Chris Hayes (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak about White Ribbon Day, the United Nations International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, which is held annually on 25 November. I have been involved with the White Ribbon campaign for a number of years as a White Ribbon ambassador because I find absolutely abhorrent the number of women who are subjected to violence in their lifetime. Nationally, the disturbing statistics are that one in three women will experience physical violence and one in five will experience sexual violence in their lifetime. What really brings this home to me is that of the women in my life—my mother, my wife, Bernadette; my daughter, Elizabeth; and my two granddaughters, Charlie and Kiarni—this statistic means that one is likely to experience violence in her lifetime. As a son, a husband, a father and a grandfather, I find that completely abhorrent and reprehensible. If everyone can personalise domestic violence in these terms and think about their families and their loved ones, people may have a better appreciation of the horrific and heartbreaking situations and the consequences and impacts that domestic violence has in our community.

Another disturbing statistic is from Amnesty International. It shows that in Australia domestic violence puts more women aged between 15 and 44 at risk of serious health issues and premature death than any other risk factor within our community. Clearly, we need to do something to change these worrying statistics; action must be taken. The White Ribbon campaign calls on all Australian men to challenge the attitudes and behaviours that allow violence to continue. It encourages men to act as role models and take the lead in order to raise awareness that violence against women is never, ever acceptable.

Sadly, in my electorate, 723 people in the Liverpool LGA reported violence, with another 690 women from the Fairfield LGA experiencing violence in 2009. It is important to bear in mind that those local statistics are from people who had the courage to report their experience of violence to the police. It is a sad fact that many incidents of violence against women go unreported. As a society, we should be doing everything we can to encourage victims of violence to come forward and to say, ‘Enough is enough.’ It is important to remember that violence against women is not simply physical or sexual; it can be emotional or financial violence. By ‘financial violence’, I refer to a situation when a partner or a husband has such a level of control over finances that women are forbidden to spend money on their necessities and those of their families. All of these types of violence against women are unacceptable.

I recently had the privilege of attending a session of the Aboriginal violence against women program in my electorate. The program is run by the Joan Harrison Support and Outreach Services for Women out of the Liverpool Women’s Resource Centre. My visit gave me a new and valuable insight into the work that is being done to break down the cycle of violence in my community. Through the partnership with TAFE New South Wales, the Liverpool Women’s Health Centre, WILMA Women’s Health Centre, Bonnyrigg Public School and the Aboriginal mental health workers, this program gets the message out there that violence within the family is never okay.

Five groups of women have now completed the program, allowing about 70 Aboriginal women to become mentors and advocates against violence in their own communities. The members of the group are given a simple message: if someone is hurting you or abusing you, tell someone about it and get some help and support. Those words are filtering down through the wider community as women who have completed the program become mentors and pass on what can be a lifesaving message.

My thanks go to Tracy Phillips, the manager of the Joan Harrison Support Services for Women, the Aboriginal project worker Mary Eatts, and Shirley Kent from the Liverpool Women’s Resource Centre, for opening my eyes to this amazing project. I was so impressed with the progress being made by the Aboriginal Women Against Violence Program that I suggested it be used as a pilot program for the White Ribbon Foundation of Australia. After all, the foundation and this program share a common philosophy: that mentoring and community leadership are key instruments in breaking down the cycle of violence.

The Liverpool Women’s Resource Centre also supports the Aboriginal Women’s Support Group, which has started producing a newsletter called Sister to Sister. I would like to share with this place a poem that was included in the latest edition of Sister to Sister and was written by a woman named Timika. Timika’s poem is entitled Place to Start, and it says:

Sometimes you feel like you are being pushed into a corner

Being made to feel like a pawn in a game of chess

Being told how to feel and when to feel it

Everyone deals with things in their own time

Who has the right to tell you different?

When you have walked in these shoes,

When you have felt the pain,

Then this is the time you will be heard.

When you sit back and help someone instead of hurting them,

When you can listen instead of being heard,

Everyone has a story

Everyone can help if we all would work together

Just talk and listen

That would be a great place to start.

As Timika so rightly points out, it is up to each and every one of us to talk about violence against women as something that is shameful and intolerable.

We also need to listen to the victims of violence against women and take their advice on what we should be doing to redress this terrible situation. As research shows us, of the children who witness domestic violence in the home, 50 per cent of young women will grow up to take abusers as partners and, most chillingly, 60 per cent of the boys will grow up to become abusers themselves. This cycle has to end.

We also need to ensure that White Ribbon Day is not just another day on the calendar but a day that people make a change in attitude, a change for the better. As I have said before in this place on many occasions, violence against women is the most widespread human rights abuse in the world. In Australia the cost of violence against women and children in the Australian economy was estimated to be $13.6 billion in 2009. If that is not addressed, by 2021 I understand that the cost is likely to rise to a staggering $15.6 billion. We must recognise that while living free from violence is everybody’s right, reducing violence is everybody’s responsibility.

In conclusion, on this White Ribbon Day I will humbly join many Australian men and take the White Ribbon Oath:

I swear never to commit, excuse or remain silent about violence against women.

