treated unfairly for making the complaint)
• Protected from further harm (e.g. through provisional action a sporting organisation might decide to impose on the offending person, by suspending or re-assigning their duties while the complaint is investigated)