*Note: We accidentally sent the wrong EVP survey link in the email you just got. We've linked the right one in the EVP Section below. If you still experience difficulties opening the survey link in your email, you may like to try opening the newsletter in your browser. Sorry about that, we’ll do better going forward.

Domestic, family and sexual violence workers 

The Australian Government’s Jobs and Skills Summit is being held tomorrow, on 1 and 2 September 2022. Ahead of the summit, the government has released an Issues Paper, outlining labour market challenges and providing summit participants and the broader community with a common understanding of these issues. Ahead of the summit, ACOSS has released its policy position paper.

While the importance of the caring sector is acknowledged — as is the undervaluing of its workforce (underpinned predominantly by its feminisation) — neither document explicitly refers to domestic, family and sexual violence workers. As noted by WESNET in its media release:

“Domestic and family violence workers are among the nation’s most essential workers in terms of saving and rebuilding the lives of women and children, and yet they are also among the most precariously under-valued—and there are not enough of them. 

WESNET highlights that the government funding models currently in place are leading to organisations and workers being chronically undervalued and underpaid.

“These are systemic issues that must be addressed. If the new Government is serious about addressing violence against women—and so far indications have been promising that it is—it must prioritise building and valuing the workforce and supporting these organisations.”

Have your say on the Escaping Violence Payment

The Australian Government’s Escaping Violence Payment trial is intended to enable people leaving violent relationships to access up to $5,000 in financial assistance.                 

An evaluation of the payment is currently underway, and feedback is sought from domestic and family violence specialist services on the payment. The Escaping Violence Payment frontline service survey: A short online survey seeking feedback on the Escaping Violence Payment is aimed at workers in the sector who both have and haven’t had clients access the payment.  The survey is open until 12 September 2022.

Around the Country

• The Australian Bureau of Statistics has released new analysis of the 2016 Personal Safety Survey (PSS) data, shedding further light on experiences of coercive control, with an estimated 2.2 million adult women (23 per cent) and 1.4 million adult men (16 per cent) estimated to have experienced emotional abuse by a partner at some point since the age of 15.

• A new ANROWS report will show that most women in their 20s have experienced sexual violence.

• Telstra have announced that around 3,000 Telstra Wi-Fi enabled payphones across Australia will offer free wi-fi access to everyone, with work already underway on the rest of Telstra’s 12,000 payphones to provide free wi-fi over the next few years. This follows Telstra’s decision last year to make calls from public payphones free.

• In Tasmania the Criminal Code Amendment Act 2022 commenced on 22 August 2022, amending Tasmania’s Criminal Code by introducing a new standalone offence of ‘Strangulation’ and associated amendments (such as alternative verdicts) and amends section 2A ‘Consent’ to specifically address ‘stealthing’ behaviour. Tasmania Legal Aid assisted the Department of Justice by drafting fact sheets on the new offence and stealthing amendment.

• The Our Watch Board has announced the appointment of Inaugural Chair Natasha Stott Despoja AO as Life Patron.

• A $10.7m Federal cash injection into domestic and family violence services in the Northern Territory will not solve the long-term crisis facing the region, a local service has warned. 

• In Western Australia, a new report has found 86 per cent of women and 50 per cent of men experiencing homelessness in WA have been a victim of an attack in the past two years.

• The Northern Territory has published its Disability Strategy 2022-2032 and the three-year action plan 2022-2025 which are the first of their kind for the Territory.

• The Treaty Authority and Other Elements Bill, which passed Victoria’s Upper House 32-3, establishes Australia’s first independent umpire to oversee Treaty and will see the State Government cede some of its power to First Nations people.

• The Western Australian government has released its annual Women's Report Card, an indicator report that provides a picture of how women in Western Australia are doing and identifies areas where outcomes still need to be improved.

• The Law Reform Commission of Western Australia has tabled its final report 'Review of Equal Opportunity Act 1984 (WA)', with most of the 163 recommendations accepted by Government including drafting of new Equal Opportunity Act to ensure all workplaces in Western Australia are free from harassment.