It is a very simple thing that all of us men in this place can do and I would encourage people to take that pledge. We all have the responsibility of leadership in our communities and I think we should be taking leadership on this principal issue of human rights abuse. Disturbingly, violence against women and children is probably the most prolific issue within our justice system at the moment.

I would also encourage the men of this place to show their commitment by wearing the white ribbon on White Ribbon Day and by being prepared to stand up when it comes to showing leadership in their communities. Whether we are fathers, brothers, uncles, community members or just workmates, we can all make a difference and we can make it very clear that we will not condone violence against women and children.

Bert Van Manen (Forde, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Fowler for his motion to recognise that White Ribbon Day is important. It is not just symbolic; there is a genuine reason for it. It is a recognition and acknowledgement of the fact that there are still major issues in many countries and societies, including our own, with respect to violence against women. As with all of these types of programs, the important thing is that we change society’s attitudes. We can talk a lot about stopping violence against women, but as men we need to stand up in the community and change our attitudes. A lot of words are spoken at times about these issues. But it is not about the words; it is about the actual actions that are taken.

There are groups in my electorate like MADD and, whilst they are focused on parents with drug problems, a lot of the women that they take care of are victims of domestic violence, whether it be sexual, financial or physical. The problems that pervade our society with respect to domestic violence cause enormous damage. In my career in financial services I have seen the destructive effects of that firsthand as clients have gone through divorce and separation for a variety of reasons. The financial and emotional consequences for the family are very destructive. It takes enormous amounts of time—and in some cases many years—for the family to recover from the effects of those situations.

As I said earlier, it is about us as men changing our attitudes and our behaviours to drive real change. By and large, men are the primary perpetrators of violence towards women. There is some discussion about violence towards men as well, but this campaign is focused on violence towards women. We as men are responsible for looking after our households. We are the primary provider. It is our responsibility to take care of our wives and take care of our children. That is what sets the tone and solidifies the family unit in order to move forward. That solidity makes families the basic building blocks of our community. The opportunity for Australian men to be involved in the My Oath campaign is an opportunity for men to stand up and say, ‘I wish to be counted.’ It is an opportunity to say, ‘I’m not going to tolerate violence, I’m not going to undertake it myself and I’m also going to hold other men accountable for the way they treat their wives and children.’

The cost of domestic violence in our community is a stark reality. I have to be honest—I was not aware that the figures were this high. That is the very sobering reality of the financial consequences. More importantly, it is about not only the financial consequences but also the emotional and physical consequences for those ladies involved. It takes so long for people to recover, if ever. If they do go through divorce or separation as a result, it can affect their next relationship or, as the member for Fowler rightly mentioned, the future relationships of families’ children. I have seen many examples of that over the years. It becomes a generational issue, and we see that in the electorate of Forde, where there are generational problems of domestic and family violence. So it is not just that immediate husband-wife relationship that is affected—it can last several generations. That is where the problem grows and becomes wider.

The fact that the violence is perpetrated not only physically but also financially or emotionally also causes a great many scars and reduces the importance of the wife in the relationship. The husband should value the wife’s contribution to the relationship because it is a partnership. It is not me as a husband lording it over my wife; it is a partnership where we work together to achieve more than we can as individual entities. And that is the value of a marriage relationship, whether it is a de facto or a married couple. Violence of any sort in that relationship breaks that down and reduces the effectiveness of that partnership. I do not think it is a coincidence that in parts of our society where these issues are much more relevant—and there are more obvious problems—the ability for those families to be successful and generate wealth or hold down jobs and contribute positively to society is reduced because those families have fractured and split as a result of these issues of domestic violence.

I agree with the request of the member for Fowler that all members show that we are challenging violence against women, because it is an enormous cost to our society. We can say that we are a wealthy, successful society but it is not just about us being wealthy or successful financially or materially. Those family relationships are far more important because having a strong family unit is the foundation of our society. Domestic violence breaks that down and takes away from that. So I commend and concur with the member’s motion and I certainly will support him on 25 November in supporting the United Nations International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women as I think that it is a very worthwhile campaign and we as a society should be looking to eliminate that. It will create a better, stronger society for this nation to grow and prosper. I thank the member and the House for the opportunity to speak on this matter.

Steve Georganas (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to support the motion before us and I thank the member for Fowler for bringing it to the House. I also rise to note the upcoming White Ribbon Day, the meaning and significance of this particular day and the ongoing violence and abusiveness on which it is focused, and the role that each and every one of us can play in ridding society of this blight. White Ribbon Day is a time to refocus on both the unacceptable violence perpetrated against women and what we ourselves are doing to prevent this so we can move toward a non-violent, non-oppressive society.

Over the course of 2008 and 2009, the Labor government commissioned response to violence against women was developed to combat and to eliminate violence towards women in Australia. That response is called Time for action. It set a framework of 117 actions of governments, collectively and individually, research and community service organisations towards the achievement of 25 strategies to realise six outcomes within a time frame of 12 years. The report has six outcomes that we all seek, and they are:

• Communities are safe and free from violence
• Relationships are respectful
• Services meet the needs of women and their children
• Responses are just
• Perpetrators stop their violence
• Systems work together effectively.

