Page 3329 - Week 09 - Thursday, 22 August 2019
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lot of women, and some men, who have been victims of domestic violence. I wish there was the opportunity to give everyone the chance to tell their stories here or in a place where they feel safe. I wish I could extend parliamentary privilege to each one of them, to all those who had the courage and the circumstances to tell their stories and, even more, all those whose circumstances do not put them in a place to tell their stories. But I cannot.
We must recognise that there are thousands of women stuck in circumstances that they cannot speak of because of fear, because of shame and because many put their children’s safety or position in front of their welfare. That calculation is real.
The old advice “if he hits you, leave,” is garbage. Leaving is, for many, the hardest decision that they will ever make. It is so hard. For too many, the idea of leaving is impossible. Where would they go? Where can they go? Until our community provides a solid, reliable and dependable answer to that question many will not leave. And when the idea of leaving enters their head they dismiss it. It is easier to pretend that everything is okay, because most of the time the hardest part is admitting to yourself that you are in trouble, not to mention that the easiest way to be murdered in this country is leaving. I know. That is how it was for me.
To be honest, I do not know what I was thinking. I did not realise that I was in as bad a situation as I was until it was time to go. I did not realise how controlling he was and how unhappy and unhealthy I was. I also did not realise that it was not normal. It was my first relationship. I did not know what was normal. I did not realise that controlling behaviour was not normal, and that makes me feel weak.
I let myself become isolated. I told my friends it was not happening, because that is what domestic violence does. It makes the victim an accomplice. And it feels like the whole world is an accomplice too. That is how it felt for me. The neighbour who wilfully does not hear, the friend who does not follow up, the police officer who finds it all too rude to ask the extra question—that is how it was for me.
There are some amazing recommendations in this report but there are also many recommendations—good ones—that are not in this report. We need to do these things but we also need to keep imagining the answers to the questions the committee did not get. We need to make a change in here and in every directorate. I know that the minister has started that journey—and it has been wonderful—but we need to continue that. We need to make a change in every street in Canberra, in every house, until nobody lives in fear in their houses and nobody is forced to lie to themselves about what is happening to them, because every time we do not do these things we are accomplices in somebody’s abuse.
We tell our daughters to be afraid walking through the park at night, when really they can be in more danger in their kitchen or their lounge room in their own home. That is right. A young woman walking drunk through the park at night is in more danger after she gets home to her intimate partner. And every time we tell them the opposite is true we put them at more risk.
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