Category: Domestic Violence

‘I had no idea people in Australia call police if anyone is beaten’: why many abused migrant women don’t involve police | The Conversation

My research focused on spousal financial abuse, but it soon became clear it was deeply entangled with emotional, physical, and sexual violence. These overlapping forms of violence help enforce fear, dependence, and silence.

Across these stories, a pattern emerged: a deep reluctance to contact the police.

Most . . . did not see the police as a source of safety.

Coming from a post-colonial country where the policing system was originally designed to serve the British Empire rather than protect ordinary people, many carried a deep-seated fear and mistrust of law enforcement. This was shaped by experiences of policing culture in Bangladesh, where abuse of power and impunity are common.

Several women described being repeatedly warned by their husbands that involving police would lead to deportation or removal of the children.

Another woman, Roji, worried that because her husband spoke fluent English and she didn’t, he would be able to convince the police while she would struggle to even understand what was being said.

Migrant women often face enormous emotional, financial, social, and cultural barriers even after contacting police. Many described becoming immediately overwhelmed by guilt and uncertainty after seeking help.

Under pressure from family and community members, and frightened by the prospect of navigating Australia’s legal and welfare systems alone, many withdrew complaints.

Women described how involving police often leads to gossip and stigma.

Most women who actually sought help described feeling lost trying to navigate the system. Many described feeling rushed interacting with authorities, unfamiliar legal language, and the absence of culturally sensitive communication.

However, not all participants experienced police interactions negatively. Faiza described how her ex-husband falsely accused her of being violent towards him after calling the police, tearing his own shirt, and banging his forehead against a wall. Arrested and taken to the police station, she felt bewildered. But a female police officer calmly guided her through the process.

It’s also important to recognise many migrant women hesitate to disclose abuse because they fear feeding racist stereotypes.

Source: ‘I had no idea people in Australia call police if anyone is beaten’: why many abused migrant women don’t involve police

Housing crisis: The trap keeping women in bad marriages. | Mamamia

Exclusive new research . . . found that nearly half of Australian women say financial pressure delayed their decision to separate.

More than half felt financially dependent on their partner before leaving.

To me, this was a shocking revelation.

It feels like a statistic from a bygone era. Women trapped in unhappy or unhealthy relationships because they simply can’t afford to leave.

It’s a dynamic we associate with our grandmothers’ generation, not modern women who work, own property, raise children and supposedly have more independence than ever before.

[Ed: An obvious reality not sufficiently discussed.]

Source: Housing crisis: The trap keeping women in bad marriages.

Maternal psychological distress study | Jisc Online Surveys

Title of study: Maternal psychological distress and suicidal ideation among female victims of coercive and controlling intimate partner relationships following the removal of their children into care.

Name of Researcher: Rebecca Freeman

1.  Invitation paragraph

You are being invited to take part in a research project which looks at psychological distress and thoughts of suicide in women who have experienced controlling or violent abusive relationships. Before you decide on whether to take part, it is important for you to understand why the research is being done and what it will involve. Please take sufficient time (24 hours recommended) to read the following information carefully before you decide whether or not you wish to take part. You are welcome to discuss this project with others if you wish before you make your decision. Please contact the researcher via r.l.freeman@edu.salford.ac.uk if there is anything that is not clear or if you would like more information.

2.  What is the purpose of the study?

The study will address psychological distress and thoughts of suicide in women who have experienced physical violence and / or psychological abuse within an intimate partner relationship, in particular how this appears to affect mothers who have had their child(ren) removed into the care of the local authority and how this differs from women who have not experienced this. There is a lack of existing research into this area and so this study will give women an opportunity to be heard and increase our understanding of their experiences.

Source: Maternal psychological distress study | Jisc Online Surveys

Teal MPs push for domestic violence royal commission to examine family law system | SMH

The family law system should be examined as part of a royal commission into domestic violence, crossbench MPs have urged, as experts warn that survivors face crushing legal bills and perpetrators are weaponising proceedings.

Teal independents Zali Steggall and Monique Ryan want Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to set up a national inquiry into the family violence crisis amid calls for an urgent injection of funds for legal assistance services.

A royal commission could “cross-check what federal and state governments are doing across all these systems, from legal aid, to crisis accommodation, to all of the areas that we know impact domestic violence”, Steggall said.

The domestic violence prevention sector is split on whether a royal commission would be useful or delay action and divert funding from crucial services.

Since 2022, the government has allocated more than $4.4 billion to the national plan to end violence against women and children.

National Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Commissioner Micaela Cronin last month said: “We don’t need more reviews” but “more action”. Independent MP Allegra Spender does not support a royal commission.

