Kylea Tink (North Sydney, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today, International Women's Day, to call on the House to note that, in the nine weeks since 2023 started, 11 women have lost their lives in acts of domestic violence. That's more than one woman a week. The shocking truth is that intimate partner violence is the main cause of illness and death in women aged 18 to 44. But let's make no mistake. These tragic deaths are preventable. There are many areas of urgent unmet need across specialist sexual, domestic and family violence services and a need for increased investment across all pillars of the National Plan to End Violence Against Women and Children.

Advocacy group Fair Agenda have collected testimonies from survivors, and I'm privileged to read one of those today. She said: 'I had to stay living with my abuser as there were no services that could assist me to get out. I never even received a return call from 85 per cent of the services I contacted. Women's and children's lives are on the line.' On behalf of my community of North Sydney and all in this place, I say here and now: we must and can do better.

International Women's Day does provide us with an important opportunity to reflect and celebrate those that have come before us and all that has been achieved, but it must also always be held as a space and time where we can regather as a parliament and a community around the significant work that is still left to do. The loss of these women's lives should never be accepted silently.

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

To the member for North Sydney, I thank you very much for bringing this really important issue to this place. The women whose voices have been silenced deserve our attention and they deserve us to raise our voices to make sure that what has happened to them, what is happening to women across this country as we meet here, is heard and addressed by this nation. They are our mothers, our daughters, our sisters, our friends, our nieces and our aunts. They're the people that we love.

The fact that one woman a week is murdered by her current or former partner is just simply so shocking to all of us. We see these women on the pages of the newspaper. We hear their stories, but then they fade. We have the opportunity here to actually recognise that these women have died, that these women's incredible opportunity has been lost to this nation and that this is something that we have to do better at. We know that one in three women experiences physical violence up to the age of 15, and that one in five has experienced sexual violence. For one in those three women, that violence is perpetrated by someone they know. For one in four, that physical, sexual and emotional violence is from a current or former partner. These statistics, the number of women who deal with violence, are shocking—one woman a week is murdered. The most recent figures show that two in five Australians do not know where to get help when they are experiencing domestic violence and, as the member for North Sydney said, even when they do, they often go unanswered.

That's why the government has acted to enact the National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children and, in the last October budget, committed funding to it. But I don't think any of us here in this place think that it will ever be enough—that anything we do will ever be enough—and that's why it is so important that we have so many women in this place raising our voices on behalf of those women who no longer can, because these services desperately matter to these women, families, children and the people who love them.

Sussan Ley (Farrer, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Women) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for North Sydney for moving this important motion on International Women's Day. On this day, across Australia, morning teas and events have been held, words have been spoken and pledges have been made. Women have been recognised, rightly, and achievements lauded. We have congratulated and commended, and progress will be and should be praised, yet that experience will not be felt equally by women across Australia, because far too many women are falling behind and being forgotten today.

A woman wakes in her hospital bed in Alice Springs, unable to stand because of her injuries. Her daughter hides in the street, too afraid to go home. Another woman wakes and cracks the window of her car. Condensation fogs the glass—she has slept another night in her car, unable to afford the rent and trapped by a tide of ever-rising costs. A woman knocks on the door, the same door she fled through last night. She knows she's going back into danger, but there is no other choice. A young girl looks in the mirror and says that she doesn't deserve to eat today. Her heart is filled with despair. Another walks off to school and, giving into the jibes of those around her, she tells herself that she wouldn't cut it in her career path, so she makes a different choice and she takes a different path.

Today, as we gather to recognise the journey that we have traversed to lift women up, we should not allow these stories to simply be the stories of the forgotten women of Australia. Today, it is important that we recognise the hard-won progress we've made in lifting women up, but it is equally important that we don't forget the women who are being left behind. We can all make grand speeches and pledges, but what matters is what we do and the decisions we make. So, today, on International Women's Day, let's not forget the women being left behind. Let's not let their stories go untold. As the sun rises in Australia, too many women are being forgotten, and we don't want it to get any worse.

Just this morning, parliamentarians from all political persuasions attended the unveiling of statues of Dame Enid Lyons and Dame Dorothy Tangney to mark International Women's Day. It was a real moment for this place. The statues depict the iconic moment the two dames walked into Old Parliament House 80 years ago. They were incredible women paving the way. I also want to say that the unveiling of these statues, the first statues of women in Canberra, would not have been possible without the member for Forrest. The member commissioned these statues in 2021 and has been a fighter for women well and truly before that day and ever since, as have so many of the women in this place that I have seen in my over 21 years in this parliament.

So, today, it does all start with us making a choice—a choice not to forget any women and a choice to do what's right, not to do what's popular. Time is running out for too many women, as the member for North Sydney said. I thank the House.

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As a mark of respect for the lives lost to domestic and family violence, I ask all in their place to rise.

Honourable members having stood in their places—

I thank the House.