Queensland establishes state’s first sexual violence peak body, with hopes it will bring victim-survivors’ voices to ‘hallways of power’ – ABC News

All entries on Feminist Legal Clinic’s News Digest Blog are extracts from news articles and other publications, with the source available at the link at the bottom. The content is not generated by Feminist Legal Clinic and does not necessarily reflect our views.

Advocates are hopeful the establishment of Queensland’s first peak body for sexual violence will encourage more victim-survivors to come forward “over time”.

On Thursday, the state government announced it would set up the service, which is only the second of its kind in the country, similar to one in Victoria.

The peak body is intended to represent the collective interests of the sexual violence support sector.

It comes amid data showing reported sexual assaults hit a 32-year high in Queensland in 2024, up 11 per cent on the previous year.

Establishing a peak body was a recommendation of the former Labor government’s Women’s Safety and Justice Taskforce, an independent taskforce which was set up in 2021 and released two reports in 2022.

Source: Queensland establishes state’s first sexual violence peak body, with hopes it will bring victim-survivors’ voices to ‘hallways of power’ – ABC News

Man fined $340,000 for deepfake pornography of prominent Australian women in first-of-its-kind case | Deepfake | The Guardian

All entries on Feminist Legal Clinic’s News Digest Blog are extracts from news articles and other publications, with the source available at the link at the bottom. The content is not generated by Feminist Legal Clinic and does not necessarily reflect our views.

A man who posted deepfake pornographic images of prominent Australian women has been slapped with a hefty fine as a “strong message” in a first-of-its-kind case.

The federal court ordered Anthony Rotondo, also known as Antonio, to pay a $343,500 penalty plus costs on Friday after the online regulator eSafety Commissioner brought a case against him almost two years ago.

Rotondo admitted to posting the images on a website called MrDeepFakes.com, which has since been shut down.

Source: Man fined $340,000 for deepfake pornography of prominent Australian women in first-of-its-kind case | Deepfake | The Guardian

NSW Police can monitor phones of DV offenders under new protections for victim-survivors – ABC News (from 29/9/25)

All entries on Feminist Legal Clinic’s News Digest Blog are extracts from news articles and other publications, with the source available at the link at the bottom. The content is not generated by Feminist Legal Clinic and does not necessarily reflect our views.

NSW courts can now issue a new type of protection order against domestic violence offenders.

Under the scheme, courts can order that perpetrators be subjected to phone monitoring by police.

The NSW government says it has invested $9.3 million into the scheme.

The orders can allow police to monitor an offender’s phone and download its contents in real time.

Domestic violence perpetrators can also be ordered to notify police if they open dating profiles or enter into new relationships.

[Ed: I do not recall any women’s groups agitating for this and considering that these DV laws are often being weaponised against female victims, I am not even sure these provisions are benevolent. Furthermore, inexplicably we still do not have a functional Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme which would play a more vital preventative role in helping women avoid forming relationships with these men in the first place.]

Source: NSW Police can monitor phones of DV offenders under new protections for victim-survivors – ABC News

Schoolchildren as young as 11 are being asked in poll part-funded by taxpayers and Andy Burnham’s office: Are you pansexual? | Daily Mail Online

All entries on Feminist Legal Clinic’s News Digest Blog are extracts from news articles and other publications, with the source available at the link at the bottom. The content is not generated by Feminist Legal Clinic and does not necessarily reflect our views.

Children as young as 11 are being asked if they are transgender, non-binary or pansexual in a study part-funded by taxpayers and Andy Burnham’s office.

The #BeeWell survey is a Manchester University project to assess wellbeing in youngsters, covering topics such as mental health, eating habits and engagement with school.

However, the questionnaire distributed to secondary school pupils also asks them about their ‘gender identity’ and sexuality.

[C]ritics fear that it is part of the normalisation of contested gender ideology in schools.

In July, the Government updated its relationships, sex and health education guidance to say schools ‘should not teach as fact that all people have a gender identity’.

