1800RESPECT launches video counselling service for domestic violence support

The national support service for domestic, family and sexual violence 1800RESPECT has launched an on-demand video counselling service.

The video option is the latest of four services available at 1800RESPECT, including the phone helpline, the SMS text option and the online chat service, which are all available 24/7.

Assistant Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence Justine Elliot said the announcement falls under the government’s National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children 2022-32.

Domestic and family violence contributes to more death, disability and illness in women aged 15 to 44 than any other preventable risk factor, and is the leading cause of homelessness for women and children.

The lives of 14 women have been taken by domestic and family violence in Australia this year, according to Destroy the Joint’s Counting Dead Women.

Source: 1800RESPECT launches video counselling service for domestic violence support

Former female staff at Sydney’s elite Cranbrook School warn of ‘toxic’ culture as it prepares to go co-ed – ABC News

Teachers given fluffy handcuffs. Wolf-whistling and orgasm noises on playground duty. An attempted blackmail for nudes. Being told you can expect to be sexually harassed because you’re good-looking. Victimisation, a toxic culture, a boys’ club.

These allegations by former female teachers and staff at Sydney’s elite Cranbrook School for boys paint a devastating picture of their workplace.

Cranbrook is nestled among Sydney’s most expensive real estate. It’s the alma mater of captains of industry and billionaires. Its headmaster has been found to be the second-most generously remunerated principal in the nation.

As Cranbrook prepares to enrol girls from 2026, multiple female former staff warn this 105-year-old institution has a women problem.

Source: Former female staff at Sydney’s elite Cranbrook School warn of ‘toxic’ culture as it prepares to go co-ed – ABC News

Trailblazing Women Lawyers | National Library of Australia

This module is aligned to the Australian Curriculum (v9): History 7–10 and includes material to support the teaching of the Knowledge and Understand areas Building Modern Australia and The Globalising World.

Source: Trailblazing Women Lawyers | National Library of Australia

MeToo Family Courts

Are you are victim of systemic abuse and institutional  failure in the federal and family court systems?

This Class Action involves a plaintiff (known as the representative plaintiff or lead litigant) pursuing a claim on behalf of a larger group that has been similarly affected. They are the only persons assuming the risk and cost of the litigation, and they are running their claim in the interests of all affected parties within the defined group.

This Class Action has 3 Objectives:

Formal Apology

Obtain a formal government apology and acknowledgement for the harm family and federal courts have caused to children and families, recognizing the impact on a generation and paving the way for healing and justice.

Compensation

Financial and other compensation for harm and economic loss to redress and support affected individuals and children who have been victims of systemic abuse and institutional  failure in the federal and family court systems.

Judicial Accountability

The immediate establishment of an independent Federal Judicial Commission with community representation and measures to deal with systemic bias and collusion.

Source: MeTooFamilyCourts

A child’s fertility pact – by Bernard Lane

A primary school-age girl, Isla1, offered one of her eggs for future harvest so that her elder sister, Mia, who identifies as a boy, could one day have a child if she is sterilised by transgender hormone treatment, a court in Australia has heard.

“It’s like a pact between them,” the court was told by parent A2, who supports their eldest daughter’s wish for puberty blockers and testosterone; Mia has also expressed a wish to undergo “every surgery available.”

The Federal Circuit and Family Court this week has been hearing a case in which the separated parents—whose personal characteristics have been suppressed by order of Justice Peter Tree—disagree on whether “gender-affirming” medical treatment or mental health intervention should be the focus in serving the best interests of the gender-diverse sisters.

Parent A, who lives with the daughters, seeks an order for sole parental responsibility, which would enable Mia, who had begun high school at the time of the fertility pact, to continue down a path towards hormonal interventions with irreversible effects including a risk of permanent infertility.

Parent B, who regards Mia’s trans identification as a phase and favours a child’s acceptance of the body over gender medicalisation, is seeking shared responsibility and orders stopping the pursuit of hormonal treatment.

Source: A child’s fertility pact – by Bernard Lane

When can we really raise a glass on International Women’s Day? | Madonna King | New Daily

We are currently ranked 32nd in the world for female parliamentary representation, below New Zealand, Rwanda and Iceland.

It’s on the rise. For example, in federal Parliament the number of female politicians has jumped 15 per cent since 2002, to sit at 40 per cent in 2023.

For those young women who feel excluded from politics and disinterested in the ‘he said-he said’ that is yelled across the political chamber, Zoe McKenzie’s message was a warm embrace that showed politics can be done in another way.

But it’s time we stopped celebrating little strides forward in equality with purple cupcakes and long celebratory lunches and looked at how we could genuinely drive real gender equality in our communities.

How can we raise our glasses this International Women’s Day when the fastest growing homeless group is women over the age of 55?

Or when some girls’ schools in Australia still do not allow shorts as part of the uniform.

