by leave—I present a copy of the Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Commission's yearly report to the parliament and a copy of my ministerial statement.

I want to begin by acknowledging victims and survivors of family, domestic and sexual violence and remembering the women and children killed—too often, by men who claimed to love them.

I also want to thank Commissioner Cronin and her team, who join us in the gallery today, and all the lived-experience advocates who are also with us today.

A mother of three recently wrote to me about the world her and all our children are growing up in.

She has a daughter she wants to keep safe.

She's got two sons that she's trying to raise to be decent men, like their father.

She worries that increasingly, 'neither is entirely within her control.'

She wrote about the forces shaping adolescence—how the pornography that once lived in the back room of video stores now sits in children's pockets, and how her son, who's just in primary school, was exposed to it in the playground; how her daughter was filmed by a group of boys in public without her consent, and the worry she now carries about what that footage could be turned into.

She described being a parent today as 'feeling like you're standing at the edge of a field watching something unfold you can no longer stop.'

Her letter ended with a plea—

That governments, at all levels, keep regulating the online spaces and technologies that parents can't.

And that we ensure that 'Whatever gets funded in the next national plan reaches boys early, and that it reaches the ordinary ones—not only the ones already in trouble.'

That letter came to my office on the last day of August—a devastating month for our nation.

Reports of women being attacked in broad daylight and killed in their homes cycled through our headlines.

As did serious allegations of sexual assault—including cases in which both the victims and perpetrators were children.

I've thought a lot about that letter since.

Not because I believe every schoolyard prank is a precursor to violence—it isn't. Or that we should fear every teenager wielding a smartphone—we shouldn't.

But because of the questions underneath it.

Namely, what kind of culture are our children inheriting?

And what are we teaching them when family, domestic and sexual violence remains so pervasive in this country?

When we talk about the challenges of ending this violence—hope can feel like an impossible word.

Especially when we consider how technology and social media are creating new avenues for abuse and amplifying the misogyny that often underpins it.

But in the opening pages of this year's report, Commissioner Cronin reminds us that hope is a muscle.

And that if we want to become a country where women and children can live free from violence—we need to exercise that muscle.

I think the other ingredient is belief.

We must believe that this violence is preventable to have any chance of stopping it. Just as we must refuse to coexist with it, normalise it, or accept it as inevitable.

Crucially, we also have to understand it as a collective problem.

One that requires collective action.

Today, I want to echo the commissioner's vision about what an Australia free from violence could look like.

And I want to lay out how the next phase of our national plan can get us there, if governments at all levels lead, and institutions and everyday people play their vital roles too.

To borrow the commissioner's words—the nation we should all be working towards is one where family, domestic and sexual violence is rare, brief, and non-recurring.

Rare because we prevent violence.

Brief because when someone is in danger, we recognise it early and offer to help immediately.

And non-recurring because victims-survivors get the support they need to leave and safely heal, while perpetrators of violence are held accountable for their actions, so they can't keep harming people.

We're already taking concrete steps to make that vision a reality.

We're reforming our family courts, child support, tax, superannuation and social security—so that the systems women and children rely on can't be weaponised against them.

We've made the leaving violence payment permanent, so they don't have to choose between survival and safety.

We've invested in crisis accommodation and housing to ensure that there's always somewhere to go.

And we've boosted funding for the frontline workers who save lives, while targeting the repeat offenders who inflict so much harm.

It's work that, through the leadership of this Prime Minister, has been elevated to the National Cabinet, which agreed on a new national risk assessment framework at its last meeting to ensure that our responses to violence remain consistently high across borders.

So that whenever someone at risk seeks help—whether it's at the GP, or from a police officer, a nurse, or a social worker—those early warning signs are acted on.

But while we should be proud of every bit of progress being made, we can't mistake progress for success. The dozens of women and children killed this year; rising rates of sexual violence among young people; and the online harm that's rapidly spilling into the real world are painful reminders of the long road ahead.

The next phase of the National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children is the best compass we have.

