GABI ELGOOD, HOST: It’s Ron and Gabi driving you home for Reach Out Speak Up day, where we are starting the conversation about coercive control and domestic and family violence to start trying to find a solution. And we always look to the Federal Government when we are looking for solutions to these Australia-wide issues, so right now I am pleased to say I have the Minister for Women on the line. Katy Gallagher, welcome. Thanks for joining.
SENATOR THE HON KATY GALLAGHER, MINISTER FOR WOMEN: Thanks for having me on, so much.
ELGOOD: Thank you so much for joining us. So, this is obviously a huge issue at the moment here in Australia with one woman dying every four days at the hands of a partner in family and domestic violence. Is this the biggest threat to women in Australia right now?
GALLAGHER: Well, it’s certainly a huge issue I think for all women, really. I mean, we either have been subject to violence or know of someone who has been subject to violence. You would be hard-pressed to find a woman who wasn’t in that position. So, that sort of talks about the size and scale of the problem we have in this country and it is huge. I think we concentrate quite rightly on those at the worst end, which is when women die at the hands of a partner or former partner, but there’s you know hundreds of thousands of women who are injured or hospitalised, traumatised. And then obviously the children involved in that as well who are also victims of that violence. So yeah, it certainly – when you look at the statistics facing women and you look at it from like non-accidents – this would be probably the most significant issue affecting women and young girls as well.
ELGOOD: Yeah, it’s massive. And in May, you actually announced a lot of funding and a lot of support that is being put towards this issue. There was a lot of money going into services and housing. When it comes to frontline services, we have spoken to a few of them. They’re obviously all very much struggling where – all of the services we’ve spoken to have had to turn women away on a daily basis. Is that where the money is looking to be funnelled?
GALLAGHER: Yes, so what we’ve got is for the first time, we’ve got this National Plan to End Violence Against Women and Children in a generation. So, all states and territories have signed up to that with the Commonwealth and now we’re all working on implementing it. So, it’s definitely about more resources and we’re putting money on the table, lots of money. You know, I wish I could spend it in other areas but it’s really important that we’re investing in that crisis response. You know, so that is service responses, it’s legal responses, it’s housing, but at the same time we’re doing that, we’re trying to come at this issue of women’s inequality. Because fundamentally, violence stems from, you know, essentially inequality that women face. And so, we’re trying to look at what are the other ways outside of the traditional crisis system that we can foster support for women, whether that’s through childcare or social security payments or making sure women get access to good jobs and good pay. That’s all part of the solution here as well. So yeah, I think there’ll always need to be more investment in the crisis response, but we also have to get serious about how we’re changing attitudes and responding in other areas that we can to make sure that women don’t face the financial insecurity that they currently do – if we can deal with that, that will help a lot of women.
ELGOOD: Yeah, we’re actually going to be talking to someone today in regards to coercive control when it comes to the financial situation, the financial control over women, because women are more vulnerable when they don’t have that independent income or independent money within their own bank accounts. So, that’s definitely something that we’ll be talking about more today as well. You did mention that you know, preventative measures need to be looked at when it comes to changing the behaviours of everyday Australians. You know, it is such a cultural thing that boys will be boys and men talking disrespectfully in the locker room about women when they’re not around. How do we start to change this idea, this behaviour among men?
GALLAGHER: Well, it’s really such a big issue. I could talk forever on it because it’s so fundamental to being able to change this for the long term – all the evidence is we need to be reaching children at the earliest stage. Even in primary school, some of those attitudes towards women are becoming entrenched. By the time they’re in high school of course, they can become more consolidated. So, part of it is making sure we’ve got good role models, that adults understand that when they are modelling certain behaviours, that their children are going to learn from it. So, I think it’s also about not demonising men, but being able to show a more appropriate way of engaging with their sons. But also engaging young. And so, schools have a role, government has a role, community leaders have a role. We’ve got to make sure that, you know, people are understanding if new technology rolls out that new forms of control are violence. Because we’re kind of caught up in this technological boom where there can be a lot of control placed on people, even remotely, that doesn’t fall into that traditional, this is domestic violence – but it is. That’s exactly what it is. And so, making sure our laws stay up to date is really important, that they’re able to deal with the world in which we’re operating, not a world from 20 years ago, because it is so different. Again, I wish there was one single solution to this problem. There isn’t. It’s a massive community-wide issue that we all have to lean in on, which is why I’m so pleased that you are doing this campaign and I just want to really thank you because governments cannot solve this on their own. We can provide leadership and we can provide resources and we can provide crisis response, but we can’t do everything that needs to be done.
ELGOOD: Yeah, because it is a whole community involvement to change behaviours and ideas and the way that Australia does run at the moment within the community – you mentioned updating laws because it is a very different world to 20 years ago. I guess when you take a step back, looking at the judicial system at the moment and how it doesn’t really support women with the fight to get someone off the streets who is a domestically violent person, because the woman is so traumatised going through that and reliving the experience over and over again through the court case. Is there a way that we can look at redoing the judicial system in this particular area?
GALLAGHER: Well, that certainly is a big piece of the work that the Attorney-General has been leading for us. So, looking at the justice response to domestic, family and sexual violence, because that is – certainly when you talk to victim-survivors, those that have chosen to go through that path – it has often been very traumatising and often very disappointing for them. As you said, felt like they’ve been retraumatised going through the process. So, there’s some work going on with the law reform commission at the moment to look at this across the board to see, how does the legal system better support women? Because the statistics are very clear, a very small percentage of women pursue legal action and of those that do pursue it, a very small amount are successful, so there’s a massive disincentive happening there. So, we’ve got to look at the police response, we’ve got to look at the justice response, but all of that’s after the violence has happened. We’ve got to put a huge amount of effort into early intervention, prevention, education, to make sure that we are trying to turn the tide of what is such a significant epidemic in this country.
ELGOOD: It is an election year next year. So, with all of this in play at the moment, it is always very slow-moving because there are so many different layers to look at to try to get real change on the ground. So, if there is a change in government next year, are we going to lose all of this forward momentum that we have?
GALLAGHER: Look, well, one I’m going to work hard to make sure we don’t have a change in government. I think the second response, I think on most of this, you would see the parliament moving as one. It is one of those areas where everyone recognises the problem. Certainly, in women’s safety. I think there possibly would be a difference in some of the interventions we’re trying to put in place earlier and things on wages and conditions for feminised industries where we’ve tried to put a lot of effort into that because we see it linked to women’s safety. If women have more money, more control over their finances, they’re able to work in a way that supports them and works for their children. You know, I think financial independence has a big role to play here and that’s why we’re trying to come at it not just from the crisis response but from whatever else we can do. What lever can I pull and push to try and make the right outcome here, because I don’t want my children or their daughters’ daughters and your friend, I don’t want young women going through what women of my generation have gone through. And the statistics aren’t moving fast enough.
ELGOOD: Yeah, you said it perfectly just then. That is exactly how we all feel. So, thank you so much Katy for joining us on Reach Out Speak Up day and hopefully with these conversations and with making it louder and making everyone more aware of what we can do in these issues, hopefully we can make a little bit of change, so thank you so much.
GALLAGHER: Gabi thanks for having me on for Reach Out Speak Up, I know that there will be women out there listening today, young women, older women whose lives will be changed by this. So, thank you very much.