Domestic Violence

This week has been an important week for women and their children who have been, or are continuing to be, victims of domestic or family violence. I joined the parliamentary friendship group advocating an end to domestic and family violence this week, to hear the incredibly sad news that this year, in 2015, the statistics now tell us that we are having two women a week murdered by their partner or ex-partner in this country. I commend the co-chairs, including the member for Gellibrand, for their work in engaging with the sector and sharing the information that they are gleaning and the strategies that they are gleaning with the rest of the caucus.

We saw the HeForShe campaign also being part of the parliamentary week, at the International Women's Day breakfast. I would like to take a moment to congratulate the Andrews Victorian government on the initiation of the Royal Commission into Family Violence—long overdue but very welcome— and I would like to commend the call of the opposition leader, Bill Shorten, for a national summit and the federal parliamentary Labor Party for its commitment to the provision of funding that will end the scourge that is driven by a desire to control and born of gender inequity. There is much work to do. Women have waited long enough.