Tuesday, 28 November 2023

Ministers statements: family violence

Jacinta ALLAN (Bendigo East – Premier) (14:39): At the outset of my ministers statement today I wish to acknowledge every single child, adult and victim-survivor of family violence in Victoria. Last Friday our Minister for Prevention of Family Violence, the Deputy Premier, Rosie Batty, Kate Fitz-Gibbon and thousands and thousands of other Victorians joined together in orange in solidarity to mark the start of the global 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence. These 16 days are a call to action. They are recognising that family violence and violence against women are not just happening to strangers, they are happening to people in our families and in our communities – our daughters, mothers, sisters, aunties, grandmothers, friends and colleagues – and Victorians are coming together to say we have had enough.

Also, I am pleased to advise the house that the government was earlier this year proud to reach a major milestone in our nation-leading work in this area to end family violence. All 227 recommendations of that groundbreaking Royal Commission into Family Violence have been implemented, and 60 years on there has been more than $3.86 billion spent, more than every other state and territory combined – comprehensive justice system reforms, 12 new specialist family violence courts, new affirmative action consent laws and new jury directions that address misconceptions in sexual offence trials, just to name a few. But we know that there is more to do, much more to do, and that is why we will continue to listen to victim-survivors, we will continue to educate our kids about affirmative consent, we will continue to partner with our Aboriginal communities to ensure that Aboriginal Victorians can access culturally safe support when and where they need it, and we will continue to build a system that is easy to understand and access and supports the lived experience of victim-survivors in this vital work. We can prevent family violence. Violence against women is preventable, and we will continue that task every day.

Kim Wells: On a point of order, Speaker, I have only two unanswered questions: constituency questions, to the Premier, 322 and 374 – if they could be followed up, please.