Page 711 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 20 March 2018
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Directorates are also working to recruit women in historically male-dominated roles. For example, the ACT Emergency Services Agency has developed a women in emergency services strategy, which focuses on attracting, recruiting, developing and retaining women. Its aim is to increase the number of women in the services and support more women to gain leadership roles. Specifically this has placed a focus on recruiting more women through the ACT Fire & Rescue community based recruitment processes. Since June 2016, 34 new firefighters have been employed, with nearly a quarter being women. This is the first step towards the fifty-fifty gender balance target the government has set itself in this area.
Improving women’s safety has been a major area of focus throughout the year. The ACT government is committed to the safer families reforms to address domestic and family violence through a number of important initiatives funded through the safer families levy. Over the past year a co-design approach to developing a family safety hub was undertaken. This will lead to future decisions by the government on the next important phase of the hub. The government is well placed to progress implementation over the coming months. The detailed insights gathered during the process included the need for innovation in the design and testing of solutions for service hubs and new pathways in safety to meet the diverse needs of our community.
The ACT government is nearing the final stages towards the introduction of additional family violence training for front-line workers. This training will complement the existing training that front-line workers already access, work to better address gendered violence and violence against women and, importantly, establish better frameworks and capacity across the human services system.
Even though men are victims of violence, the vast majority of victims of domestic violence are women. Recent national research shows that the societal messages to our girls and boys continue to normalise gender-based violence and victim blaming. A number of directorates are taking steps to obtain White Ribbon accreditation. In doing so, the ACT government has shown its support for those who have experienced or are experiencing domestic violence. For example, in May last year, ACT Fire & Rescue launched its White Ribbon pumper fire truck with the message “There’s no excuse for domestic violence”, to raise awareness about and communicate the lack of acceptance of domestic violence in the ACT community.
The Environment, Planning and Sustainable Development Directorate undertook a volunteer Backyard Blitz style working bee for the local women’s refuge, Beryl Women Inc, in November 2017. Additionally, Transport Canberra established a system to provide free public transport for victims of domestic and family violence. These may seem like small things but they make the issue of domestic and family violence visible. They send a strong message to the community, to victims and to perpetrators that domestic and family violence is not acceptable.
The first action plan has a strong commitment to improving gender equality in the workplace. The government hopes to model best practice and encourage workplaces across the ACT to follow suit to implement and engage in strategies promoting gender equity.
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