Stephanie Davies-Arai, of the campaign group Transgender Trend, said: ‘Inviting children to select the category “girl (including trans girl)” is blatant indoctrination of children to believe the trans-activist propaganda trans women are women.’

Source: Schoolchildren as young as 11 are being asked in poll part-funded by taxpayers and Andy Burnham’s office: Are you pansexual? | Daily Mail Online

Fundraiser for K K by Haleigh halcoop : ” Escaping torture and forced to return to it “

I am reaching out with an urgent and heartfelt plea for support. We are in desperate need of funds to secure the best possible legal representation for my cousin, Kimberley and her 2 year-old son who are in a critical and deeply distressing state due to being forced back to a country where they don’t belong. Banished from their home country back to a life where they are at extreme risk of harm.
Kimberley is the devoted mother to her son who was born in England in 2023. Kimberley (also a British citizen), fled with her son from her ex-partners country of origin to the UK, to escape a long-standing and severe history of domestic abuse at the hands of her ex-partner—her son’s father. They had lived in her ex’s home country for only 21 days before escaping for their safety. Yet, the courts have ruled that they must return to the father’s home country as he did not authorise their escape.

Source: Fundraiser for K K by Haleigh halcoop : ” Escaping torture and forced to return to it “

Democracy in denial: How excluding women’s groups from consultation produces bad law

All entries on Feminist Legal Clinic’s News Digest Blog are extracts from news articles and other publications, with the source available at the link at the bottom. The content is not generated by Feminist Legal Clinic and does not necessarily reflect our views.

Across Australia, governments are enacting legislation that profoundly affects women’s rights whilst systematically excluding us from meaningful participation in consultation. This not only violates Australia’s international obligations but produces legislation that serves commercial and other interests rather than protects women and girls.

The NSW Equality Legislation Amendment (LGBTIQA+) Bill 2023 clearly exemplifies how restricted stakeholder selection predetermines outcomes. The Committee on Community Services invited selected stakeholders to make submissions on the bill, with the majority representing only one side of the debate on matters affecting women and girls.

And despite acknowledging substantial public interest in the bill, the Committee constrained feedback to an online survey (which, in the end, showed 85.13% of respondents opposed to the bill) allowing only Likert-scale responses, with no prose-based submissions — all while the bill proposed to amend 20 Acts in a single omnibus hit. Tick-a-box consultation fails to meet the democratic participation standards Australia has committed to uphold.

Excluding women from consultation on laws that affect us violates Australia’s international human rights obligations and produces harmful legislation. Women’s meaningful democratic participation requires more than tokenism or curated stakeholder lists: it demands genuine engagement with women’s advocacy groups, including those of us who scrutinise commercial interests and challenge industry narratives. Until governments honour CEDAW Article 7 and implement meaningful consultative processes with groups such as AAWAA, commercial capture will persist, harmful laws will follow, and Australia’s signature on international human rights instruments will be meaningless.

Source: Democracy in denial: How excluding women’s groups from consultation produces bad law

Hampstead Heath swimming ponds considering limiting transgender users’ access | Transgender | The Guardian

All entries on Feminist Legal Clinic’s News Digest Blog are extracts from news articles and other publications, with the source available at the link at the bottom. The content is not generated by Feminist Legal Clinic and does not necessarily reflect our views.

A consultation has been launched on transgender swimmers’ access to Hampstead Heath ponds, which could result in them being banned from using the pools for the gender they identify as.

The Kenwood Ladies’ and Highgate Men’s ponds are gender-segregated, with trans people currently able to swim in whichever they feel most appropriate, or use the heath’s mixed-gender pond instead.

The consultation, by the City of London Corporation (CLC), is now presenting six options for gender inclusivity in the historic institution, one of which would ban trans people from using their preferred ponds.

It comes amid a battle between groups who swim in the natural pools, with a protest in 2018 in the men’s pond by women wearing fake moustaches and beards to draw attention to the organisation’s refusal to ban trans women from the ladies’ pond.