• The Commonwealth and State Attorneys-General met on 12 August and agreed to the release of the Consultation Draft of the National Principles to Address Coercive Control. Consultation will commence from September 2022 with a view to approval of the final National Principles in early 2023.

• In Queensland, an anonymous Brisbane philanthropist has partnered with charities Small Steps 4 Hannah and Beyond DV to build Hannah’s Sanctuary. The accommodation will have space for nine families escaping violence who will be able to use the property as a refuge for up to 18 months.

• Work is set to commence on a new inner-Sydney development that will provide additional housing for women and children escaping domestic and family violence as part of a partnership between the NSW Government and City West Housing.

• The Disability Employment Services sector gets a shakeup in wake of the Royal Commission with the federal government moving to cancel a number of disability employment services.

• The new federal government has officially called a royal commission into the former government's unlawful debt recovery scheme known as 'Robodebt'. Former Queensland Supreme Court Justice Catherine Holmes will lead the commission with the final report due by 18 April 2023.

• Businesses have argued against covering the cost of 10 days’ paid domestic violence leave, saying that the leave will be a big burden on employers.

• The NSW government has promised to upgrade security and lighting across the state’s 86 women’s refuges, in a move partly driven by technology undermining the ability of domestic violence shelters to keep their locations secret.

• In Queensland Murgon Moments newspaper publisher issues apology for printing domestic violence joke.

• Advocates have hit back at Opposition leader Peter Dutton's claims that the abolishment of the cashless debit card would lead to more family violence in Aboriginal communities.

Around the World

• Chinese police have vowed to prioritise cases involving underage victims as part of an ongoing crackdown on sexual assaults. The statement said the campaign had seen the arrests of 32,200 suspects around the country.

• The Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities today concluded its consideration of the combined second and third periodic report of New Zealand on its implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Committee Experts commended the establishment of a dedicated Ministry for Disability Issues, while asking questions on forced sterilisation and assisted death.

• A series of violent crimes against women in Egypt has drawn attention to gaps in legal and social protection that leave female citizens vulnerable to attacks and harassment, victims and activists say.

• In Canada, an ongoing pattern of abuse and threats directed at female journalists and female journalists of colour has reached such a crescendo, it's drawing condemnation from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and an NDP MP.

• UN human rights experts have called for stronger measures to prevent and penalise female genital mutilation in Sierra Leone, following criminal proceedings on the death of a 21-year-old student who was subjected to the brutal practice in the Bonthe District.

• Afghanistan’s women in exile continue to push for equality with activists and former politicians putting pressure on the international community regarding concerns over key women’s rights.

• African women call for help to eliminate violence against women and girls following the gender-based violence in South Africa that has shocked and enraged the country's citizens.

• Bangladesh data has revealed that the number of women dying of unnatural causes is 500 a year on average, which rises to 700 in some years. Causes include homicide and suicide. 

• In South Sudan United Nations Police (UNPOL) have trained 160 community officers on preventing gender-based violence.

• In the US, the Senate has passed a bill to support victims of violence by making the POWER Act permanent. The POWER Act helps combat domestic violence and sexual assault by holding summits that encourage lawyers to offer pro bono legal services to survivors of these crimes.

• In the UK, police officers who are violent to women or girls will now be sacked, according to new misconduct guidelines.

• Kenya’s general election, held on 9 August, is being lauded as a “historic” breakthrough that has brought more women to power than ever before. This is true – up to a point.

• In Massachusetts, an investigation has found that the state’s uniquely broad privacy law, intended to protect the privacy and safety of victims of domestic and sexual violence, has instead protected perpetrators and police. The law requires police to keep all reports and arrests related to sexual and domestic violence secret, something no other state does.

• Residents of Mexico City are decrying a decision by officials to remove a statue protesting gender violence that had been mounted by activists last year.

