It pains me to speak on this incredibly serious bill, which will make non-fatal strangulation a standalone offence in Victoria, pained because violence against women still haunts us. It still permeates across our communities. It follows us into our homes, where we should be safest. I say ‘it’, but violence against women is not perpetrated by a nondescript ‘it’. Violence against women, the murder of women, is perpetrated by a ‘who’, and it is important that we are self-aware in our language, attributing the deliberate action to the perpetrator who commits it, in most cases a man known to the victim.
In a two-week period this past month Australia has reeled under the shock of six more women’s deaths allegedly at the hands of intimate partners or acquaintances. Already this year 47 women have been murdered in our country, the vast majority through a choice made by a man that they knew. The harrowing reality is that one in six women in Australia endure physical or sexual violence in their lifetime, while one in four suffer emotional abuse from a partner. Worse still, First Nations and migrant women face even higher risks, often exacerbated by language barriers and visa constraints. And alarmingly, nearly 30 per cent of young adults aged 18 to 19 have experienced intimate partner violence in the past year, a frightening thing to consider for such a young cohort. These grim statistics are not just numbers, they are a clarion call reminding us that family violence remains a deep-rooted national crisis demanding our immediate attention.
In Victoria we have been taking action consistently and with determination and purpose since Labor came into government in 2014. In one of our first acts we appointed a Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence and commenced Victoria’s Royal Commission into Family Violence, both national firsts. The commission was tasked with identifying effective strategies to prevent family violence, enhance support for victim-survivors and hold perpetrators accountable. When it handed down an enormous 227 recommendations, we knew the full extent of the challenge before us to keep women and children safe in our state. In response the Victorian Labor government has committed more than $3.8 billion to implement every recommendation, and in January this year we implemented the final ones. In politics and with the churn of the media it is easy for the caravan to move on, but I am proud to be part of a government that has not allowed that to happen. We refuse to stop working on making women safer in our state. That means not just working to deliver the generational change we need but putting it front and centre of our work. Yet the work is by no means over, and this bill is another step to both shining a light on the scourge of family violence and also strengthening our legislation in relation to it.
Non-fatal strangulation is an incredibly disturbing, highly dangerous and life-threatening form of offending. This form of violence, involving the compression of the neck to impede breathing or blood flow, is not just physically brutal, it is also a potent symbol of control, a dark demonstration that the abuser literally has the victim’s life in their hands. It is designed to instil fear and compliance, and I can scarcely imagine anything more terrifying. While non-fatal strangulation is already captured by criminal offences such as assault, intentionally or recklessly causing injury, or assault with intent to commit a sexual offence, these offences do not wholly capture the seriousness of this act, nor do they fully convey the power dynamics at play in many cases or the risk profile arising from the established link between non-fatal strangulation and murder. Non-fatal strangulation is rarely isolated and often indicates an escalation of violence and coercive and controlling behaviours in a family violence context.
Women who survive a non-fatal strangulation are seven times more likely to be seriously injured or murdered by that partner – seven times more likely. Indeed 15 per cent of all family violence-related deaths are attributed to strangulation. Fatal outcomes are possible in as little as a minute. For survivors the impacts can be immediate or delayed, including the risk of death from blood clots, stroke or brain damage weeks or months afterwards. Non-fatal cases often lead to severe injuries like memory loss or nerve damage or miscarriage, with short-term effects like bruising and nausea, but notably 50 per cent of victim-survivors show no visible injuries, even when they have lost consciousness. These are horrible things to think about, let alone endure, but are worth elucidating to convey the gravity of this crime, yet the absence of a standalone offence in Victoria has represented a barrier to identifying, reporting and prosecuting this offending.
The bill before us proposes two distinct offences: a five-year maximum penalty for non-fatal strangulation against a family member and a 10-year maximum penalty if the strangulation intentionally causes injury. These changes aim to enhance victim-survivor protection, hold offenders accountable, signal escalating family violence and increase awareness amongst law enforcement and community service practitioners. There are several nuances to the bill – which other speakers have elucidated, and for brevity I will not go into them – which prevent the application of the offence to genuine accidents.
I do need to acknowledge the tireless and powerful advocacy for the creation of a standalone non-fatal strangulation offence by the family of the late Joy Maree Rowley. Joy was tragically murdered by strangulation and suffocation in 2011 after being non-fatally strangled by her killer on at least one occasion prior to her death. Since then her family have campaigned for the creation of an offence which specifically identifies this horrible act and the risk profile it carries as the reddest of red flags for what could follow.
In my community of the inner north the Fitzroy Legal Service has long been assisting women to navigate an often overwhelming and convoluted legal system when they are at some of the most vulnerable times of their lives. In preparing my comments today I reached out to Kristine Olaris, the CEO of the Fitzroy Legal Service, knowing the direct relevance of this legislation to their work. Kristine identified non-fatal strangulation as a form of coercive control, which they often see in family violence intervention order narratives, but significantly she also highlighted the importance of not just the robust justice response but of strong wraparound supports and services for victim-survivors and broader awareness raising about gender inequality and the role of non-fatal strangulation within family violence.
We have known for a long time that violence against women begins with poor attitudes towards women. It begins with gender inequality. A cultural change that needs to happen, and that is why our government has invested so heavily in initiatives like Respectful Relationships and in supporting the work of our mighty women’s health services. Yet we sadly still have such a long way to go to eradicate family violence. In Darebin there were 1261 reported incidents of family violence, by women, in 2022. In 365 cases of reported family violence there was a child present. That is heartbreaking. As others on both sides of the house have rightly noted, this is lifelong trauma that is being inflicted by cowardly perpetrators. There is no power in these acts, only weakness.
In closing I will just say this: women experience disadvantage in almost every aspect of our lives. We experience violence far too often. It all comes back to one thing: gender inequality. I commend the bill to the house.
