Louise Miller-Frost (Boothby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Gender based violence is an epidemic in our country. Thirty-nine per cent of women have experienced violence since the age of 15. Thirty-one per cent of women have experienced physical violence and 22 per cent have experienced sexual violence. Twelve per cent of adults reported having seen domestic violence against their mothers when they were children. Women are more likely to experience violence from someone they know than from a stranger—35 per cent to 11 per cent. Twenty-five per cent of women have experienced violence, emotional abuse or financial abuse from a cohabiting partner since the age of 15. Women with disability are more likely to experience violence, with 50 per cent of women with an intellectual disability experiencing sexual violence. Fifty-three per cent of women have experienced sexual harassment. On average, one woman is killed every nine days by a current or former partner.

According to the research group Counting Dead Women Australia, 64 women were killed in violent incidents in 2023. In 2021-22, 4,620 women aged 15 or over were hospitalised due to family and domestic violence. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women are 31 times more likely to be hospitalised by family and domestic violence, with non-Indigenous men making up a significant portion of the perpetrators. Our Watch research shows that around 25 per cent of men in Australia say that they have used physical or sexual violence against women. Gendered violence against women is estimated to cost Australia $26 billion a year. Financial abuse is estimated to cost $10.9 billion, of which $5.7 billion is borne directly by the victims—those same women who turn up in homelessness shelters in their latter years. We talk a lot about family and domestic violence in this place, and they are some very sobering statistics.

In 2022 the government launched the National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children. This is a 10-year plan for state and Commonwealth governments that looks at prevention, early intervention, response, recovery and healing. In the last three budgets this government has invested $3.4 billion; states and territories fund services, not-for-profits and charities fundraise for services and still these statistics persist. And each statistic represents countless lives, real human beings, lives lost, suffering, fear and disadvantage. To say this is an epidemic is understating it. If any other cause of death and injury, not to mention cost to the taxpayer and the economy—if there were anything else causing this much damage to 51 per cent of the community, it would be an emergency.

I think it's sometimes easy to think everyone knows this, everyone cares and everyone wants something done about it. In here we talk about this quite a lot. We hear the statistics. We meet the survivors and the families of those killed. But I know that every time I put something up on social media about women—it doesn't even have to be about violence against women—I need to keep a sharp eye out for the trolls.

I do wonder if maybe the language we use is wrong, as we know the expression 'just a domestic' used to be used to minimise what was happening behind closed doors to clearly align in this being a private matter. Maybe using terms like 'domestic violence' also minimises what is happening. Maybe, if we refer to what's happening as murder, assault and torture, the seriousness of what is happening to a very significant part of the Australian population might get through. The definition of the word 'domestic' relates to the running of a home or to family relations, and the only relevance here is that some of it happens in a domestic setting.

I would like to finish by dedicating this speech to the late Helen Oxenham OAM. Helen Oxenham was a stalwart of the women's movement in South Australia. She grew up in a violent household in Ireland, one of six children, where her mother experienced violence and the children saw it. After migrating to Adelaide with her husband and hearing the stories of her friends going through similar violence with no supports, no services, she was instrumental in setting up the first women's shelter, in Christies Beach, in 1977. She sold lamingtons to fundraise to support this. Helen spent her entire life campaigning against domestic violence and promoting gender equity.

She died recently, at age 93, and her Irish funeral and wake were attended by hundreds of mourners, from women that she had helped over the decades and their now adult children to leaders in the gender equality movement and in the anti-domestic-violence movement, local community groups, politicians and community leaders. Vale, Helen, and thank you for all you did. You made a difference to so many lives.

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