• Afghan women's rights activists have opened a library in Kabul, hoping to provide an oasis for women increasingly cut off from education and public life under the ruling Taliban.

Research and Publications

• Engendering justice: the sentencing of women and girls in Queensland finds that the number of women sentenced to imprisonment in Queensland has quadrupled in the last 14 years.

• The University of Queensland has published Experiences of COVID-19: The pandemic and work/life outcomes for Australian men and women finding that the pandemic has had a significantly greater financial and psychological impact on women than on men.

• The AIHW report National sexual violence responses brings together data from a range of sources to build a better understanding of sexual violence responses.

• A University of Queensland study has found there are still barriers to terminating a pregnancy in Queensland, more than three years after the practice was decriminalised.

• The City Violence Prevention Index is a first-of-its-kind report that provides United States’ city officials with a framework for investing in a comprehensive public health approach to violence prevention. It allows local officials to understand the current extent of their violence prevention investments and infrastructure, identify priorities for expanding their violence prevention initiatives, and track their progress over time.

• KPMG have released a report Budgeting for gender equity: How gender responsive budgeting can help governments and society.

• AHURI has released Housing First: An evidence review of implementation, effectiveness and outcomes finding that, while Housing First is a resource-intensive intervention, it is most cost-effective for people experiencing chronic homelessness who have complex and high needs.

• The UN Population Fund has published Women and young people with disabilities: A needs assessment of sexual and reproductive health and rights, gender-based violence, and access to essential services - Samoa.

• The report Options to improve access to existing and alternate accommodation to address the social housing shortage has been tabled in the NSW Parliament, canvassing a range of short and long term solutions to the current social housing crisis.

• A Swinburne University study Actions to address health literacy and equity in social housing in Victoria sought to understand residents’ health literacy, including what they knew and had been told about COVID-19 and keeping safe. The study also worked with frontline community health workers to uncover what they did to understand residents’ requirements and assist them.

• Sage Publishing is offering free downloads until the end of September of a special issue of the journal Violence Against Women Prioritizing the Elimination of Violence Against Women Worldwide: Lessons From the 65th Session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women. The issue explores topics such as gender-based violence during COVID-19, incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women, and new strategies to address domestic and sexual violence.

• Clark H, Bachelet M, Albares J M. Conflict, climate change, and covid-19 combine to create a breeding ground for sexual and gender based violence. BMJ 2022.

Resources and Guidelines

• Our Watch’s Men in focus practice guide offers practical strategies on engaging with men and boys on masculinities, such focusing on building empathy and motivation and fostering self-awareness.

• The Handbook on Gender, Sexual and Gender-Based Violence in Disasters provides practical guidance to policymakers, response staff of the Disaster Management Centre and community groups to plan, coordinate, implement, monitor, and evaluate essential actions for a gender equitable disaster response. The handbook was created by the Disaster Management Centre, Sri Lanka with the financial support of the Australian Government.

• Harmony Alliance has developed a 2016 Census and Settlement Database brief to provide an understanding on migrant and refugee women's diversity in Australia and identify some of the challenges they face with a focus on the impact of English proficiency.

• The Supporting Women’s Financial Safety guide - published by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet - provides user-friendly checklists for financial service organisations to better understand, prevent and address financial abuse.

• Safe and Equal and the Expert Advisory Panel have developed a series of resources and templates to support other services and organisations in their engagement with survivor advocates. Safe and Equal has also released an issues paper, seeking to define and explore different sources of lived experience to inform the work of the family violence sector.

• As part of the Women with Disabilities Australia (WWDA) LEAD project, WWDA has developed a fact sheet to support women, girls, feminine identifying, and non-binary people with disability in understanding, applying for and navigating the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).

• The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare has uploaded a website article Family, domestic and sexual violence containing facts and data, drawing from a range of statistics and research.

• Harmony Alliance has developed a grant writing guide which includes the steps to prepare grant proposals, what a proposal should consist of, and a practical example. 

