E&OE TRANSCRIPT
Topics: National Cabinet, Women’s Safety
I’m Justine Elliot, Assistant Minister for Social Services and Assistant Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence.
Of course, on Friday, we had National Cabinet, a really important meeting where the Prime Minister and our First Ministers got to talk about women's safety and also how we can end violence against women and children in one generation.
This issue of women’s safety is a national priority for our government, as I know it's a priority for all governments across the country - and that's why National Cabinet was so important.
What we saw coming out of that was a huge announcement in terms of the funding commitment to end violence against women and children in one generation, $4.7 billion towards that shared goal of keeping women safe right throughout the country.
As part of that major funding initiative, we saw $3.9 billion towards providing greater access to legal services. We know this is such an important issue right across the country, particularly for women fleeing domestic violence, needing to access those important legal services. These are major commitments in terms of providing more support for frontline services.
$700 million in shared funding from the Commonwealth and States, and this will go to those important frontline services that we know women and children need. Every day I hear from services across the country that they need more funding for frontline services for women and children, and we'll be delivering that.
That’s in a five-year National Partnership Agreement. It's important to have that certainty of funding for our services, and importantly, to have that certainty of funding to provide that access for women and children.
We also saw coming out of the National Cabinet, as well, $80 million to provide more support for children. We know children suffer so much trauma when they are victims of family, domestic and sexual violence, so we're putting forward that funding to provide more support and services for them.
And as part of the announcement for National Cabinet, we're looking at national standards for men's behavioural change programs. This is an important issue right across the community and we’ve already invested a whole series of programs towards that end. We know there needs to be more done in terms of the research and coordination around that, making sure we can look further into those men who choose to use violence - so this is a huge announcement on Friday in terms of National Cabinet.
It builds on our already record funding of $3.4 billion of course. At the first National Cabinet, we saw the commitment of a billion dollars towards establishing the Leaving Violence Program, providing that important financial support for women and children to relocate, and this second National Cabinet that we had on Friday builds on that. Particularly with these five-year commitments for access to legal services and frontline services.
We're working very closely with all the States and Territories to make sure we provide the support that women and children need and together, we’re working towards our shared goal of ending violence against women and children in one generation.