At No to Violence’s special Federal Election Forum on Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence, our audience of over 500 people were invited to submit questions for the four panellists to answer.
Audience members were also given the option of voting for their preferred previously-submitted questions to be put to the panel. Following the Forum, the three most popular questions were supplied to the panellists and their teams with a request to respond by Wednesday 30 April.
Senator Larissa Waters, spokesperson on women for the Australian Greens, was the first to respond. Here are her responses:
Question 1:
I am an Aboriginal woman/victim-survivor, currently working in a crisis response space; responding to L17 reports and referrals [the interface between Victorian Police reports and service system].
A major factor contributing to ongoing family violence is the lack of housing. All housing supports are at maximum capacity and are struggling to keep up with demand. Victim-survivors are returning to violent relationships as there is “no other option”. Refuges have wait times and specific criteria.
What is the plan for housing for people experiencing/using family violence that do not meet the “at serious risk requiring immediate protection/intervention” [category as determined by Victorian Police]?
Answer:
Women should not have to choose between violence and homelessness, but that’s the reality when the refuges are full and there is no long-term affordable housing.
Thank you for being one of the frontline response services helping survivors, you and your organisation deserve full funding. The Greens have costed our pledge to fully fund frontline response services, including First Nations led services, with $1 billion each year over the 12-year life of the National Plan to End Violence Against Women and their Children. This means that shelters, legal services, healing and trauma support services would all have the funding they need to help everyone who needs it. Our $15bil plan would also resource men’s behaviour change programs and prevention programs to try to tackle the increasing use of men’s violence.
We also want to see more women and children kept in their homes where it is safe to do so, and the perpetrator be the one that is removed. We’ve committed $250 million annually to expand the existing small program that does that (‘Staying Home Leaving Violence’) right across Australia, and $1 million for each state and territory to raise awareness of the program within Police, Local, and Magistrate Courts.
The Greens also have a range of housing policies to address the housing crisis for all, including ending investor tax breaks that have inflated property prices, capping rents, a massive build of public housing just like the government did after WW2, and establishing a public property developer to build homes for people not private profit, at prices people can afford to rent and buy.
Question 2:
There have been no new commitments from any major party this election campaign – it is noticeably absent from all election events and conversations. We have just had a cluster of deaths this week and heading into easter we know rates of violence will not only increase but likely there will be more deaths.
Why is the fear of backlash [to commitments to end violence] more important than the risk to women?
Answer:
It is outrageous that neither major party has highlighted family, domestic or sexual violence during the federal election campaign, despite more than one woman every week in Australia being killed by men’s violence.
In November last year, the Greens announced our $15 billion costed election policy package to address the national FDSV crisis, hoping the major parties would copy our homework. Unfortunately, that has not happened.
The Greens have committed to fully funding for frontline services with $12 billion over 12 years, doubling the Escaping Violence Payment, and establishing a national real-time toll of women killed by violence, to name a few of our policies.
Labor’s proposed reform this week to stop perpetrators weaponising the tax system is a welcome but small gesture in the face of a devastating crisis. Meanwhile, the Liberal’s idea of supporting women was walking back their own attack on flexible work arrangements, then a belated tiny commitment of 90 million once again focussing on crime and not prevention or support.
The Greens won’t stop working until women and children are safe.
Question 3:
There has been significant focus on men and boys, “to engage them”
What does engagement [of men and boys] really mean to you? In this “engagement” does this include trans-men, gay men, boys with disability, refugee men, young men who live in very remote Australia?
Answer:
Engaging all men and boys is imperative to transforming our culture of gendered violence.
Around 95% of all victims of violence, irrespective of their gender, experience violence from a male perpetrator (ABS 2015 Personal Safety Survey data).
Men and boys are part of the problem and it’s critical they are also part of the solution.
Unfortunately, online misogyny is getting worse. We need to combat this toxicity and teach in all parts of our communities that kindness and respect are traits of healthy masculinity.
The Greens $15 billion costed plan to fully fund frontline family, domestic and sexual violence services include funding for men’s behaviour change programs and consent and respectful relationships education, because prevention and education are critical to changing the culture of gendered violence.
