Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

(—) (): My question is to the Minister for Women, Senator Gallagher. It's day 3 of the UN's 16 days of activism campaign for the elimination of violence against women. This year 54 women have been killed already, including six in just one week this month. It's clear we need more funding for prevention work with respectful relationships education in schools and prevention work in sporting clubs, workplaces and all areas of society. In the response space, the women's safety sector have long called for $1 billion a year in funding for frontline support services to meet demand and to ensure everyone who seeks help fleeing violence can get it. In budget estimates this year, the department confirmed the total federal funding commitment to prevent violence against women over the next five years is only $2.23 billion, less than half the $5 billion the sector needs to ensure no-one who seeks help is turned away. Why is the government not spending $1 billion a year on women escaping violence? (Time expired)

Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Waters for the question and acknowledge her longstanding advocacy in this space around women's safety. I too would like to put on the record how devastating the loss of life in this country is every year, in particular in the last couple of months, where we have seen an increased number of women who have died at the hands of their former partner or their partner. It is a massive problem in this country. I will come to your question, but this is a national problem that requires all parts of the community and the economy to work together to get rid of the attitudes and the views that lead to this type of violence against women and children. It's not just the women who have died—although, obviously, that is devastating in itself; it's the hundreds and thousands of women and children who are hospitalised, who are homeless and who fear for their lives every day from living in such a violent arrangement.

The point you raise is around the level of investment. As you say, we have allocated $2.3 billion across a range of programs to end violence against women and children under the national plan. We will always—Minister Rishworth, myself, Minister Elliott—continue to work with states and territories to identify other areas of need, and all governments are working together to look at how we can end violence against women and children. (Time expired)

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Waters, a first supplementary?

Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

After years of the Greens and many organisations calling for a national toll of women killed by violence to be collated and publicised by government rather than simply relying on volunteer orgs to do that work, over the weekend the government announced what seems to be a version of that—a dashboard for official reporting on intimate partner homicide, which will provide quarterly updates from mid next year. How much funding has been allocated to this? Why is it only reporting quarterly? Why the seven-month delay until it starts? How will the figures be publicised to help drive change?

Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'll come back if there's anything further I can provide. But you are right: this is one of the issues that the ministers for women's safety, yourself and others have been calling for because there is a range of organisations that report numbers of deaths and homicides against women, but a number use different information. Trying to get a picture of the exact information, with a definition that people agree on, has been difficult but the dashboard will be introduced as part of that. I think the time is about putting all the systems in place to ensure that the reporting, particularly from the states and territories, is accurate. It is being developed by the Australian Institute of Criminology and it will be able to provide us with more up-to-date figures, which is part of understanding the extent of the problem.

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Waters, a second supplementary.

Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We think we know that gender inequality drives domestic, family and sexual violence but, when less than two per cent of perpetrators ever have contact with the police or the criminal justice system, there's a lot more we need to understand about what drives perpetrators. We need a national prevalence study like the Perpetration Project. Will the federal government fund and commit to a repeatable national prevalence study of the perpetration of domestic, family and sexual violence?

Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you. This is in Minister Rishworth's portfolio area, so if there's anything further I will come back on it. I know that Minister Rishworth has been looking at the issue of perpetrators and perpetrator programs. In fact, it's an important part of the National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children. And I know that the sector itself has been very keen to see more happen in that space. I don't have anything further to add for you but, if I can, I will provide more information through Minister Rishworth. I would also say that we are working nationally to improve the information that is provided to police around the country in real time so that some of those issues about crossing jurisdictions and women's safety can be addressed.