Safety plan targets men
MEN’S “dominant masculinity” will be targeted in the next 10-year national plan for women’s safety, as domestic violence groups demand more safe housing for victims.
Australia’s first Women’s Safety Summit has called on governments to “prioritise working with men and boys’’ to stop and prevent violence against women and children.
“Dominant forms of masculinity’’ must be stamped out of homes, schools and workplaces in the next national
plan, the summit’s 400 delegates have stated in a 12-page communique released after the summit this week.
“Addressing men’s violence against women and children must be targeted across all settings, including work, education, public, institutional and other community spaces, as well as at home,” it states.
“This must include prevention work addressing dominant forms of masculinity, rigid gender stereotyping and male peer relations based on aggression.”
The two-day summit – called after former federal government staffer Brittany Higgins went public with allegations she was raped by a colleague inside Parliament House in 2019 – ended in acrimony this week. Australian of the Year Grace Tame, who was groomed as a schoolgirl and raped by a paedophile maths teacher, blasted Prime Minister Scott Morrison for using his opening speech to “appropriate” women’s private disclosures of sexual assault.
The ensuing media storm stole the spotlight from discussion about safe housing, better support for children suffering domestic violence, and a crackdown on technological abuse.
Mr Morrison signalled that men’s behaviour would be given more attention in the next 10-year national plan for women’s safety.
“I don’t believe we can talk about women’s safety without talking about men,” he told the summit. “About the way some men think they own women, about the way women are subjected to disrespect, coercion, and violence.”
The safety summit called on governments to “stop violence before it starts”, by helping perpetrators deal with alcohol and drug abuse, or brain injury that can “influence violent behaviours”.
Noting that gender equality is “key to preventing violence”, it called for reforms to parental leave and superannuation rules, better income support, childcare access and more support for older women who are most at risk of financial insecurity. The summit sought special support for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women subjected to “abhorrent family violence”.
The federal government provided $1.1bn for women’s safety in this year’s budget, and will develop the next national safety plan by June next year.