WELF3006 Family Violence Policy and Practice

Introduction

The words "battering", "violence," and "abuse" are used sometimes synonymously. As per the studies of the Australian community, "domestic violence" generally means abuse of partners, particularly the physical violence of a boy and a girl partner, generally committed by the boy partner towards his female partner. A 'partner' is an individual with a married or de facto partner, a boyfriend or girlfriend, or an individual intimately associated with another individual. But "domestic violence" (or "family violence") may also be employed to adhere to abuse occurring in any family relation, including a child, elderly or sibling abuse (Parkinson 2019). Most of the article addresses partner abuse of women, as women are the victims most often, but it cannot be denied that there are uncommon cases of males being abused by females. The word "domestic violence" under Australian law denotes solely viciousness carried out by a straight partner. It covers bodily wounds, pressure or severe harassment, intentional property impairment, impolite conduct without consent, or a threat to any such act (Buiten 2020).

Under the Family Law Act 1975, domestic violence in Australia is described as "brutal, threatening or other conduct of an individual coercing or controlling a member of the family or causing an intimidation of a family member." The Act refers to violent acts between persons who have or have been intimately connected in their households. Family violence involves viciousness among partners of both sexes, including homosexual relationships. Though, the word could be changed by each State's law and extended to include household violence, as in Victoria, where personal relationships and the presence of any family violence are described as "domestic violence." States have decided to name them in a different way concerning domestic violence in Australia. Domestic violence in Australia is known as 'domestic violence,' 'domestic and family violence,' 'family violence,' and 'domestic abuse' under the State. In Australia,  a survey of information on domestic violence exhibited that approximately one in six females and one out of twenty males had suffered abuse from a present or former partner for 15 years. As per the report of 2016, 1.7% of females and 0.8% of males examined stated that they had suffered violence from their close partner during the earlier twelve months, as per the "Personal Safety Survey by the Australian Bureau of Statistics." On average, a woman died from family violence every ten days between 2010 and 2012, with a subtotal of seventy-five over the time in 2015, and women reported for nearly two thirds (65%) of all FDV related Homicide sufferers in 2015 in Australia (103 victims) (Leser 2019).

Discussion

Domestic violence is a serious problem that affects millions of people worldwide. Violence committed by a close partner, usually known as domestic violence, is the most prevalent type of violence women face in Australia. It is essential to note that males and homosexual partners can also go through such violence. There is much ambiguity and misleading information in public discussion about domestic violence, which is complicated. However, there is a common consensus that sex discrimination, power inequalities and regulating conducts in relations are important factors (O'Brien 2014).

Gaps in policies and practices

The 2016 ABS Women's Safety Survey and the 2015 Personal Safety Survey observed that violence among partners could greatly impact children living at home. The 2016 ABS Women's Safety Survey revealed that 61% (211,600) of females who suffered violence from an existing partner confirmed having kids in their care for a certain time during their relationship, and 38% (132,400) females reported that these adolescents had witnessed the violence. Due to this reason, The Family Law Court makes decisions putting the best interests of children first and foremost. The Government of Australia is accountable for overriding government programs to minimise domestic violence. The Commonwealth sponsors cooperate between the government of State and Territory to promote and execute policies and practices for dealing with and prohibiting violence through its national policy strategies. Regrettably, the State's governments or the territory, not the Commonwealth Government, are responsible for policy enforcement and domestic violence prosecution matters (Richards 2011).

It cannot be ignored that the Australian governments fund their services and programs to discourage domestic violence and help the persons impacted by it. For instance, through their communities, health services, and police agencies, they are funding and administering their programs to prohibit domestic violence in each jurisdiction violence. The Council of Australian Government (COAG) and its Select Council for Women's Issues collaborate more extensively on Inter-governmental Liaison on Domestic violence and violence against females. The Women's Council is a council of the ministers' discussion board, which reports to COAG and works together at all governmental stages. Membership of this forum is the Commonwealth, State and Territory Ministers responsible for females' problems. The government of Australia has adopted the national plan to abolish violence against females and their kids, which in February 2011, has been endorsed by COAG. In partnership with the State and the Territories, the Federal Social Services Department works with the Office for Women within Prime Minster's Ministry and the Cabinet to enforce the National Plan (Phillips et al. 2015).

