Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is time for a national crisis summit on family violence, not a talkfest but an assembly of the front line—community and legal services, law enforcement and experts, people working in prevention—and, most importantly, a platform for the voices of survivors and their families. They are the people who understand the postcode lottery of unequal treatment, people who know the cracks in our system because they have fallen through them and, in some cases, survived and climbed back out. The summit would involve state leaders, but it must go further than COAG.

Too often, the first public warning sign that a woman is in danger is a report of her death. Whilst women are being killed weekly, there are tens of thousands further living with violence in their homes. The dreadful reports from Queensland and Victoria last week force us to confront this reality once again.

But last week also showed that our nation is capable of rising to meet great and urgent challenges. This parliament, community groups, welfare organisations and state governments—Australians one and all—came together to offer to help 12,000 desperate people on the other side of the world. Let us bring the same urgency, the same purpose and the same compassion to the total elimination of family violence from our national life. We cannot practise politics as usual. Never before have we assembled everyone. Family violence requires national leadership.