"(Affirmative consent) matters are fraught and complex, with increased complexity comes the increased potential for both error, re-trials and substantial miscarriages of justice," he said on Wednesday.

"There needs to be a better system of both adversarial and non-adversarial criminal justice, one that centres the experience of victim-survivors.

"But we must be vigilant that fundamental protections including the right to silence and presumption of innocence are not eroded."

Mr Stanton said the practical impact of affirmative consent would require an accused person to give evidence, limiting their right to silence. 

He believed there was a cultural shift among defence lawyers not to peddle rape myths while cross-examining a complainant. 

Yet advocates have shone a spotlight on how the justice system often falls short when it comes to rape survivors.

Rape survivor Andrew Doherty said Australia's fractious and inadequate sexual consent laws provided the perfect place for predators to thrive. 

He shared his experience seeking justice after being raped by someone he trusted in 2022. 

"I've come to the conclusion, I'm sorry to say, that it feels like the whole system is set up to protect the bad guys," he said.

"Victims aren't just fighting our traumatic memories of being raped, we're fighting a broken and fractured legal system that is set up almost by design to fail us and to protect rapists." 

The Grace Tame Foundation director Michael Bradley said child sexual abuse was too often treated as a subset of sexual violence crimes, when it was in a class of its own.

The foundation called for the age of consent and relevant legal definitions to be consistent across all Australian jurisdictions.

Perpetrators looked for loopholes including between different states and territories, Mr Bradley suggested.

He noted a quote from Ms Tame's perpetrator, Nicolaas Bester, which illustrated how predators sought to exploit the law's anomalies.

Bester said: "The law is quite clear; if you're having sex with a woman, and she is 17 years old today and it's one minute to midnight and she's 18 tomorrow, then tonight it's illegal and one minute past midnight, when she's 18, it's legal".

No part of the conversation about consent was relevant to child sexual abusers, Mr Bradley said.

"Consent means nothing to them."

Women's Legal Services Australia executive Lara Freidin rejected suggestions affirmative consent laws would result in an increased number of false accusations.

"There is both Australian and international evidence that false allegations of sexual assault are exceedingly rare," she said.

"If a victim-survivor of sexual assault has to face such significantly traumatic experience by reporting (their allegation), why would they lie? 

"That's actually the question we should be asking."

No to Violence - an organisation working with abusive men to change their behaviour - said it was common for perpetrators to exploit weaknesses in the justice system. 

"A clear and consistent approach to consent will reduce the potential for perpetrators to engage in systems abuse, which results in further harm to victim survivors through the legal system," chief executive Jacqui Watt said.

NSW, Queensland, Victoria, Tasmania and the ACT have adopted some form of communicative or affirmative consent laws, which mean silence or a lack of resistance cannot be interpreted as consent.

WA, SA and the NT have no such measures.

One in five Australian women and one in 16 men over the age of 15 will or have experienced sexual violence in their lifetime.

Just 1.7 per cent of reported sexual crimes in Australia result in convictions.

1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732)

Lifeline 13 11 14

National Sexual Abuse and Redress Support Service 1800 211 028

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