While this was unsuccessful, the Kenwood Ladies’ Pond Association (KLPA) rejecting a motion among its 200 members last year that “only those born female in sex can use the pond”, pressure has since mounted after the supreme court ruled earlier this year that trans women were not legally defined as women.

The consultation appears to have come in response to threatened legal action by the campaign group Sex Matters.

Source: Hampstead Heath swimming ponds considering limiting transgender users’ access | Transgender | The Guardian

Jacinta Allan’s trans activism is a betrayal of women | Julie Bindel | The Australian

All entries on Feminist Legal Clinic’s News Digest Blog are extracts from news articles and other publications, with the source available at the link at the bottom. The content is not generated by Feminist Legal Clinic and does not necessarily reflect our views.

To those of us in the UK who have been vigorously – and effectively – fighting back against the harms of transgender ideology, Australia is a laughing stock.
As a lifelong feminist campaigner against male violence towards women and girls, to me one thing is crystal clear: there is a special place in hell reserved for privileged women who should know better but who still betray other women.
Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan is a full-blown trans activist who has swallowed the ideology whole. Allan endorses the indoctrination of schoolchildren into the gender cult and the dissemina­tion of the dangerous lie that “trans children” are at a much higher risk of taking their own lives. She also has accused this newspaper of causing hurt and harm.
And now the latest scandal. In Victoria, a 25-year-old man who sexually abused his five-year-old daughter is being held in a state correctional facility for women because he identifies as female. Inevitably, Allan is an avid supporter of placing dangerous male sex offenders in the women’s prison estate.
Since setting up the UK feminist law reform organisation Justice for Women in 1990, I have gained decades of experience working on the issue of women in prison, and there can be no doubt that the vast majority of them, whatever their conviction, have been victims of child sexual abuse, domestic violence and rape.
Whatever crimes they have committed, these women are the most vulnerable. Being locked up alongside male guards is bad enough – and feminists have been campaigning against this since the 1980s – but being incarcerated alongside male child sex offenders claiming to be women is another level of horror.
When it comes to the safety of women and children, both the Australian media and the Premier display an unholy mix of general complacency and wilful neglect. Shame on them.

Source: Jacinta Allan’s trans activism is a betrayal of women

Behind closed doors: Gender Identity Ideology in the EU – YouTube

‘Extraordinary leniency’: Outrage over trans pedophile’s 2½-year sentence | The Australian

All entries on Feminist Legal Clinic’s News Digest Blog are extracts from news articles and other publications, with the source available at the link at the bottom. The content is not generated by Feminist Legal Clinic and does not necessarily reflect our views.

The Victorian government is facing demands to review sentencing policies after a father who sexually abused his five-year-old daughter was given a minimum jail term of just two and half years, with the judge accepting that his transition to being a woman reduced his “moral culpability”.

Ms Allan has refused to make any public comment about Maloney, who was arrested after he agreed to become the “slave” of American pedophile Sam Booth, and molest his daughter on camera for the sexual gratification of his “master”.
Women’s groups have slammed the “extraordinary leniency” granted to Maloney by Victorian County Court judge Nola Karapanagiotidis, who accepted when sentencing him that “given Booth’s manipulation and coercion, and your vulnerabilities, you were much less able to make objectively the right and healthy choices”.
Judge Karapanagiotidis also took into consideration that “you will face additional hardship in prison as a relatively young trans woman and that you will struggle considerably, more so with prison life than the average inmate”.
The judge noted that Dr Darjee considered Maloney was “highly unlikely to commit a further sexual offence, unless she finds herself in a similar situation, being pressured or coerced by a man”.
The Australian asked Ms Allan whether she would review sentencing guidelines in claims by sex offenders that their “moral culpability” may be reduced by reason of their gender transition.

Source: ‘Extraordinary leniency’: Outrage over trans pedophile’s 2½-year sentence