It is a very sad indictment of our society and those of nations around the world that these statements are so hard to apply to our very own communities, our very own neighbourhoods, our own circle of friends and the social and community services that we have created to serve us.

Of the 117 actions listed, 20 actions were prioritised within the response for immediate fulfilment. One such action was:

Recognising that most men are not violent towards women, encourage them to take a role in countering such violence and promote understandings of, and support for, expressions of masculinities that are non-violent.

White Ribbon Day ambassadors are men who assume a role in countering the violence and promoting non-violent expression. I am very honoured to be one of no doubt many members of this House and myriad White Ribbon Day ambassadors in our communities. I believe that there is no greater or more significant task that we have assumed over recent years than that of being White Ribbon Day ambassadors. The pain and suffering perpetrated on women and their children, the normalisation of abuse learned and passed on through such experiences from generation to generation and the debasing of people’s human experience are the manifestations which we pledge, as White Ribbon Day ambassadors, to strive to bring to an end.

We are reminded on White Ribbon Day that each and every one of us is in a position to do our bit to stop and to prevent that which we find so unacceptable and unconscionable. We should all be doing all that we can among our families, when we are raising our children, and guiding those close to us, our colleagues and those on whom they rely, within our social circles, our clubs and our congregations at all times and in all circumstances. We have the opportunity to set an example and to instil in our fellows what is right, good and just.

There is, of course, a tremendous role for professional service providers in both halting the perpetration of violence in the immediate discharge of their duties and preventing its recurrence within a context from which a person has been brave enough to emerge seeking help. I welcome the funding of the Women’s Services Network to build the capacity of service providers to support those victims of domestic and family violence within an early intervention and prevention model. I encourage all governments, federal, state and local, to give appropriate resources to emergency housing for use by women and their children who leave an abusive and violent environment.

People desperately need our help. They ask for our help. They plead for our help every day in our electorate offices. We need to acknowledge what that means in terms of service provision, face up to our responsibility to help people as and when they need and request it and fund the services, including emergency accommodation, so that they can make a difference. Good intentions are cheap but without effort and resources too often betray indifference. This is not the mark of a civilised society.

Ken Wyatt (Hasluck, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I support the motion by the member for Fowler. It is a privilege to talk on this issue because it affects so many families across Australia. Having worked in the fields of both education and health, I have seen the direct result of violence inflicted on women and families. A close colleague of mine, Judy Atkinson, who lectures at the Southern Cross University in the top end of New South Wales, once spoke to me about the intergenerational impact of family violence and violence perpetrated against women. This intergenerational trauma is passed through generations of the family, and the practices and learned behaviours are there for some time.

I strongly endorse and support the My Oath campaign and I believe that all Australian men and other men living in Australia should commit to this campaign because this violence has social consequences that are far reaching, and the dislocation of women and children in times of hardship and in times of stress is something that we do not want to see experienced on the scale that we do at times. I also swear to commit to never excuse or remain silent about violence against women. I would like to salute the Canadian men who, after the massacre of 14 women in Canada by a gunman, made a commitment to acknowledge that there was a need to address violence against women.

I had the privilege of working in New South Wales as Director of Aboriginal Health, and I had a strong association with the Education Centre Against Violence, whose principal task is to work with communities—all communities, because family violence is not an issue particular to any section of society but tends to be right across the socioeconomic spectrum—to develop women’s awareness of the avenues, services and resources that are available to them when seeking refuge from violence or seeking a strategy in which an intervention can occur which allows them to change from being a recipient of violence to being much more proactive about removing themselves and their children from a violent situation.

I am pleased that the United Nations has established an International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, which aims to prevent violence against women by increasing public awareness and education, and by challenging the attitudes and behaviours that allow violence to continue. Certainly, the fundamental role of the ECAV program in New South Wales was to develop the awareness of communities and men that it is not appropriate for a male to exercise any level of violence against a woman or against children within the family. There is a need, as I said, for all men to drive the change in our society, because, if we go to the whole crux of the way in which we bully or are violent towards another human being, it leads in our minds our ability to control the circumstances that we sometimes find ourselves in.

I will certainly work tirelessly in Hasluck to create wide-scale awareness of the positive role that men can play in bringing an end to violence against women and in influencing other men who are violent to look at behaviours to deal with that rage, to protect the women who are part of their lives and to protect their family. It should also enable leadership, particularly by men and boys, to bring about social change and build collective knowledge and understanding of the effective prevention of violence against women. I concur with the comments by the previous speaker, the member for Hindmarsh, about the need to ensure that services in this area are real, provided at appropriate times and readily accessible.

I am also proud to say that I am now a member of the male parliamentarians for the elimination of violence against women subcommittee. We will ensure that awareness of the impact of violence and the inappropriateness of violence against women and children becomes a focal point of our work and that we continue to influence the way in which men behave in family or in partnership relationships. When you consider the range of violence that is part of that whole make-up, we certainly have a challenge. I commend the member for Fowler for putting this motion forward.

Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The time allotted for this debate has expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.