Jess Hill on how to stop domestic violence

I would wake up at four point thirty in the morning.

It was really the only thing I thought about and focused on for that entire time.

Jess Hill hasn't been sleeping much lately.

I just would be crunching through trying to get to the nub of what needed to be done throughout the day and night.

For the past three months, she's been working on a plan to try and end violence against women and children.

This report really came about because of the sharp escalation in domestic homicides.

Were the government of acknowledge that the national emergency, and the horror expressed by the Australian public about why this was happening and how can we stop it.

The alban Easy government has assembled an expert panel to conduct a rapid review into domestic violence the panel and.

When I was finally they asked to be part of it, I knew that this was going to be a herculean task, especially when they said you've got twelve weeks.

Now that plan is out, it looks beyond the education campaigns that we've come to understand as domestic violence prevention and calls for a complete overhaul to the way government responds to men killing women and their children From Schwartz Media. I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven AM Today, journalist and co author of the rapid review Jess Hill on what's in the report and whether we're going to see any change.

So essentially, what we did is we started off with kind of an endless blue skyscope, right, and then we had to crush it down into something that could be achievable for the federal and state and territory governments. So what we decided was to zero in on what ended up being twenty one recommendations, and we wanted to look for the big leavers, like what are the big things

So the primary finding of this review was.

That the potential for prevention exists in more areas than Australia has previously recognized. We need to be looking at how do we prevent violence once it's already occurring, how do we prevent violence once it's already at severe stages and before it becomes fatal?

And also how.

Do we go back to an area that we have neglected for so long.

Which is the experiences of children and young people.

When we've talked about prevention and children and young people, a lot of it has been about teaching them how to have respectful relationships.

But where has been the emphasis.

On helping children young people recover from trauma of experiencing family violence or sexual violence themselves. To really respond to this area and to unlock the prevention potential within children and young people requires a massive pivot from every level of government and serious investment into creating services that simply do not exist right now.

Okay, So it's about having supports in place in schools, for example, and so embedding I guess our response to violence anywhere that it seems like it might be able to meet need.

Yeah, it's essentially a lot of people.

When we talked about oh, we're doing this review into prevention. They were like, oh, so you mean like looking at attitudes and education and we're like, no, prevention goes beyond that. So, for example, one of the recommendations that we've made is we need to activate the health sector. Right there are

Sector into view and how to.

Bring the government departments of health and the government departments look after women and children's safety to work much more closely together. So that's a big part of what we're recommending. Similarly, you know, we need to do much more to bring together the mental health but also alcohol and other drug sectors into closer collaboration with domestic and family violence. So there's a large percentage of men who show up to alcohol and other drug services will also be perpetrating domestic

Again, we miss this opportunity for prevention.

And one of those opportunities that you wrote about is the idea of meeting men and boys where they're at. So what would that actually look like, That.

Would look like actually codesigning these sorts of interventions with men and boys in such a way that does not just highlight their deficits and how those deficits need to be overcome, but actually steps right into what are the healthy masculinities, What are the ways in which men and boys thrive, and how are they feeling set upon by online influencers, the growing rates of misogyny that are really targeting disaffected young men online, the sorts of things they're

Yeah, you mentioned deep fake porn, and it does seem like there are just so many new avenues for abuse or what have you found out about the new ways of which perpetrators are targeting their victims.

So we are seeing whole new areas open up in ways that are quite unprecedented, particularly technology facilitated abuse, different types of financial abuse. Essentially, the scope of coersive control and family violence is rapidly expanding, and a lot of what we're seeing in terms of the new frontiers.

Of abuse is that the abuse is.

Being conducted through government systems like family law, child support, child protection.

Now that's both.

Terrifying and overwhelming, but also presents this huge opportunity because government cannot be in the kitchen with every couple when the physical violence or the coercive control occurs, but they can be in the child support system and they can be at the centering end to stop those perpetrators ueeing those systems to further their abuse and so one of our big recommendations is the governments to stop perpetrators weaponizing systems and you reform them so that they are safe

Coming up after the break, when will the government respond, Jess, So just want to come back to this idea. You mentioned the importance of foregrounding the views of Indigenous women, but one big criticism of the review was the fact that there were no First Nations women who were selected to take part in that review process. Did that limit your work?

Yes, So we prioritized consultations with the Aboriginal Torrest Trade Islander Advisory Council on Family, Domestic and Sexual Viles and also the First Nation's National Plan Steering Committee. We also had doctor Todd Fernando or Adarie Mann, who's also the former LGBTQI Commissioner for Victoria. Now, consultation is incredibly important and there's absolutely no doubt that the composition of a

I think the point that some Indigenous advocates are making those that consulting is different to having an actual seat at the table, particularly when you are the group of people who are disproportionately affected by the issue that's being discussed.

I totally agree, and this is all I can say is that I'm not I wasn't in charge of the composition of this panel, so so you.

Know, that's a question that has to go to government. I could just say that in the absence.

Of that, we did our absolute best to make sure that those experiences were fore grounded and in our discussions they were often the first consideration in terms of how we've shaped those recommendations.

And on September sixth, the National Cabinet will meet and respond to the review. What would you like to see come from that cabinet meeting?

One hundred percent support for every recommendation, Like, realistically, I want to see a schedule for how they are going to implement what has been recommended, and a big part of that is the government needs to finally accurately calculate how much is this going to cost to adequately resource every year, because we actually don't know, and it's time to actually take this issue seriously and say, if we're going to end gendered violence in a single generation, which

I think obviously the work that's being done is important, but I do think that there is a sense in the community that at times it does feel like the government's solution is another review or a summit. And at times, as a journalist doing these interviews, I can feel lost in the admin of all of this, in the suggestions, in the recommendations. As someone who's inside all of that, I mean, how does it seem to you? Do you feel like this work is leading somewhere.

I can say that I would not have gone to the wall for the last twelve weeks if I didn't think that it was worth it. This is not just the thoughts and ideas of six people. We reviewed consultations that have gone on for years. The sector is consulted out a lot of this. You just need to have a look at what are the recommendations that have been made for the last ten years that haven't been actioned.

Jess, thank you so much.

Beete pleasure, Ruby, thank you.

If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic or family violence, you can call one eight hundred. Respect. Also in the news today, the federal government has proposed to cap the enrollment of new international students to two hundred and seventy thousand for the next calendar year. The move is part of the government's wider effort of reducing net