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Study every death, tackle alcohol: DV commissioner’s urgent advice
States and territories should thoroughly investigate every domestic violence death and feed that knowledge to a national body that makes sure governments learn lessons and act on them whenever a woman is killed by her partner.
Policymakers must also start talking about what levers they have to rein in alcohol and drug use, and overcome their reluctance to acknowledge the role those elements play in violence out of fear of “excusing” bad behaviour.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Domestic Family and Sexual Violence Commissioner Micaela Cronin during last week’s national cabinet meeting.Credit: Gaye Gerard
As new analysis shows federal spending on family, domestic and sexual violence has soared in the last 10 years – from $2 million in 2013/14 to $644 million this financial year – experts are asking for better evidence, more data and scrutiny around how funds are leading to better outcomes.
Intimate partner homicides have been on a general decline for 30 years, but there was an uptick last financial year when 34 women were killed by their partners, up from 26. Twenty-eight women have been killed in violent circumstances so far in 2024, according to the Counting Dead Women social media group.
Australia’s inaugural domestic violence commissioner this week convened 70 hand-picked experts for emergency talks that will shape the advice she gives to governments, as a national crisis of gendered violence has meant demands for stronger action from the prime minister and state premiers.
Commissioner Micaela Cronin said it had been a confronting few weeks; several women have allegedly been killed by men known to law enforcement while a stabbing rampage through a Sydney shopping centre left five women dead.
“We called these … crisis talks just over two weeks ago. And since that time, four more women have lost their lives,” she said at Tuesday’s roundtable. “We have a target in that national plan of reducing homicides by 25 per cent … We are absolutely not on track for that.”
Part of the problem is that not enough is known about who perpetrates violence, and why they do it, while men who wanted to change their behaviour had limited options.
“Research to better understand perpetrators will be critical to ensure our interventions can be effectively tailored,” said a summary document of the roundtable discussions.
“The men’s behaviour change programs that are available are not always tailored to the individual needs of communities such as First Nations men, [gay, bisexual, transgender and queer] men, or men from migrant communities.”
Men also needed more access points for intervention, such as through the health and legal system, rather than just specialist services.
The experts also said law enforcement needed to escalate how it responded to people who were at high risk of committing violence or experiencing harm – continuing the argument for agencies to make risk assessments of potential and serial perpetrators and share information about them across different systems.
Cronin said she would be raising the issue with attorneys-general and police commissioners, as well as telling them to implement the recommendations of death reviews across the country.
“There is a detail and depth of analysis done through death reviews, coronial inquests and inquiries … around Australia which are important to understanding the critical moments for intervention,” the meeting summary said.
“Participants emphasised the need for every jurisdiction to have a well-funded and effective [domestic and family violence] death review mechanism. In addition, reporting to a national body would enable lessons from these death reviews to be shared and acted upon across states and territories.”
Another urgent issue was elevating the role governments play in regulating and responding to factors such as alcohol, drug use, gambling and pornography.
“There has been a reluctance to acknowledge the role of alcohol and other drugs in violence in case it ‘excused’ or ‘justified’ the behaviour,” the summary said.
“It is undeniably a factor in reducing inhibition and resulting in more serious violence. There are now calls to have serious, evidence-based discussions about the role of [alcohol and other drugs] in violence and what levers the government may have.”
This was paired with calls for better support and more resources for the domestic and sexual violence sector – which often operates with a stretched workforce and on short-term funding cycles – as well as accessible accommodation.
A separate analysis of federal domestic violence funding since 2010 found Commonwealth spending had risen from $0 to $4.5 million a year, between 2010 and 2014, to $644 million by 2023. At the same time, what governments spend money on has become more sophisticated.
“Early on, [domestic and family violence] financing was focused predominantly on crisis response. In recent years, financing has become multipronged … with increasing focus on intersectional experiences, data collection, policy implementation, and systemic reforms,” it said.
But this investment has not been adequately monitored to make sure it’s successful. The analysis, by professional services firm MinterEllison, said the government should outline its specific funding measures for domestic violence in the federal budget, and track funding against concrete outcomes in the national plan.
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