For the last few months, the fantastic assistant minister Ged Kearney and I have travelled across the country to hear directly from frontline workers, from victims-survivors and from advocates—to understand where we need to go from here, because one of the clearest messages in the commissioner's report is that lived experience isn't just testimony. It's expertise.

The people who have had to navigate these systems see exactly where the gaps are, because they've fallen through them, which is why their knowledge is shaping our next steps—many of which align closely with the recommendations in the commissioner's report.

First and foremost, we know that we have to shift from simply responding to violence, to dealing with the conditions that cause and exacerbate it. That means getting support to families before they reach crisis, while continuing to fund the frontline services that people depend on today.

It means ensuring children experiencing violence get the help they need to escape and heal; intervening earlier with people who use violence, before their behaviour becomes entrenched; holding perpetrators to account; and giving the sexual violence that is playing out in our schools, institutions, homes and communities the distinct and sustained attention it demands.

To do all this work we need to ensure the services people rely on prioritise safety, reflect the realities of their lives and speak to each other across jurisdictions, just as we need the state and territory governments who run them to be reliable partners.

That means strengthening the frontline supports victims-survivors rely on—not cutting them, as some jurisdictions have—while ensuring every point of contact counts.

That is the principle behind the new National Risk Assessment Framework. And it's why we're laser focused on co-designing policies with the people they're intended to serve.

'Our Ways—Strong Ways—Our Voices'is just one example of where we'll show what this can look like in practice. It's the first standalone national plan for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women and children. But it's also an important opportunity to work with First Nations communities to find solutions that meet their unique needs and address the barriers they face when seeking help.

The reality, however, is that our responses simply won't be effective if they can't keep pace with the new frontiers of violence that we face.

Technology has created innovative ways to control, humiliate and abuse. And we now live in a world where teachers across the country are reporting little boys as young as six using language that they've picked up from the so-called manosphere.

Parents and educators can't be expected to take on billion-dollar tech companies alone. That's why dealing with online harm remains a central focus of our government.

We never claimed the social media delay for under-16s would be perfect—but we knew it would be a lifeline for parents fighting the David versus Goliath battle of infinite scroll.

Age assurance for pornography, to ban access for under-18s, follows a similar principle. We can't pretend for a second we can put the genie back in the bottle when it comes to the avalanche of violent pornography that exists online.

But by restricting access and investing in age-appropriate 21st century sex education and porn literacy, we're giving young people the best possible chance to learn about consent and love from people that they trust.

Holding platforms accountable for the harm their products inflict is the next challenge that we need to meet.

That is why it's crucial our digital duty of care, which we released yesterday, embeds safety by design and forces social media companies to consider the welfare of their users.

Ending violence requires us to do two things at once. We have to be there when somebody needs help today, while building a future where violence touches far fewer lives.

Since coming to government, we have invested well over $4.4 billion to pursue those goals and more work lies ahead. But if we want violence to become rare, brief, and non-recurring, as the commissioner states, we must ensure that all areas of government at all levels—social security, education, health, police and justice—are speaking to each other and pulling in the same direction. And, crucially, we must confront the attitudes and behaviours across our communities that still minimise or excuse violence, or allow it to remain hidden in plain sight.

I know that we have it in us as a nation to rise to the task ahead because I've seen parts of our culture, which once felt unmovable, change before. I grew up in an Australia where family, domestic and sexual violence was often viewed as a private issue, not a crime, and where politicians—many in this very House—argued that the first funding for women's refuges would destroy the family, as if it was the escape from violence breaking up homes, not the violence itself.

Today, by contrast, governments at all levels accept that keeping women and children safe is a public responsibility. We fund and visit the refuges that were once vilified, states and territories have introduced important changes like affirmative consent laws and laws against coercive control and the victims-survivors who suffered in silence are helping design policies to keep others safe.