Or when the media refer to a felon or an accused person as ‘a mother of three’ and the narrative is dominated by her role as a woman. Rarely do we know the marital status of a male in similar circumstances.

But it’s probably the heartbreak of domestic violence that drives home the absolute inequality now faced by many women in Australia (and indeed around the world).

Advertising campaigns, targeted school talks and new laws to address coercive control have all failed to reduce the nation’s shameful domestic violence figures, with police DV callouts now increasing 20 per cent each year. In the large proportion of those, the victim is female.

Imagine if domestic violence figures became the barometer of equality, and we – men and women – worked together to curtail the heartache that largely remains hidden.

Source: When can we really raise a glass on International Women’s Day?

Abortions were illegal in Australia in the 1930s, and many women like Isabel Pepper died getting them – ABC News

Until the late 1960s, abortion was illegal in Australia. With limited access to contraception, many women, like my great-grandmother, unlawfully attempted to terminate unwanted pregnancies.

According to The Royal Women’s Hospital records from the 1930s, about 250 women each year presented with a septic abortion. This equates to five admissions each week to that one hospital.

“It’s a situation for the desperate,” registered nurse, midwife and historian, Madonna Grehan says.

According to the inquest, Isabel had repeatedly attempted to abort the pregnancy herself. When these home methods were unsuccessful, she sought the assistance of a backyard abortionist.

But there were clearly complications.

Once at the hospital, Isabel was quickly admitted to ward one, the septic ward.

“Ward one was a ward that collected women with lots of problems,” Ms Mabbitt explains.

Now in her 90s, the former midwife still has vivid memories of caring for women with septic abortions on ward one.

“It’s the distinctive smell, it’s all-encompassing. And the screaming. They were in so much pain from everything shutting down,” she says.

Despite the pain Isabel would undoubtedly have been suffering, she was interviewed by police within hours of her admission to hospital because of the illegality of abortion.

She told police that she had miscarried.

“She really didn’t give any indication of the truth, and that was normal,” Ms Mabbitt says.

Just 24 hours after she was admitted to hospital, Isabel died at 5.15am on August 21, 1937.

For decades, thousands of Australian women found themselves in equally desperate situations and they died as a result.

“What really irritates me, most of the people who are against abortion are men, and they really have no idea what they’re talking about, no idea how women died.”

Source: Abortions were illegal in Australia in the 1930s, and many women like Isabel Pepper died getting them – ABC News

Superannuation will be added to Paid Parental Leave scheme | The Australian

Mums and dads will receive superannuation on top of government-funded paid parental leave payments, in a major spending commitment ahead of the May budget aimed at bolstering Labor’s gender equity credentials.

Women’s Minister Katy Gallagher will on Thursday unveil a plan to increase the nearly $900 a week payment by 12 per cent, which will go into superannuation accounts for the 180,000 parents who access the scheme every year.

Senator Gallagher said the measure would “close the super gap”, with men generally retiring with about 25 per cent more superannuation than women.

The announcement comes almost a year after the government’s Women’s Economic Equality Taskforce recommended it take “urgent” action to add super to PPL, which Senator Gallagher said she was actively considering ahead of the May 2023 budget.

Source: Superannuation will be added to Paid Parental Leave scheme | The Australian

Pay gap stats aren’t about naming and shaming? Um, they kind of are | SMH | Jacqueline Maley

We’ve all got to get our kicks somehow. I’ve been getting mine by playing a game of compare-and-contrast: looking at the data released on Tuesday showing which companies have the biggest gender pay gaps, and lining it up with what those companies say on their corporate websites, under the “diversity and inclusion” tabs.

Here is CommBank (gender pay gap of 29.8 per cent on base salary, twice the national median of 14.5 per cent) telling us its policy on equality. “Everyone has fair and equitable access to career and development opportunities resulting in diverse representation at leadership levels,” it asserts.

Energy company AGL (gender pay gap of 30 per cent, again, twice the national median for base pay) says it “strives to empower women to achieve their career goals and provide them with opportunities to connect and grow”.

AGL assures sceptics that “our Values [sic] are not just words on paper, they represent the very essence of who we are as an organisation and what we stand for. They shape our culture, guide our decisions, and drive our actions”.

Investment bank Morgan Stanley (gender pay gap of 25 per cent on base salary, and a whopping 48.2 per cent when you factor in bonuses), boasts of its commitment to “Diversity & Inclusion” as one of its “core values”.

So – is the pay gap entirely structural? And is it fair to expect companies to fix gender stereotyping in society at large?

We can blame corporate Australia for some things, but not for the fact that women, for their own reasons, “choose” to do more flexible, family-friendly jobs that happen to be less paid.

Right?

Well, it requires a truly heroic suspension of reason to conclude sexism and discrimination do not contribute to the pay gap. Salary begins to diverge along gender lines at the graduate level, before most women have had babies.

Source: 12ft