[O]ne option the government might consider was the feasibility of a loan scheme similar to HECS that could be “rolled out to cater for that middle tier of the population” that did not qualify for legal aid in family law cases.

National Legal Aid executive director Yvette D’Ath, a former Queensland attorney-general and justice minister, did not believe a royal commission was necessary because “a lot of the answers are there” as a result of previous inquiries.

She said a national approach was required in the “prevention and early intervention space”, alongside an increase in funding for legal assistance services.

Source: Teal MPs push for domestic violence royal commission to examine family law system

Why we cannot name high-profile Queensland man at centre of Cairns extortion case – ABC News

There is a highly secretive and unusual court case playing out behind closed doors in Far North Queensland involving a prominent married man and his alleged affair, a non-publication order we are not allowed to see and an allegation of extortion we cannot tell you much about.

This is a story of how a regional magistrates court became the centre of a mysterious high-stakes legal drama that raises questions over the fundamental principle of open justice, the media’s right to fairly report what happens in court, and whether powerful people are using their influence over public institutions to protect this high-profile man from embarrassment.

The defendant’s legal team, along with media organisations including the ABC, have now launched a judicial review into the acting magistrate’s decision, arguing her blanket suppression order went beyond the scope of her powers.

Police prosecutors and the magistrates court have doubled down, hiring their own top silk to fight the appeal.

A directions hearing before Justice James Henry in Cairns Supreme Court on Wednesday morning was conducted entirely behind closed doors, with journalists locked outside.

We had raced there from a press conference around the corner with Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie.

As a former attorney-general, he was asked about the case but refused to comment on it specifically, agreeing only that the fundamental concept of open court in the justice system was important to uphold.

“I couldn’t possibly comment based on the suppression order that’s in place by a court,” he said.

Source: Why we cannot name high-profile Queensland man at centre of Cairns extortion case – ABC News

Family law fight: Women forced to ‘work until the day I die’ to afford court cases | SMH

By the time of the final Federal Circuit and Family Court hearing in her case, the financial strain on Eloise was so severe she had to access her superannuation on compassionate grounds to prevent the forced sale of her home to cover legal bills.

“Thirty years of working; I now have zero super,” Eloise said. “This is what happens to so many women my age that have gone through this.

“I don’t regret spending half a million dollars protecting my children … but I will be paying that price for the rest of my life. I will probably work until the day I die.”

Eloise said the system was “absolutely not workable, but there isn’t any other choice”.

“It is exhausting to have to keep proving abuse over and over again. The secondary trauma of family court proceedings takes a huge emotional and financial toll.”

Eloise’s lawyer, whom the Herald has chosen not to name to avoid indirectly identifying her client, said there was a massive gap between people who don’t qualify for legal aid and people who can actually afford legal fees.

“The system is really broken,” she said.

Steve Frost, founder of the not-for-profit Horizons Family Law Centre in Sydney, estimated that “about 70 to 80 per cent of the population … couldn’t afford a private lawyer to run a full family law case”.

“Under current funding arrangements, most people in paid employment wouldn’t qualify for legal aid,” he said. Nor would those with “any form of savings, even if they’re modest”. Home-owners, even with a mortgage, were also mostly ruled out.

“It’s normal people,” Frost said. “When we first set up [in 2005], we used to talk about our service being for ‘ladies and tradies’.

“These days … huge numbers of the people contacting us are in white-collar jobs earning objectively good incomes but without the capacity to pay $330 an hour and upwards for a private solicitor.”

Frost’s centre, a registered charity, does not receive government grants and is funded by donations. Its service is not means tested, but it provides higher levels of help to people who don’t qualify for legal aid and who can’t afford a private lawyer, he said.

Litigation funding by private lenders is available in some family law cases involving property, rather than purely parenting matters. The loan is repaid from the eventual payout. But the interest rates are high.

In the case of amicable splits, Frost said the government-funded AI tool Amica, developed by National Legal Aid, provided guidance about likely court outcomes and generated legal documents for a relatively low cost.

The proportion of parenting cases in the Federal Circuit and Family Court alleging family violence increased from 80 per cent to 86 per cent over the past four years, according to its 2024-25 annual report.

Statistically, it is more common for women and their children to be the victims of family violence by a male partner, heightening the need for lawyers in parenting and property disputes.

National Legal Aid executive director Yvette D’Ath, a former Queensland attorney-general and justice minister, said it was clear the family law system was weaponised in some cases to further traumatise victims of domestic and family violence.

Jacqueline Minors, principal of Minors Family Law in Sydney, said she had seen an increase in the number of clients trying to act for themselves in court to reduce costs.

Ultimately, the cost of proceedings affected how parents could support their children financially in the future, she said.