None of that happened by accident—it happened because of relentless pressure from ordinary people: from women who spoke up when they were told to be quiet; from advocates who wouldn't take no for an answer; from communities who took to the streets; from governments who listened, created new laws and invested in services; and from Australians across the country, ordinary people, who changed what they were prepared to accept. That is how culture shifts.

Yes, governments at all levels must lead, because there are responsibilities that only governments can carry. But we can't do this work alone.

There are things unfolding in homes, schools, workplaces and sporting clubs that we simply don't see, just as there are men who kill women who've never previously come into contact with our justice systems until the worst has happened—until it's too late

So, to Australians who are listening across the country today, my message is very clear: you have more power than you think. Take a disclosure seriously. Show your children that love never requires control. Model respect at every opportunity. Teach the boys in your life the value of empathy, and that women's and girls' boundaries aren't obstacles to overcome.

These feel like small acts but, taken together, they can make a radical difference. We have changed this country before. Now is the time to move together to change it again.

We owe the women and children who have had their lives stolen by this violence more than our horror.

We owe them action.

We tell women experiencing domestic and family violence to leave: leave the house, leave the relationship, take the children, get somewhere safe. But today, in this parliament, I want us to confront the question that comes next. Where does she go? Where does she go tonight, not in six months when her housing application might finally be approved, not next week when a refuge bed might become available? Where does she take her children when the safest thing she can do is walk out her own front door?

But there is nowhere waiting on the other side. For some women, there is family; for some, a friend; and for some, a refuge. But, for too many, there is a motel room for one night, a couch, a car or nowhere at all. Somewhere in Australia tonight, a woman is facing an impossible choice: 'Do I stay with a person hurting me, or do I take my children and risk homelessness?' That is not freedom, that is not safety, and that is not a choice any Australian woman should ever have to make.

For years, we have asked women experiencing violence to find the courage to leave. Today, I want to ask something of us. Have we built a country with the courage to be there when they do? We know women are being hurt, we know children are growing up surrounded by fear, and we know Australian women are still dying. Sometimes, one name tells us what a thousand statistics cannot.

I acknowledge the member for Parkes because this happened in his electorate. That name is Molly Ticehurst. Molly was 28 years old, a daughter, a friend, a mother. In April 2024, Molly was murdered in her home in Forbes by her former partner. At the time, he was on bail for domestic violence offences against her, and, recently, the Supreme Court in Orange heard that Molly's little boy takes an urn containing his mother's ashes wherever he can. A little boy carrying his mum. There are moments when politics should become very quiet, and I feel this is one of them. Molly should have been watching her little boy grow up, taking him to school, celebrating birthdays and doing all the ordinary things that make life. Instead, her little boy carries what remains of his mum in an urn.

Beneath every strategy, every funding package and every law we pass, there is ultimately one question: did we keep her safe? Did we keep Molly safe? Will we keep the next Molly safe? That must be our measure. Expenditure is an input; safety is the outcome. I represent Lindsay, and, when I speak about domestic violence and family violence, this is not a statistic I read in a briefing note. This is my community. It is a woman I may pass in the high street of Penrith. It's a mother at school pick-up, a woman standing beside me at the supermarket, a woman who's cheering for her child at weekend sport and goes home to a life no-one around her can see and a woman hiding out in my electorate office because she is scared.

In the 12 months to March this year, 1,285 domestic violence related assaults were recorded in the Penrith local government area. That is the equivalent of one being recorded, on average, roughly every seven hours—morning, afternoon, night and morning again. Violence does not always leave a bruise. Sometimes, it is a bank account she cannot access, a phone being checked, a location tracked, a friendship she's no longer allowed to have or a look across the room that tells her exactly what will happen when they get home. Sometimes, violence is an entire life organised around fear. When she finally decides to leave, she does not make one decision, she makes a hundred: Where will we sleep? Can I take the children? How will I pay the rent? Will he find us? Will police even believe me? Perhaps, the most frightening question of all is: what will he do when he realises I am gone?

