Page 688 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 17 March 2015
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Domestic and family violence does not discriminate. It has a significant and lasting impact on all sectors of the community. This violence claims the lives of more than a hundred people, many women, in Australia every year and causes enduring damage to individuals and to society as a whole.
Right here in the ACT we received a painful and confronting reminder of the impact of family violence with the tragic death of Tara Costigan. As a community and in economic terms we measure the cost of domestic and family violence in the billions of dollars. Violence against women costs Australia $13.6 billion each year. This figure is spread across our society and economy and includes health costs, pain and suffering, loss of productivity due to absences from work, and law enforcement and court systems costs, to name but a few. I am sure every member in this place will agree that there is no greater cost, though, than when a family suffers the loss of a loved one, or a child loses a parent through such violence.
Effective responses to this form of violence require a whole-of-government response and widespread community engagement. Everyone in the community can play a role in addressing this violence by speaking out and working towards a culture that is safe, respectful and just. Accordingly, a strong and ongoing commitment to ending domestic and family violence continues to be needed. Only a whole-of-government and a whole-of-community responsibility approach will bring about an end to this form of violence.
As a nation, Australia is signatory to several international agreements that relate to addressing the issue of violence against women, including domestic and family violence. The obligations outlined in these international agreements have shaped Australia’s responses to domestic violence and have led to the development of the 12-year national plan to reduce violence against women and their children, which informs approaches to domestic and family violence across the commonwealth, states and territories.
Here in the ACT we currently support more than 20 initiatives, agencies and programs designed to help prevent instances of domestic violence, to support victims and to educate offenders. A number of these agencies work together to coordinate the government’s efforts to address domestic violence issues in the community and undertake critical and difficult work dealing with all aspects of family violence. Notable amongst these is the Domestic Violence Crisis Service. It stands at the coalface of many of these efforts. The service promotes the safety of people subjected to violence and works to leave the responsibility for violence and abuse with its perpetrator. The DVCS is often a first point of contact for victims of domestic violence and their families, and I want to place on the record the government’s thanks to the DVCS and all of its staff for the complex and often taxing work they do each and every day.
Part of this work is undertaken under a memorandum of agreement with ACT Policing that supports the family violence incident review mechanism. This system of review has been developed in recent years and gives feedback to both agencies about the ways in which incidents can be more effectively handled in the future. It ensures
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