Source: Family law fight: Women forced to ‘work until the day I die’ to afford court cases

The government is reforming child support. Here’s what’s changing – and what’s been missed | The Conversation

The proposed changes would encourage child support to be collected directly from wages more often. About half of child support payment arrangements are made privately, which can be hard to enforce.

The government is also planning to release an online tool to help parents select the most suitable collection method.

The proposed laws would also be more flexible, allowing either parent to switch from private to government collection to recover child support debts.

There’s also funding to crack down on people who repeatedly don’t lodge tax returns to reduce the amount of child support they owe.

When child support is unpaid, delayed, or underpaid, payees (mostly mothers) can lose access to higher government payments or face unexpected debts because government payments are linked to expected child support. Single mothers with young children almost always carry the greatest financial burden of non-payment because they are less likely to be employed than other mothers.

Under the changes, late or unpaid child support is increasingly being framed as financial abuse.

Source: The government is reforming child support. Here’s what’s changing – and what’s been missed

Tightening NDIS eligibility will disproportionately affect women – in more ways than you’d expect | The Conversation

Public hearings are underway this week to highlight the impacts of the government’s new National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) bill to tighten eligibility and save costs.

Over the past two days, the Senate inquiry heard that if the bill passes in its current form, it risks entrenching gender inequities in the NDIS and further excluding women and girls.

We have long known the NDIS has a gender problem.

Women and girls only make up 38% of the scheme. Men outnumber women in every age category (except for 55 and over) and dominate nearly every disability type within the scheme.

From the age of 15, access requests from men are also approved at a higher rate than access requests for women.

Women are more likely than men to have medically unexplained or chronic conditions, such as myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia, which causes chronic pain.

These “pay to prove” dynamics also disproportionately affect those with fewer financial resources. Women with disability are more likely than men with disability to live on lower incomes. They also have higher expenses and lower earning capacity due to greater caring responsibilities.

Tightening access to the scheme in this way – without first addressing costly and difficult-to-access treatment pathways – risks excluding these women and girls from key supports.

The bill gives the minister power to make cuts to entire categories of supports in the future, without introducing legislation or consultation.

The 50% across-the-board cuts will shift these responsibilities back onto informal carers – largely women.

There are more than twice as many female primary carers as male primary carers. Of those providing primary care to children with disability, the overwhelming majority (84.7%) are women.

Cuts to social and community participation funding are also likely to increase social isolation and reduce natural safeguards of community connection for people with disability.

Women with disability are disproportionately likely to experience violence, so cutting them off from vital community participation supports poses an unacceptable risk.

Source: Tightening NDIS eligibility will disproportionately affect women – in more ways than you’d expect

Family Court Is Getting Worse, Advocates and Experts Warn | by Catherine Jones | Medium

While every custody case is different, a growing number of advocates, attorneys, and child-welfare professionals say they are witnessing a troubling shift in courtrooms.

Family courts are becoming more contentious, more polarized and, in some cases, more harmful to the very children they were designed to protect.

A recent investigation by the South Florida Sun Sentinel examines four mothers who lost meaningful contact with their children despite never being found guilty of abuse or neglect. Some have gone years without seeing their children.

“Judges, attorneys, guardians and other court professionals have repeatedly used custody as a cudgel, according to some family court attorneys and advocates, punishing parents for their conduct by limiting their access to their children,” the South Florida Sun Sentinel writes.

However, stories of how mothers and children are treated in family court are not limited to the United States.

A recent report by the nonprofit organization Right to Equality, outlined in a new article in The Guardian, found what researchers described as “widespread and concerning evidence” of victim-blaming and bias in family court judgments in England and Wales.

The findings echo concerns raised by family court advocates in other countries as well.

“It’s definitely getting worse here in Australia,” says Janine Rees, a self-described “lived-experience advocate.” “We have absolutely no oversight here of family court. Judges have absolute power.”

Rees says she has seen similar patterns in her own work with mothers navigating the system.

She argues that domestic violence allegations are frequently minimized while mothers who raise concerns are portrayed as hostile or obstructive.

“Legal misogyny is at the core,” she says. “[It keeps] women in their place. How dare she leave? How dare she speak up?”

Source: Family Court Is Getting Worse, Advocates and Experts Warn | by Catherine Jones | Jun, 2026 | Medium

Violence against mothers | Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, its causes and consequences, Reem Alsalem

Summary

In the present report, submitted pursuant to the Human Rights Council resolution 50/7, the Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, its causes and consequences, Reem Alsalem, examines violence and discrimination faced by women and girls worldwide due to their status as mothers, and in connection with other grounds of discrimination. The Special Rapporteur offers recommendations on how to uphold international human rights obligations and ensure human rights-based responses.

Source: A/HRC/62/49 – a-hrc-62-49-aev-1-en.pdf