Nicolette Boele (Bradfield, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on this important motion in support of victims-survivors of domestic violence. It's heartbreaking and it's unacceptable that Australians—men, women and children—continue to suffer from domestic and sexual violence. It's unacceptable that when women—it's happening predominantly to women and children—try to leave an abusive household, they struggle to find anywhere safe to go. It's unacceptable that people should feel like one of my constituents did. She wrote to me recently and explained how the financial stress and the housing insecurity that she faced after leaving a violent household made her feel like she should never have left in the first place.

The persistence of these problems burns through our communities and is a blight on our nation. Protecting the most vulnerable in our community must be a priority, yet for too long leaders have failed to treat this crisis with the urgency and the seriousness that it deserves. But where leadership has fallen short community organisations are filling the gap. Bradfield is home to a number of services supporting people experiencing domestic and intimate partner violence, and they do incredible work.

One of those is in St Leonards. It's called Taldumande—or, as we like to call it, Taldy. Taldy has been supporting young people for decades. This year marks 50 years of operations. Children and young people can go to Taldy for help while facing some of the most difficult challenges any person can face. They support young people at risk of homelessness with crisis accommodation and finding a long-term home. They help young people who are in police custody or who are out on bail to navigate the justice system and meet their bail conditions by arranging transport and legal support. They operate a youth hub where people can get informal and formal support in a comfortable and non-threatening environment, and they run group education programs, preparing young people for work and helping them learn practical skills to navigate their lives.

The young people and their families who turn to Taldy for help are in crisis for many reasons, but many of them are there because of family violence. One-third of Taldy's clients were victims of violence perpetrated by either a parent or a guardian. We know that family violence is a significant cause of children and young people's mental distress and is a major reason why children end up homeless. When children have nowhere to go, it's organisations like Taldy that step in to help them

We need more Taldies. As is always the case, Taldy is at full stretch. Their housing service is at capacity 24/7, and Taldy was forced to turn away over 400 young people last year. It just shouldn't be this way. Organisations doing such important work should not be so underresourced. They should be given everything that they need to continue their important work. But they're facing challenges because of siloed funding—the siloed funding approach that doesn't clearly account for the overlap between domestic violence and youth homelessness.

The National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children focuses on four main areas: prevention, early intervention, response, and recovery and healing, and organisations like Taldy are essential to our ability to make progress towards two of these four areas—responding to support victims-survivors and helping people heal. We will not be able to meet the national plan's goals of ending violence against women and children in one generation without ensuring that frontline organisations are sufficiently resourced. As the government develops its second action plan towards ending violence against women and children, I urge it to provide greater support to community organisations like Taldy. They do the hardest work of all, and they should be supported to do so.

I thank the member for Bonner for her motion raising the awareness of this issue, and I echo her call to promote zero tolerance for violence in this country, and I commend this motion to the Chamber.

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