Implications for Policy: How to fill these gaps

It cannot be ignored that the Australian government has taken several initiatives to protect Australian women from domestic violence, including action plans. However, all initiatives are not perfect and involve certain flaws. A robust foundation, which was printed in 2012, is the First Action Plan 2010-2013, which outlines how the Australian government and social groups will lay the foundations for the upcoming and lay the stage for life in the National Plan. It concentrated on 'primary prevention, alteration in attitudes and the development of strong evidence.' There are four important factors in the first action plan: building the basis for proof, building the capacities for primary deterrence, improving the distribution of services, and firming justice responses (Piper and Stevenson 2019). Apart from that, the Australian government tried to modify various legislation related to domestic violence, such as the Domestic Violence and Protection Orders Act 2008 (ACT) and Crimes (Domestic and Personal Violence) Act 2007 (NSW).

Recommendations

In order to determine whether the policies and practices related to domestic violence work effectively, several committees have been appointed by the Australian government. These committees perform their duties by assessing various family violence report as per the legislation and promote effective results. However, the courts always provide their decisions for the benefit of the children as per the facts of the case concerning matters related to family violence. In the recent case of Carra & Shultz [2012] FMCA fam 930, the court stated that not giving time or discontinuing interaction with a kid does not amount to domestic violence. The definition of domestic violence is essentially conducted that "coerces or regulates" a family member or makes him/her afraid.

1. These committees combating domestic violence recommend that States conduct assessments of their existing family violence reporting legislation to investigate whether and how early case discovery results for victims or families are better and promote alterations based on good research. 

Conclusion

Thus, from the above discussion, it can be concluded that domestic violence is considered a major problem that affects millions of women worldwide, and international governments are still trying to control and minimise violence. Domestic violence is one of the worst types of abuse experienced by women nowadays in society. According to statistics, 85% of domestic abuse victims are women. Men are also the victims of domestic violence, but not like women.  Domestic violence can occur to everyone, irrespective of the race, caste, religion, or position of the victim in society. However, several of these tactics have been in place for several decades, despite that domestic violence has not been removed from society completely. This type of violence is not unavoidable, and thus, the Australian government has enacted several legislations in order to protect the rights of women and children. These rights protect the women and children if domestic violence occurs but cannot prevent domestic violence completely from the Australian society. Therefore, it can be stated that if domestic violence is not addressed adequately, this kind of maltreatment will continue without end in all social classes. In order to eliminate this horrific type of abuse, every human being, as a society, need to stand up and make harder legislation to safeguard the victims of this abuse.

Reference

Buiten, D., 2020, Why do men abuse their families? Here's what the research says, The Conversation.

Carra & Shultz [2012] FMCA fam 930

Cox, P., 2015. Violence against women in Australia: Additional analysis of the Australian Bureau of Statistics' Personal Safety Survey, 2012. Australia's National Research Organisation for Women's Safety.

Crimes (Domestic and Personal Violence) Act 2007 (NSW)

Domestic Violence and Protection Orders Act 2008 (ACT)

Family Law Act 1975

Hill, J., 2019, See what you made me do: power, control and domestic violence", Schwartz Publishing Pty Limited, Carlton.

Leser, D, 2019, Women, men and the whole damn thing, Allen & Unwin, Sydney.

O'Brien, C., 2014, Blame changer: understanding domestic violence, Threekookaburras Pty Ltd, Syndal.

Parkinson, D., 2019. Investigating the increase in domestic violence post disaster: an Australian case study. Journal of interpersonal violence, 34(11), pp.2333-2362.

Phillips, J., Dunkley, A., Muller, D.. & Lorimer, C., 2015, Domestic violence: issues and policy challenges, Parliament of Australia.

Piper, A., and Stevenson, A., 2019. Gender violence in Australia: historical perspectives. Monash University Publishing.

Richards, K., 2011. Children's exposure to domestic violence in Australia. Trends and issues in crime and criminal justice, 419, pp.1-7.

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