Thursday, 5 March 2020

Ministers statements: family violence

Ms WILLIAMS (Dandenong—Minister for Prevention of Family Violence, Minister for Women, Minister for Youth) (11:13): I rise today to update the house on the Andrews Labor government’s ongoing commitment to keeping Victorian women and children safe from family violence. Over 81 000 Victorians have now received support through our support and safety hubs, which are more commonly known as the Orange Door, and this includes some 31 000 children. We currently have five primary sites of the Orange Door with another 12 on the way. However, the model is not just about the bricks and mortar. It is about the network of services and support that the Orange Door represents and that it coordinates. It is about ensuring that help is available to victim survivors when they need it, and it is about ensuring that victim survivors do not have to continually repeat their stories and also of course that perpetrators of violence are held to account.

Last week I joined with the member for Shepparton in Shepparton to meet with partner organisations for the Goulburn Orange Door—Primary Care Connect, Nexus Primary Health, FamilyCare and Rumbalara Aboriginal Co-operative. These organisations do amazing work in their own right, and they are now working hard with us to better join up the service delivery system in the Goulburn region. We have invested $448 million in the Orange Door services as part of our record $2.9 billion investment into addressing the recommendations of the royal commission.

But it is not about money; it is about lives. Every week in Australia a woman dies at the hands of her partner or former partner, and we are reminded all too regularly of the tragic outcomes if we do not address this issue properly. Sadly we recently had another harsh reminder of this, with the murder of Hannah Clarke and her three children at the hands of the person who should have loved them the most. We know reform like this is complex, and we know we need to be in it for the long haul. We do not shy away from that; we never have, because we know what is at stake if we do not make the changes that the royal commission told us that we need to make. This work continues, it is crucial and it is saving lives.

The SPEAKER: Just before calling the Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party I want to acknowledge in the gallery the presence of George Cox, who was a member of the other place.