Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Family Law Amendment Bill 2023 and the Family Law Amendment (Information Sharing) Bill 2023, and I note at the outset that the Greens will be supporting both of these bills.

After years of inaction and unnecessary and damaging inquiries, I welcome some positive reforms to the family law system. The family law amendment bills aim to make the family law system safer for women and children, and they do this by putting children's welfare first. The Family Law Amendment Bill does a number of things, which include removing the presumption of equal shared parental responsibility. This is a damaging and regressive provision, implemented by the Howard government, which has been widely misconstrued in the community and often weaponised in family law court cases to claim equal time with children, even when that is not in the best interests of the child, such as in cases of domestic and family violence. Repealing this presumption will make the family law system safer for women and children.

The Family Law Amendment Bill also expands the definition of 'family member' to better capture First Nations cultural norms and kinship arrangements. We support that. I'm pleased to see a new requirement for independent children's lawyers to actually meet with the child and give them the opportunity to express a view about proposed parenting arrangements. We also welcome the broadened duty of lawyers and judges to act to achieve the best interests of children.

The Family Law Amendment Bill also gives the minister the power to develop accreditation standards for family law report writers, which are long overdue. I've had countless people raise concerns with me, both through Senate inquiry processes and in separate meetings with me over many years now, the varied quality of family law report writers. There's no quality control despite the crucial role that those people play in the court process, and the conclusions that they draw are often unquestioned and very difficult to challenge. We urge the government to move quickly on the accreditation standards for family report writers. Get this done! It will have a huge impact and there's not a moment to lose.

The main bill also clarifies the restriction on publishing details of Family Court matters to ensure that information can be provided to relevant authorities. That's obviously similar to the accompanying Family Law Amendment (Information Sharing) Bill, which introduces a new framework aimed at improving access to information from state and territory family violence and child protection systems during family law proceedings. They're important reforms because they empower the family law courts to procure from state and territory agencies information related to family violence, and they provide for the admission of that information into evidence.

This brings me to the issue of perpetrators subpoenaing counselling records of victims-survivors as part of family law cases. The exposure draft of the main bill did propose some restrictions to this, but they were deleted from the final bill after feedback from stakeholders on this sensitive and complicated issue. Attempting to weaponise a person's confidential records through the family law courts is an obvious abuse of power and privilege, yet, as evidence to the Senate inquiry into these bills made clear, a blanket ban on access to medical or psychological records is not always helpful, as that information can both identify and conceal evidence that's useful to keeping women safe. It is important that the right balance be struck to protect vulnerable people. It's important to ensure that people who are seeking the mental health support and counselling they need won't fear that information becoming public or known to a perpetrator and then used against them in family law cases, deterring them from seeking the help they need. It's also important to ensure that the court has the information it needs to decide what's in the best interests of the child. I'm pleased that the government is reconsidering the shape and nature of these amendments and working with stakeholders to strike that balance. We would like to see the government progress those reforms promptly and in a way that both protects survivors and ensures the court has the information it needs to make decisions about the best interests of the child. We look forward to engaging further on that crucial topic.

The women's safety sector and legal advocates have long called for a child safety focus, and these bills at least partially deliver on that. However, their child-safety-focused outcomes can only be achieved with adequate resourcing of the court system. The court system was already set back by the abolition of the specialist Family Court under the Morrison government. Very few in the legal profession thought that the Federal Circuit and Family Court merger was a good idea. Conservative estimates suggest that at least 60 per cent of Family Court matters involve family violence, and other estimates have it at 90 per cent. Even those that don't involve violence regularly involve complex parenting or property matters. The loss of specialisation in a court that relies on specialist expertise to navigate complex matters and to ensure the safety of children has only made those existing pressures more extreme. Reform should strengthen a system, not lead to the diminution of specialisation. The now-amalgamated Federal Circuit and Family Court has taken some steps to recognise and expedite family law matters where violence or child abuse is alleged to be occurring, but there is still the need for specialist judges and court officers to deliver justice properly.

Moreover, we hear so many tales of how poorly the court recognises and deals with violence against women and children. This is not the first time I've said this, nor will it be the last: we urgently need comprehensive family and domestic violence education and trauma-informed training for the judiciary, legal practitioners, independent children's lawyers, family law report writers, the police and all others associated with the court process. Justice delayed is justice denied so, in addition to that trauma training, the court needs more resourcing. Review after review has confirmed that the entire family law framework is overstretched and underresourced. The government must ensure that legal aid, community legal centres, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander legal services, family violence prevention legal services and various peak bodies have adequate and secure funding to provide timely advice and representation to parties. Failure to strengthen that legal assistance sector will simply exacerbate the delays and costs that directly impact on the accessibility and quality of justice.

Whilst the legislative reforms that we're debating today are welcome, full funding for frontline family and domestic violence support services is needed to ensure that women and children don't remain at risk. And, as always, the community legal sector deserves ample and secure funding. I'm a former CLC lawyer myself, and that sector is crucial to access to justice; it provides top-quality legal advice and support. CLC lawyers move mountains to assist their clients and they often do so either for free or for a fraction of the price that clients would need to provide in the private sector. I note that the NLAP review, which is a review of the five-year funding agreement between the states and the federal government for legal centres is currently underway, and I urge that it deliver appropriate financial recognition to this vital sector. I extend my deep gratitude to all the advocates, practitioners and frontline service providers who continue to fight for better protections for vulnerable people and for a safer family law system. This is critical work, but it's not easy work, and we thank you for all that you do.

The improvements to the family law system in the upcoming bills are important ones, but there is much more work to be done. At this stage, I will move a second reading amendment to the info-sharing bill on behalf of Senator Thorpe; it has been circulated, as amended, in the chamber. At the request of Senator Thorpe, in respect of the Family Law Amendment (Information Sharing) Bill 2023 I move:

At the end of the motion, add ", but the Senate calls on the Government to work with the states and territories to ensure that training on family violence is provided to employees or officers involved in the information sharing scheme established by this bill, including training on:

(a) recognising the dynamics of family violence;

(b) working with victim-survivors of family violence; and

(c) response-based practice and cultural competence in relation to family violence".