Ms BADGER (Lyons) – Today, 7 May, marks National Domestic Violence Remembrance Day. Outside Parliament House, earlier this evening, on the lawns in the rain, members of this place joined a candlelight vigil held by Engender Equality to remember those who have lost their lives to gendered violence. It is a time to reflect on how much more we must do – and urgently – to ensure the safety of women and children.
According to Femicide Watch, 24 women and seven children in Australia have been killed in gendered violence since the start of 2025. Shamefully, Tasmania has the highest number of people facing family, domestic and sexual violence in their own homes with the lowest investment per capita in prevention and support services in the country.
I am going to read into Hansard a family, domestic and sexual violence statement from a brave victim-survivor who is here with us in the Chamber today:
I’m a survivor of family violence. Before the abuse I was a strong, independent and well-known, respected member of my community. For 30 years I worked to save lives – swim teacher, lifeguard, volunteer, paramedic, first aid trainer. I had dreams of leading Surf Life Saving Tasmania. Then I met a man who dismantled everything I was.
Over four years, I was groomed, isolated, gaslit, beaten, raped and even strangled while eight months pregnant. His abuse escalated when I found out I was pregnant with our son. During our relationship, I witnessed him hurt his other children and our pets. After our son was born, the abuse escalated again. Then he reversed the narrative, smeared my name and discarded us.
In June 2023, the abuser was arrested and charged. A family violence order was granted to protect me but, due to a clerical error, my son’s name wasn’t included, a three-year old child left exposed. I’ve done everything that I can to have this corrected. I’ve spoken to the police services, lawyers. Nothing has changed. And so the man who abused us walks free without a monitoring bracelet. We’ve had to move more than five times. My dogs flinch at passing utes. I vomit from anxiety. I break teeth by grinding them in my sleep. I live in fear that the next time he’ll come for my son.
My son is the invisible victim of this violence. The system has failed him and it continues to. Why am I protected, but not my son? Why is a child in less need of protection? The offender, my son’s dad, displayed patterns of harming children, harming pets, harming his ex-wife and myself, an extensive coercive control of the whole family. So, there is undeniable evidence of a risk to my son. Why is he not protected? I am being supported by services such as SASS, family violence counselling, DECYP Tasmania, Engender Equality, BaptistCare, CatholicCare, and so many others. Each of these services echo with the same distressing point: the system is broken.
Even with changes to legislation, I have been told that we must wait for people in these professions to catch up to the changes. How many women and children are put at risk before they catch up? It seems we live in a system where the only way domestic violence is recognised is when something horrific or tragic happens. How many lives, women and children’s lives, have to be taken before something is done to deter perpetrator behaviour? Please, I beg you, fix this error. Protect my son. Don’t wait until tragedy strikes to act.
How is it that in Tasmania in 2025 this story is all too familiar, and that these distressing circumstances and systemic failures are faced repeatedly by Tasmanian women and children doing all in their power to simply create a safe life? How long must a mother and child live in fear because they are victims of both family violence and of an underfunded, no longer fit‑for‑purpose system? It is a system that should be protecting them, not increasing fear and prolonging an unsafe living situation. In courts, FVOs can be altered to include the protection of children, but these systems are lengthy, they are unpredictable, and they are too often weaponised.
We should not only see serious action after a victim has lost their voice. If we listen and act now, we can learn and fix systemic failures commonly faced. We should be proactive on systemic and legislative overhaul. There must be appropriate training and accountability for decision‑makers. We must be doing all in our power to create a fairer, safer and kinder Tasmania, and indeed Australia, every day.
Members – Hear, hear.
The SPEAKER – Well said, Ms Badger.
