Wednesday, 2 April 2025

 Cindy McLEISH (Eildon) (10:09): I rise to make a contribution on the Legal and Social Issues Committee’s report, which was tabled yesterday, on the inquiry into capturing data on people who use family violence. We titled it Building the Evidence Base, and I want to thank very much at the outset the committee, and not just my parliamentary colleagues, who did a pretty good job on a pretty heavy topic, but particularly the secretariat. Jessica Strout, as the committee manager did a really exceptional job, always keeping a level head.

With different views in the room often, she was able to work with us and guide us to come up with outcomes that were certainly satisfactory. Danielle Broadhurst was with us for the time as the administrative and research assistant, and there was nothing Danielle did not do to help members along the way. Her attention to detail was remarkable, and I thank her greatly. With Danielle and Jessica, really the work that they did over and above what was presented through submissions and hearings to get a really full understanding of the topic was terrific. They were wholly invested and believed in this report as well, which was terrific. Katherine Murtagh was with us for most of the time as a research officer and then moved on, and we had additional support at the end as things got pretty tight and we needed to get this moving.

This is a really serious issue, what we were looking at, and it is very pressing. Family violence is a particularly pressing topic in Victoria at the moment. We know too many women and children in particular lose their lives or are seriously injured as a result of family violence, and there are a number of deficits.

I thought the terms of reference that we were given were particularly vague, and that was a challenge for us at the start. The terms of reference that we were asked to consider were:

… the mechanisms for capturing data on the profile and volume of perpetrators of family violence in Victoria and barriers to achieving a full understanding of this cohort …

We received many submissions which were not quite related to our topic, because I think from speaking to some of the submitters they equally found it a little bit vague. If their submissions did not fit our topic perfectly, we certainly took the time and effort to consider them. They were very invested in this area and continue to be invested in this area, so we had to work out how we could include them in our report. Because the terms of reference were a bit vague, we had to come up with our own interpretation of what we would narrow this topic into being. We focused on how the Victorian government can achieve a more holistic understanding of people using family violence. This included considering improvements in the current data collection, linkage and sharing of data and what else is needed to build knowledge about the perpetration of family violence. I want to say that we used the term ‘person using violence’ rather than ‘perpetrator’, as per some of the information that we heard.

This comes on the back of the royal commission that was completed in 2015 with some 227 ‍recommendations. In January 2023 the implementation monitor said the final recommendation had been implemented, but there is still a lot more to know and a lot more to do. It is time now, given it is 10 years since that royal commission, that we have another look at a number of areas here. We looked specifically at how to move to a more purposeful approach and how to improve current data processes. The data processes are very, very complex, and as a result a number of the recommendations where we put timelines in were pushed out to 2027, in recognition that the data is really different. So many organisations have different means and ways of capturing data using different systems and processes.

We also looked at what we need to know more about and how to improve our understanding. For me, it was exceptionally important that we included timeframes on this. Because this is such a pressing issue, we do not want these recommendations to be pushed out into the never-never. We need some continued action in this space. One thing I would really like to see in the field around the perpetration of violence is people being very curious – curious to ask more questions to understand a little bit more deeply what is really happening in the space and in the head of a perpetrator. I really encourage those working in that field to be curious.