For too long, we have asked, 'Why didn't she leave?' But perhaps a harder question is: why, when she finally tried to leave, was freedom made so difficult to reach? Courage was never her problem; it can't pay a rental bond. Courage cannot create an empty refuge bed; it cannot feed the children. Courage alone cannot rebuild a life. The immediate cost of escaping a violent relationship is now estimated at more than $7,000. Around 117,000 Australians who have experienced family and domestic violence needed specialist homelessness services in just one year. They represent 40 per cent of everyone those services assisted. Those numbers tell us something very important. Leaving violence and finding somewhere safe to live are not two different problems. For too many women, they are the same problem. We have spent years telling women to be brave. Our systems need to be brave enough for them.

I believe that every domestic and family violence policy in this country should face three simple tests. The first is: Can she leave? Does she have the money? Does somebody answer the phone? Can she get immediate practical help? If the cost of leaving is greater than the resources available to leave, we have built a trap and called it a choice.

Second, is there somewhere safe for her to go—not eventually, not after 20 phone calls, but when she needs it tonight, and for long enough to rebuild? Safety cannot mean simply surviving tonight. That woman and her family need a future tomorrow.

Third, will the person causing the violence be stopped? Too often, the woman experiencing violence is the person required to change absolutely everything. She changes her phone. She changes the locks. She changes the children's school. She moves house. Her world becomes smaller, and somebody else, who did this to her, has all the choices, when they made the wrong choice. A woman should not have to disappear in order to survive. The responsibility must sit where it belongs—with the person choosing violence. Our policing must respect that. It must reflect that, and our bail systems and our courts must also do that. Freedom should belong to the victim, and the restrictions should follow the danger, not the other way around.

Molly's father told the court:

I still ask myself why it took Molly's life for this to happen.

That question should trouble every government in this country. Leadership demands more than responding after tragedy. Leadership means seeing the danger before the funeral and protecting the woman whose name the country does not yet know and should never have to know because she became another victim.

Government cannot do this alone. Domestic violence begins long before the police are called. It begins in attitudes about power and control. So we must teach our sons that strength is not control, that love is not possession and that respect is not weakness, and our daughters must know that love should never require them to become smaller.

I believe in an Australia where home is safety. I think that's an Australia that we all believe in—where a mother can close her front door at night and know that she's safe behind that door; where the child who's in that home doesn't lie awake listening for footsteps; where no little boy has to understand what an urn is because somebody murdered his mum; where the burden falls on the person creating the danger, not the person running from it; and where a woman who finally does find the courage to leave does not open the front door and find another cliff waiting on the other side. I don't think that's impossible in this country. I think it's an Australia that we should all expect of ourselves.

I'll come back to where I started. We tell her to leave. We tell her she deserves better. We tell her to take her children. We tell her to get somewhere safe. But words spoken from the safety of this chamber and parliament mean very little if there's nowhere safe for her to go. I want you to imagine the moment. The bag is packed. The children are beside her. Her heart is racing. Her hand is on the door. She shouldn't have to know every answer. She should not have to have money and be wealthy. She should not have to be fearless. She should only have to know that, when she finds the courage to walk out, her country will not fail her. When she walks through that door, Australia must be on the other side—somewhere safe, somewhere with practical help, enough financial support to begin again, laws that understand the danger, people that actually believe her and a path from violence to freedom.

The true measure of our response will not be found in the announcements. It will be found in the lives that are saved—in the woman who got out, the mother who found a home and the little girl who learned that love does not hurt—and in children who get to grow up with their mums. Molly's little boy deserved that, and every child does.

We've spent years asking women whether they have the courage to leave. It's time we ask whether Australia has the courage to be there when they do. I want the answer to that first question—where does she go?—to be something every Australian woman can know with certainty: she goes somewhere safe. She shouldn't have had to go anywhere at all. When she does leave and goes forward, we need to ensure she does not do that alone. Her country needs to go with her.

I move:

That the House take note of the following document:

Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Commission—Yearly report to Parliament—Statement by the Minister for Social Services, Tanya Plibersek MP, 9 September 2026.

Debate adjourned.