Claire Clutterham (Sturt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Australian government established the Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Commission to provide national leadership and promote national coordination in seeking to address the scourge of violence against women and children. Working across government and across our communities is the only way we can work together towards ending violence against women and children in a generation.

This is not easy. In fact, most of the time it feels impossible. Every day there is a story of a woman dying at the hands of family members, stories of death, stories of shattered lives and families who will never recover. Let's be clear: you don't recover from a woman or child in your family being killed by a husband, by a father, by another family member—you don't. This violence destroys lives and communities forever, yet incidents of violence against women and children are increasing. More lives will be lost and many more will be destroyed. And what for? What could be more senseless?

The Albanese Labor government understands this and is working towards strengthening prevention approaches by addressing factors that exacerbate violence, such as access to alcohol and access to pornography and misogynistic online content. It also is seeking to improve information sharing for those who respond to high-risk and serial perpetrators of domestic and family violence, not forgetting that sometimes their lives are shattered too because of what they witness and what they investigate.

We also need to continue to amplify the voices of people with lived experience, and living with experience, to have meaningful engagement with them in shaping policy design and service delivery. People with lived experience need to be supported to be able to participate in policy development and implementation decisions, because we know that the best people to help us make change and improve the system are those who have needed it most in the past. Because there is an epidemic of violence against women and children, there are people available to contribute to this, but they need to be supported, cared for and guided through this process because they're willing to be a part of it.

A constituent of my electorate of Sturt recently came to see me to tell me her story, which was an absolutely appalling outline of betrayal, failure and devastation. She was here in Australia by virtue of her marriage, without any family of her own and without any support networks. She outlined to me the fear and helplessness she felt after her husband took away her access to her own bank account, into which money she earned from her own job was distributed. She outlined the despair she felt when she was tracked, monitored, spied on by the person who was supposed to love her forever. She outlined the utter desperation and terror she felt when he held a knife to her neck and sexually assaulted her. Then she outlined the confusion and frustration she felt as she tried, at her absolute lowest ebb, to navigate police processes, domestic violence support services and the courts.

Despite all of this, she then told me that she had come to see me because she wanted to do what she could to ensure that other women would never share her story. This is what all women want. This is, in fact, what all reasonable Australians—men and women—want. If my constituent, after what she went through, has the courage, resilience and fortitude to want to make change for others, then the rest of society simply has no excuse.

My constituent was also at pains to tell me that she received empathetic and caring support from the Legal Services Commission of South Australia, who helped her to understand what was happening in the legal system and what her options were. I'm not going to name the woman who came to see me, and so I can't name those wonderful lawyers at the Legal Services Commission of South Australia who helped her. Instead, I offer my heartfelt gratitude to those women for doing what they could to make an uncertain, confusing and frankly terrifying process just that little bit easier for my constituent.

In South Australia, Ms Natasha Stott Despoja AO was appointed as the Commissioner of the Royal Commission into Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence. In her capacity as the commissioner, she was recently charged with holding a royal commission into that violence, which aimed to address several factors. These included prevention—how we can facilitate widespread change in the underlying social drivers of domestic, family and sexual violence; early intervention—how we can improve effective early intervention through the identification and support of individuals who are at high risk of experiencing or perpetrating domestic, family and sexual violence; responding—how we can ensure best-practice responses to these types of violence through the provision of services and supports; recovery and healing—how we can embed an approach that supports recovery and healing through reducing the risk of retraumatisation and supporting victims-survivors to be safe and healthy; and coordination—how government agencies, non-government organisations and communities can better integrate and coordinate efforts across the spectrum of prevention, intervention, response and recovery.

But this is not just a South Australian issue. This is a national issue, which is why this government has invested $4 billion into the prevention of family, domestic and sexual violence since 2022. Natasha and her colleagues needed to hear from all relevant stakeholders, so particular regard was given to the views and experiences of victims-survivors and those with lived experience; First Nations people, their communities and organisations; culturally and linguistically diverse communities; LGBTQIA communities; people living with a disability; children and young people; older South Australians; people living in regional and remote communities; experts, service providers and leaders in domestic, family and sexual violence; medical professionals, including mental health providers; and police and the legal sector, including those involved in court administration and victim support. What that tells us is that relevant stakeholders were in fact the entire community. The entire community has skin in the game when it comes to ending violence against women and children. The breadth of the stakeholders shows just how wide this scourge is. No part of the community is untouched. It's community wide. It's an embedded problem. Everyone needs to understand that they have a responsibility to contribute to eliminating it.

The report that was issued after this royal commission concluded contained 120 recommendations ranging from e-safety to alcohol, education and peer support, more funding, and more support in courtrooms. This is 120 recommendations just in one state. There is work to do. Empowering women, as this government seeks to do, is part of the solution. If a woman has a job and is paid a fair wage for doing it, she has agency and the ability to make hard choices if she needs to. Domestic and family violence is not limited to a certain section of the community. It affects women of every income level. However, empowering those on the lowest incomes, such as women working in the care economy, is critical. Pay rises in that industry together with superannuation on paid parental leave are just two initiatives that give women more options should they ever need to consider them because of family and domestic violence.

Finally, there is another section of the community that can contribute to ending domestic and family violence against women. That section is those that are perpetrating this violence. To those perpetrators, please hear this: you are the problem. The problem is not your wife. The problem is not your girlfriend, your spouse or your child. The problem is you and your inability and unwillingness to control your own behaviour. Your problem is that you look for someone to blame and fail to be accountable for your own decisions. You are the problem, and you need to accept that and stop it. Stop committing acts of violence within your own family. Stop the killing. Stop the violence. Stop the death. Stop destroying the lives of those you are meant to love. Stop it now.

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