Andrew Broad (Mallee, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I commend the member for Moreton for bringing this matter to the parliament. The first point is that we are talking about it. If we are going to change attitudes, we need to be talking about issues of family violence. Tim Watts, the member for Gellibrand, the very charming member for Canning and I intend on forming 'parliamentarians against family violence in the 45th Parliament'—three young men out there saying that this needs to stop, that the family unit needs to be a place of refuge and that people should be able to feel safe in their family home. We championed it in the last parliament and we will continue to champion it. There are some things that cross many borders and many political lines, and dealing with family violence should be one of those.

This is a very interesting and quite detailed pathway forward, and I think it is something worthy of due consideration. I am a strong believer, of course, in putting the fence around the top of the hill, which is addressing attitudinal change, particularly in our young men. One of the things that I have done in my own electorate is distribute 15,000 '100 ways to praise a child posters. What I am trying to do is instil in our young girls, particularly, a sense of self-worth. This is a challenge I am going to put out to Australian fathers: one of the key roles of a father of a daughter is to instil a sense of self-worth into their daughter. That is one of the best ways they can protect them from a violent relationship, because a sense of self-worth means that when that bloke comes along who does not value them and treats them poorly, they will say, 'To hell with that; I can do better than you, sunshine,' and move on. I think that attitudinal change, where we change our young women to know what they should look for in relationships and we change our young men to value women and see them as someone's sister or someone's daughter and to value them for their worth, contribution and intellect, is a societal change we need to instil. That is the first step to addressing family violence in Australia.

But, unfortunately, we also need the ambulance at the top of the hill. We also need to have good law enforcement. That is why we fought very hard to implement Australia-wide intervention orders. That was something that was very relevant in my electorate. A woman could feel protected under the Victorian policing law, but when she crossed over the Murray river, only 300 metres, she was not protected under law. I am very pleased that COAG is working to bring that to fruition. Better legal protection does need to be implemented. I am disappointed that, in the 2014 budget, our government tried to pull back on that legal protection and support for victims of family violence.

I am quite pleased that the electorate of Mallee, and Mildura in particular, is one of the 12 trial sites across Australia that is using a case-managed service to deal with family violence, so that if a woman presents in a hospital as a clear victim of family violence they can come to her. They are case managed and then we can put police and support services around that, and I think this is a step forward. I am very interested to hear how this trial goes. A trial, like anything, is never going to perfect, but it is going to have some lessons.

I think there also needs to be a look at particularly what the member for Moreton has brought to the discussion today. It is inappropriate for a woman who is going through a court case to be cross-examined by her ex-partner. That is completely inappropriate, and it does not provide a supportive network, because, whether we like it or not, not only have we removed that offender from the chance to physically harm, that offender usually has quite an emotionally hold over that victim and we need to make sure that we are supporting that victim as we move forward. Of course there needs to be integrity in the legal system. Of course we need to make sure that the judge and those making the discussions feel that they can make an informed decision, but I think there is a lot of merit in what the member for Moreton has brought here today.

The fact that our parliament is talking about this is fantastic. The Parliamentarians against Family Violence Friendship Group started in the 44th Parliament and I intend to champion it through the 45th Parliament. I think we, as Australians, needs to remember that the home is a refuge, that women and families should feel safe and that we will continue to fight for this on both sides of the parliament. I am very pleased to speak on this bill.

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