Page 783 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 18 March 2015
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last year. That report showed that nearly one woman every week in Australia is killed by their current or former partner. One woman every week! One in three women in Australia has experienced physical violence. One in four has experienced emotional abuse. One in six experience physical or sexual violence from a current or former partner. One in 19 Australian women also reported experiencing physical or sexual violence from a partner or former partner.
It is important to appreciate that domestic violence is more than simply physical violence. It crosses social boundaries and the statistics mean that domestic and family violence is likely to affect someone you know, love or care about. In 2010 the New South Wales and the Australian law reform commissions jointly published a report entitled Family violence—a national legal response. It contained 186 recommendations. Of these, 131 were specifically relevant to states and territories.
The ACT decided that it would work with our own stakeholders locally to work out how we could respond to these recommendations. As a result, the government hosted a series of five roundtable discussions with a broad range of community and justice sector representatives, including the Human Rights Commission, the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Aboriginal Justice Centre, Legal Aid, the Victims of Crime Commissioner, Corrective Services, the Law Society, the Domestic Violence Prevention Council, the Women’s Legal Centre, the Canberra Rape Crisis Centre, VOCAL, the Public Advocate of the ACT, the Office for Women and many others.
In addition to these roundtable discussions, there were a number of one-on-one conversations with agencies who had a particular interest in specific recommendations of the law reform commissions. That consultation and policy development process is ongoing. The report has over 40 recommendations relating to protection orders alone which have been discussed in detail.
The net effect of the recommendations contained in these reports is that there should be a seamless legal framework for those involved in domestic and family violence and sexual assault; that victims are able to better obtain access to legal and support services; that people who engage in domestic and family violence or sexual assault need to be held to account for their actions; and that interventions and support in circumstances of family violence need to be effective.
I mentioned earlier the development of a national DVO scheme. This has been mentioned in Mr Hanson’s motion. It is currently the subject of interjurisdictional consultation to develop a model bill. The ACT has indicated its support for the development of a model national scheme to recognise domestic violence orders across state and territory boundaries. It will improve the safety of those who are protected by such orders, and we continue to have input into the development of that model bill.
“Our responsibility—ending violence against women and children” is the ACT’s strategy for the prevention of violence against women and children. Implementation of the our responsibility strategy requires integrated governance arrangements that cut across different parts of government administration. Consultation taken as part of the development of this strategy included broad community consultation in November
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