MINISTERIAL STATEMENTS
Mr NG (Menzies) (12:37): For too long, family and sexual violence have been endemic in Australia. Yesterday, the Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Commission released its annual report. The report makes clear that, despite progress in some areas, we are not seeing the change that we need.
The impact of family violence continues to be felt across our communities. Persistent homelessness among women and children affected by family violence is now at its highest level since reporting began in 2018. The report also highlights the disproportionate impact of family violence on First Nations communities, with the rate of hospitalisations for First Nations children due to family violence assault continuing to rise since 2022-23 reaching its highest recorded level.
Similarly, hospitalisations of First Nations women due to family violence assaults have continued to increase since 2021-22. Reports of sexual violence are at their highest levels in 33 years, with reported incidents increasing by 64 per cent over the past 15 years. In the report, the commissioner talked about a future where gendered violence is rare, brief and non-recurring.
That is the future we are working towards. Through the National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children, we as a government have committed to ending violence against women and children in a generation. There is no doubt that this is ambitious, but as long as there are women being killed, harmed or living in fear, as long as there are children for whom home is not a safe place, all members of parliament must treat the scourge of family and sexual violence with the urgency that it deserves.
As the Minister for Social Services said yesterday, this is a collective problem. It's a collective problem that requires a collective solution. It requires all members of society, from government to civil society, from sporting clubs to parents, to pull together to create a country where everyone can be free of violence and control.
I want to acknowledge the Minister for Social Services for all the work she has done to elevate this national priority and continue this difficult national conversation. I acknowledge the Minister for Social Services for all the work she has done to elevate this national priority and continue this difficult national conversation. I also acknowledge the work of the Assistant Minister for Social Services and her leadership and engagement with communities right around the country, including my community.
All of us fortunate enough to be elected to this place come with issues that are close to our hearts—national problems that we want to solve. For me, family and sexual violence is one of them. Family and sexual violence is so prevalent that I'd be surprised if all of us don't know someone who has been deeply affected.
As a volunteer in community legal centres, I saw that the vast majority of clients who walked through the door were impacted by domestic and family violence. The myriad issues they raised were around property law, intervention orders, criminal law and the family courts. Working in the courts, I saw the impacts of family and sexual violence on victims-survivors, and I also saw how the courts and the law often fail victims-survivors and are even weaponised to perpetrate systems abuse.
As a member of the Social Policy and Legal Affairs Committee—with the member for Mitchell, who's here in the Chamber today—I've been involved in the inquiry into domestic, family and sexual violence and suicide, which is ongoing. I acknowledge the state and federal government departments, frontline services experts and especially lived experience advocates for contributing to this inquiry.
Locally, in my community of Menzies, I convened a local consultation on the Second Action Plan under the National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children. I thank our fantastic local services—Doncare, FVREE, Eastern Community Legal Centre, Alkira Disability Services, Access Health and Community, the Family Action Network and some of our local maternal child health services—for their attendance, and many of our other frontline services.
I acknowledge their amazing contribution in this difficult space which can take a toll on the people that work in it. Despite the different services that were involved in those consultations, these organisations raised very similar issues—ones that we see reflected in the commissioner's report and ones that I hear about regularly while speaking with our community: the need for more supports for both men and women during times of heightened stress and transition, like following the birth of a child; how critical coordinated case management and specialist violence workers are; an acknowledgement that healing from violence is not linear or short term; and an identification of how critical it is to have therapeutic support that sits alongside case management.
These services do everything they can to help vulnerable people navigate complex and sometimes traumatic systems in the context of incredible demand and limited resources. It's because of this work that we know that progress is being made and that further progress is possible. The government is committed to supporting these frontline workers, and is supporting women and children to be safe, but also to enabling them to increase their capacity and improve integration and fully utilise their expertise.
In order to make family and sexual violence rare, as the commissioner calls for, we also need to change our culture. As men, it means taking responsibility for playing our part in creating that better culture. This isn't an attack on men and it doesn't mean that all men are the problem, but it does mean that all men can be part of the solution.
I acknowledge my friend the member for Leichhardt, who spoke before and spoke very powerfully about what it means to be a good man—and he is definitely a good man who leads in this parliament, in this important area. I also welcome the comments of the member for Groom just before in this Chamber. It's important that we, as male parliamentarians, speak out on this issue.
We need to call out bad behaviour and say violence is never okay. It's never okay to hit your wife and kids, and it's not strong to demean or control your partner. As fathers or as carers, we need to model what a good man and what a healthy relationship is.
We need to have uncomfortable and difficult conversations with our sons. Alarmingly, young men are more likely than older men to harbour dangerous attitudes towards women. A first-of-its-kind Australian study, released last month, exposed a startling reality.
Among boys aged 13 to 17, it found that 24.7 per cent believe that feminism is damaging society and should be resisted with violence if necessary. Gen Z males are approximately four times more likely to agree that a husband is the head of the household and his wife should be obedient. Gen Z and millennial males are much more likely to agree that, within a marriage, men are entitled to sex with their wives.
These are abhorrent attitudes. As the commissioner has highlighted in her report, sexual violence is a persistent area of significant harm, particularly for Australian women. There are forces working at incredible speed against parents, communities and governments every day to make women and girls less safe and to communicate destructive ideas to men and boys, ideas that we know are associated with real harm.
Technology is evolving very quickly and increasingly becoming a weapon through which perpetrators can access victims. There are the 'nudify' apps, undetectable stalking tools, trackers and algorithms that target vulnerable people with harmful and violent content. We are taking action to combat these forces, particularly through our social media ban and recently announced digital duty of care.
However, as the minister said, there are responsibilities that government carries to prevent harm but government cannot do it alone. I look at my son and the young men in my community and I believe that nobody is born wanting to use violence or to abuse their partner. This is learned behaviour and it can be unlearned.
We need to stop the spread of misogynistic, hateful content which makes men believe they are entitled to women's bodies. For men or people who have used violence, we need to make sure that those who want to get help can get help. Thankfully, there are men who stand up and take action, like the member for Leichhardt, and are having conversations to create better outcomes for young fathers, husbands and families across the country.
I want to particularly shout-out my friend and the Special Envoy for Men's Health, the member for Hunter, for the work he does to champion the importance of being a good father and a good partner and having healthy relationships throughout all his conversations about men's physical and mental health. Healthy men have healthy relationships. There are also incredible women in this space in parliament who are leading and speaking out on this issue, people like the Minister for Social Services, the Assistant Minister for Social Services and Assistant Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence, and my friend here, the member for Bonner.
We need to recognise that, just as women are often constrained by traditional gender norms, men are also constrained by traditional gender norms and what they can and can't talk about, and we need to reach out for help when we need it.