Page 3642 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 24 November 2021
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The first phase of the safer families levy provided $770,000 for the training of frontline staff across the community—a worthwhile initiative. Not long after that, another $2.4 million of the levy was spent on training all 21,000 ACT government staff, at the expense of frontline service providers. This is not how we expected the safer families levy to be used. When I first learned of this change in the spending of the levy, I immediately sought clarity from the minister in hearings and continued to represent the many Canberrans who raised significant concerns about the ACT government’s decision to pull much-needed funding away from better support for victims of domestic violence.
Answers to questions on notice from estimates hearings and during sitting weeks over the years confirm that about only 25 per cent of the levy was spent directly on supporting domestic violence victims and frontline domestic violence services. It was only in 2020-21, after persistently raising concerns with the ACT government, that the percentage rose to approximately 30 per cent.
We ran out of money during a time when victims of domestic violence, and the frontline workers and service providers who support them, needed it the most. I have received reports of mothers and their children fleeing violent homes and sleeping in cars because there is a lack of emergency housing.
I have received reports of men and other people who are victims of domestic violence, unable to access critical support and accommodation when they were in need; families waiting an average of 280 days to find priority housing; community legal centres at full capacity and forced to let victims down; and children who are in desperate need of trauma counselling and professional support from being invisible victims of violence in the home. The list goes on, and most of the levy was seen by many to have been squandered by the ACT government.
What is the solution? The minister announced that the solution is for Canberra ratepayers to bear the cost, by increasing the safer families levy by $5 each year over four years, so that we will be paying $50 instead of the original $30 levy by the year 2024-25.
As the opposition, the Canberra Liberals and I have relentlessly scrutinised and questioned the ACT government on their decisions in this space. We have represented and advocated for the concerns of many Canberrans for safer families. We have made recommendations and provided advice on possible pathways and solutions to these concerns. Without an Assembly majority, we have no choice but to accept that under this current Labor-Greens government, increasing the levy is the only solution they can offer to remedy the crisis that we now find ourselves in, much of which was foreseen, even before COVID-19.
I know that the Canberra Liberals and I would have exercised foresight regarding the warnings given and made sure that the valuable contributions made by Canberrans as part of the safer families levy would be spent wisely to create increased safety for those directly impacted by domestic violence.
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