Page 3355 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 12 October 1993
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The questionnaire used in the survey, which is shown at Appendix 1, is of great interest. I note that the return rate of the survey could have been higher, but I also agree that there may have been some very plausible reasons for the result that the survey had. Of real interest and importance, I believe, are the form of the questionnaire and some of the responses. The inclusion of this sort of information and the information contained in the chapter concerning the one-on-one interviews that were participated in by DV workers, by police and so on broadens this research paper and makes it of such practical use.
There are two issues that I would like to mention while we are discussing this research paper. One of them is the pilot program that was run recently by the domestic violence unit and involving school students in the ACT. I was particularly pleased to hear in answer to a question I put at the Estimates Committee that the outcome of that pilot program was such that such a program is to be recommended to the Department of Education for very serious consideration for inclusion in the school curriculum. The pilot program involved learning how to handle dispute resolution between young male and female students. I think that is the sort of approach that we need to take in a concerted effort to tackle this problem in our society at the grassroots.
On Wednesday evening I was at home and saw on the ABC a television documentary called So Help Me God. I do not know whether any other members here saw it, but I found it fairly shattering to watch. It involved no actors but real people. The cameras and the reporters spent two or three days in a Magistrates Court in the western suburbs of Sydney. I refer to this documentary because the segment that alarmed me the most concerned the case of a young woman coming to court against her husband over a domestic violence order. You could see a very subtle influence being exercised on that woman on behalf of the husband in an attempt, which was succeeding, to have her drop any further action against him. You could see a potential statistic - probably by now a real statistic - walking out the door of the court.
Any research paper such as this is to be commended. No paper such as this should ever attempt to hold within its cover the answer to all of the problems of a subject such as domestic violence. The value in a research paper such as this is that it keeps the topic in front of us, so that we pay due attention to it daily and continue attempts to improve the situation in the community, be it by creating laws or by educating young people in our schools. As long as we continue that approach we can hope for a better outcome than some people, unfortunately, are experiencing as we speak or have experienced in the past.
MR CONNOLLY (Attorney-General, Minister for Housing and Community Services and Minister for Urban Services) (9.23), in reply: It is pleasing that on a Tuesday night after estimates, when I think we are all having a bit of a groan about being here, we have now debated two very substantial issues in a way that has avoided toing-and-froing across the chamber and shown some general bipartisan support for grappling with difficult issues. Previously we discussed proposed legislation on de facto relationships and now we are discussing the Community Law Reform Committee's major research paper on domestic violence.
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