Our roundtable participants acknowledged the
anecdotal and self-reported nature of much of the
existing information about serious harms on the
basis of religion. It was agreed that this is not ideal.
In fact, community members involved in collecting
data on serious harms often report a level of
vicarious trauma from constantly hearing about
harms towards their fellow community members.
The absence of a nationally consistent system for
recording and classifying bias-motivated crimes
was seen as an urgent priority. Some pointed to
the systems in place in other countries, including
Canada, the US and the UK, which have had
systems in place for several decades. Particular
reference was made to a UK online reporting tool,
True Vision, which allows people to report incidents
or crimes on the basis of various attributes,
including religion. This tool is linked to the police,
and also functions as an official national register.32
Freedom of religion in Australia: a focus on serious harms • July 2020 • 19