• The Victorian Women’s Trust has launched Rural Women Online for women living and working in rural and remote Victoria. The program is designed to provide online help with computers, phones, and the internet, and is also a place to learn new digital skills, find a nearby workshop, access technical support, and sign up to be mentored.

• Our Watch and Senior Rights Victoria have produced a new resource for practitioners seeking to build their knowledge and practice on preventing violence against older women.

Media

• The Conversation warns Unintended, but not unanticipated: coercive control laws will disadvantage First Nations women.

• Watch an ABC video In Timber Creek, domestic violence victims have few places to go.

• Lawfare writes a foreign policy essay The Gender Pay Gap Is a National Security Threat.

• The Sydney Morning Herald shares three stories of survivors of domestic abuse Renée thought she could bring out his good side. The abuse only got worse.

• The Conversation discusses A professor in India lost her job over a bikini photo on Instagram. What does this say about misogyny?

• Primer explains one women’s story “Why I stayed”.

• Immigration agent Dr Talat Abu Zeid spoke to the SBS Arabic24 "Good Morning Australia" program about the Visa Subclass 204 available to women at risk.

• The Global Network on Extremism and Technology writes Incel Extremism in India: A View from the Global South.

• Dr. Hlavka answers some questions about her new book Researching Gender-Based Violence: Embodied and Intersectional Approaches, including her favourite part of the writing process, what she hopes the book can accomplish and how it complements her teaching and research work.

• The Conversation writes There is an urgent need to prevent the lifelong damage caused by adverse childhood experiences.

• The Conversation asks Sexual violence in South Africa: where are the male victims?

• Julie Bindel, UK feminist author and journalist, writes Male coppers are rotters about how Britain's police forces still drip with misogyny.

• Livewire reports Inside the Four Walls of Intimate Partner Violence in India.

• Just Security writes Gendering the Legal Review of New Means and Methods of Warfare.

• Macquarie University discusses Coercive control: How proposed new laws will work.

• Architecture and Design write about Better integrating women’s voices in the design and planning of public spaces and making public spaces safer for women.

• The LA Times writes Russia’s ‘most hidden crime’ in Ukraine war: Rape of women, girls, men and boys.

• The Minnesota Reformer says Misogyny is fueling the country’s gun violence epidemic.

• Jezebel writes Student Debt Keeps Domestic Violence Survivors Tied to Their Abusers.

• Website dw.com analyses Abuse: How African women suffer in silence.

Calls for Submissions, Surveys, and EOIs

• Have you experienced tech-facilitated coercive control? Has a partner abused you using text messages or Facebook? Have they tracked you using GPS tracking apps? If you have experienced this type of abuse and sought safety and justice support, researchers from Monash, RMIT and WESNET would like to speak to you. Contact: [email protected]
• If you work in family violence or other related services, such as legal and family services in Victoria, the Australian Institute of Family Studies invites you to share your experiences of how your client service needs changed and how your services adapted to meet their needs during COVID-19. Take the survey: Future-proofing Safety Project Information Sheet (aifs.gov.au).
  
• Monash University and Harmony Alliance - in partnership with ANROWS - are calling on migrant and refugee women in Australia to share their experiences of sexual harassment in the workplace in a first-of-its-kind national survey. The survey is open until 31 August and all who complete it have a chance of winning one of 20 $100 Coles-Myer vouchers.
  
• The NSW Government seeks feedback on its exposure draft Crimes Legislation Amendment (Coercive Control) Bill 2022, with comments accepted until 31 August 2022.

• The Human Rights Commission’s annual Human Rights Awards celebrate outstanding achievements to advance human rights, recognising the important work of individuals, communities and organisations from across the country. Submissions close Sunday 4th September.

