Kerrynne Liddle (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Child Protection and the Prevention of Family Violence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We'd all agree that every single domestic and family violence death is horrific. In my home state of South Australia, the number in the past month has been unprecedented, with the killing of five women. Tragically, the sector predicts we'll see further escalation of violence as the cost-of-living pressure in the home increases and there's the seasonal strain on relationships during the festive season.

We have the tools to help turn things around. We have two national action plans that inform the National Plan to End Violence against Women and their Children, which outlines the work of the Commonwealth, the states and the territories, and their commitment to delivering on the ambition of ending violence within a generation. So we have plans. But saying that you're doing something is one thing; what matters is that you are actually doing what you said you would do, and that what you are doing is being done with the urgency that's required. As shadow minister for child protection and the prevention of family violence, I know that we must get better at monitoring how this government, the states and the territories are turning words into action.

Prevention and early intervention are best for everybody—most importantly, though, for the children. A 39-year-old woman killed at Morphett Vale had five children. A woman fatally shot at Modbury North had a teenage daughter. An analysis of intimate partner homicides in Australia, highlighted in a newly released report by the University of Melbourne, indicates that 172 children have been bereaved through domestic violence in eight years. Imagine the heart-wrenching reality for these children. Trauma is compounded for children when they are the offspring of both the killer and the victim. Our response must be timely, responsive, and in sufficient measure in prevention, early intervention, response, recovery and healing, and it must be connected to those plans. It's 17 days of activism; we've got to do more. (Time expired)