• Queensland’s commission of inquiry into police responses to domestic violence has unexpectedly reopened submissions to the public, citing the reaction to evidence given by the state’s police commissioner as a driver for the decision. The new cut-off date for public submissions is 5 September and responses can be made confidentially.
• The WA Government recently opened a grant program for community-based initiatives that work towards the prevention of violence against women and their children. A total of $3 million is available for eligible organisations to deliver community primary prevention programs that address the gendered drivers of violence and aim to shift attitudes and culture that allow violence to occur. Applications close on 30 September 2022.

• Forcibly Displaced People Network has launched the first Australia-wide survey to capture the experiences of displacement and settlement for LGBTIQA+ forcibly displaced people. The findings will be used to advocate for more welcoming and inclusive support. The survey can be completed online before 9 October 2022.

• Now is the time to share your experience of violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation with the Disability Royal Commission. Submissions close on 31 December 2022. Find more information on the DRC website.

Events

• REGISTRATION IS OPEN: WESNET is convening the 4th Tech Summit on 20-22 September 2022 to bring together national and international experts on technology safety and violence against women. This year’s virtual conference will focus on trending issues of technology-facilitated abuse in the context of domestic and family violence, as well as emerging technologies addressing the intersection of technology, privacy and violence against women. Register here.
• WomenKind Australia Inc welcomes Rosie Batty and local experts to discuss the issues of domestic violence at an intimate lunch at Noosa Boathouse, on Friday, 2 September, from 11.30am-3pm.
• The 2022 Philanthropy Australia National Conference, ‘For the Love of Humanity: People, Place and Planet’ will take place from 6-8 September at the International Convention Centre in Sydney. The conference will explore insights emerging from First Nations philanthropy, impact investing, global funding, and more.

• The ACCANect 2022 Better Basics conference will feature a range of presentations about key topics including access to reliable communications services, affordable communications, on-line safety and trust, and the essentiality of communications. The event is on 14 September 2022 and registrations are now open.

• The Conference on Women's Safety and Financial Security is being held at the ANU Research School of Finance, Actuarial Studies and Statistics in Canberra on 20 to 21 October 2022.

• The Queer Displacements is the first and only conference in the Asia Pacific (22 February 2023) designed to comprehensibly foreground protection and settlement challenges of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer (LGBTIQ+) forcibly displaced people. Proposals to present are now accepted before 1 October and there will be a number of scholarships available for LGBTIQ+ forcibly displaced people with applications open until 1 November.

Training and Further Education

• WESNET is offering Technology Safety Online Training for SADFV professionals, for dates and training descriptions please visit https://techsafety.org.au/training
• Harmony Alliance is collaborating with La Trobe University to support migrant and refugee women to start and further develop their careers through the Future Proof Career Development program. This free program will include educational, mentorship and networking resources.

• ACON has recently launched three online training modules: The Trans Vitality: Trans Affirming Practice eLearning; Trans and Gender Diverse Sexual Health ELearning, in collaboration with ASHM; and Recognise and Respond, in collaboration with the Black Dog Institute.

• The RACGP Family Violence GP Education Program assists GPs in developing skills and knowledge to respond to domestic and family violence. The program is open to all Victorian GPs and practice staff and offers two training pathway options – beginner and intermediate/advanced.
  

• RMIT’s Graduate Certificate in Domestic and Family Violence provides an exciting opportunity for current and future family violence practitioners, with subjects in gendered violence, responding to family violence, primary prevention of violence against women and specialist case coordination and management. The program is offered online and part-time to support work/life/study balance. Applications can be made online here, or for more information, visit the Program Overview.

• Harmony Alliance has developed a free online course on 'Financial Literacy for Women' available in English, Arabic, Dari, Simplified Chinese, Vietnamese, Nepalese, Punjabi, Hazaragi, Thai, Karen, and Korean.

Share the latest round-up with a colleague
and encourage them to sign up here.

*Articles published do not necessarily reflect the views of AWAVA or WESNET and are included as items of interest only.

If you would like to submit a particularly topical piece of news, research, report, etc. please e-mail to [email protected]. We cannot guarantee this will be included.